Customers filled the Hangchow Chinese Restaurant in North Bend Aug. 31, the last day the landmark restaurant was open for business.

“We thought we would stay here longer,” said co-owner Sue Chen. She and her father Leung Chen have owned the restaurant since buying it from original owner Kwok Louie in 2002.

Now, they must move out within the next 10 days. Sue said they will sell what they can of the furnishings and equipment but will have to pay to have the rest hauled away. Their lease expired and their bid to purchase the building was not accepted, Sue said.

“We have to leave,” she said. “We were ready to purchase the building but [it didn’t happen.]”

Instead, North Bend Realtor David Cook and his wife Lisa made the winning bid to buy the building. They will announce their plans for the structure in September, David Cook said.

Sue and her family will move back to Chicago, where her parents are buying an established grocery market from a retiring acquaintance. They considered opening another restaurant in the Seattle area, but the highly competitive market prompted the family to seek a business opportunity that has a higher chance of success, Sue said. Moving to Chicago will also place them closer to other family members who live there, she said.

Hangchow neighbor Melissa Morrison said she is sad to see the Chens leave. Though she doesn’t work at the Hangchow, on its last night, she helped staff the busy restaurant. Helping is what neighbors do, she explained. Morrison recalled how Leung Chen once climbed up the fruit tree in her yard behind the restaurant and tossed apricots down to his wife and daughter.

“It was so cute,” Morrison said. She said she’ll miss her visits with them and wishes they had been able to stay.

Many longtime customers also will miss the Chens and the restaurant many have frequented for years. Sue said some customers came almost every day. Aaron Hite, who’s lived in North Bend almost as long as the Hangchow has been there, said he had to come during the business’ last days.

“How could you not come by a place that has been from your childhood that’s very important?” Hite said. “I’m going to miss it.”

For his last Hangchow meal, Hite ordered almond chicken and special fried rice.

Dozens of patrons packed the restaurant on its last evening open, filling the deep red and black-colored dining room and the adjacent Dragon’s Den lounge and ordering their favorite entrees. One man wore a hand-lettered shirt that read “Farewell Hangchow we love you.”

Some patrons had come since the restaurant’s early years.

Louie – along with business partners Hong Wang and Bor Chan – opened the restaurant Aug. 14, 1972. It was located in the old bank building built in 1917. It was the first building in North Bend to adopt the Bavarian style theme that was part of a downtown revitalization project in the early 1970s.

The Hangchow was the Valley’s first Chinese restaurant. Valley residents proved to be hungry for Chinese food. Soon after opening, lines to get in snaked out the door onto the sidewalk, Louis recalled when he retired at the end of 2001 to move back to China with his wife. He had earlier bought out his two business partners and created the lounge in a former barbershop next door.

The Chens, who moved to the United States from Hong Kong, heard about Louis’ retirement from their home in Portland, Ore., and bought the business. They’d moved from Chicago to the West Coast a few years before.

The Chens kept the name, decor and much of the menu when they took over.

“I just want to thank people for their support and say goodbye to people,” Sue said.