Murray’s, beloved Westport ice cream shop, has closed permanently
The terrible news just keeps coming this year, and this time it’s almost cruel. We learned this morning that Murray’s Homemade Ice Creams (4120 Pennsylvania Avenue), a 32-year midtown destination (which this year once again earned the top slot for ice cream in The Pitch‘s Best of Kansas City readers’ poll), has closed. Not just for the season, as usual, but permanently.
The shop shutters each winter for a few months, and all indications had led us to believe that this year would be no different. The end-of-season sale went down as usual early in December, and a sign on the door told the ice cream faithful to expect the usual reopening in March. But the shop’s equipment — everything from the espresso machines to the walk-in freezer to the waffle-cone maker to the neon signs — has just been listed for auction on Equip-Bid’s website.
Owner Murray Nixon is not at the shop to take calls, but auctioneer Travis Faith, from Equip-Bid, says that, for Nixon anyway, the closure isn’t about something awful.
“[She] is just retiring now — she’s just ready to be done. She is in good health,” he tells The Pitch. He also indicates that her shop is in remarkable condition, and that she took an extraordinary level of care of her equipment, which he said is all original from when Nixon opened the shop in 1984.
“She kept it all in brand-new condition. It is amazing. Everything is so clean, I can’t believe it.”
The shop’s voice mail still says, “See you sometime in March.” If I’d only known, I’d have stood in line a few weeks ago to stock up on One Drunk Monk.
