Gino's Hamburgers was a fast-food restaurant chain founded in Baltimore, Maryland by Baltimore Colts defensive end Gino Marchetti and running back Alan Ameche, along with their close friends Joe Campanella, who played linebacker for six seasons for the Cleveland Browns and the Baltimore Colts and Louis Fischer, in 1957. A new group of restaurants under the Gino's name, involving some of the principals of the original chain, was started in 2010. Campanella left the group in 1963 and started his own restaurant, Rustler Steak House.
History
The first Gino's was opened in Dundalk, Maryland, just outside Baltimore; it got its official name in 1959 when the owners Joe Campanella, Louis Fischer, and Alan Ameche invited Colts' captain Gino Marchetti to become a partner. In 1967 Gino's merged with Tops Drive Inn, a chain of 18 drive-in restaurants located in the Washington, D.C., area; most Tops locations were rebranded as Gino's.[1] In the early 1970s, the company attempted to expand from its Mid-Atlantic base into the Midwest; however, these locations only operated for a short period. For one location, it purchased Orchestra Hall in Detroit and planned to demolish the structure to construct a restaurant. When the plan became public, it led to a grass-roots campaign to save and restore the abandoned structure.[2]