There was a paper place mat laid out in front of me, and the first words on the paper read: “You are dining at the oldest Italian restaurant in America.”
As I continued to read on, I learned that Francesco Dispigno and his wife, Catherine, immigrated to the US from Naples, Italy, in 1893. They settled in an Italian neighborhood in Philadelphia and opened the country’s first Italian restaurant in 1900, naming it after their son, Ralph.
Over 120 years later, the restaurant is now run by the fourth generation of Dispignos and operates out of the same building. Throughout the years, notables like Taylor Swift, Frank Sinatra, Patti LaBelle, and many others have all dined at Ralph’s. According to the restaurant, President Joe Biden was even a frequent visitor when he was a senator — and I quickly learned why.
I started to feel embarrassed for prejudging the restaurant and now felt lucky to even have scored a reservation at this historic restaurant.
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