A Tangier Island landmark is for sale outside the owners’ family for the first time in 75 years.

Hilda Crockett’s Chesapeake House was listed for sale for $389,000 on May 28 with real estate broker Long Foster of Onancock.

Hilda Crockett opened the restaurant in 1939 and her name is still attached to it four decades after her death.

The Chesapeake House, which also provides lodging, has long been a favored dining destination for tourists arriving on Tangier via ferry from both the western and Eastern Shores of Virginia, as well as from Crisfield, Maryland.

The establishment serves as many as 300 customers a day at long tables where strangers sit together and eat, often getting up from the hearty meal as new friends.

Open from mid-April to October, the Chesapeake House is known for its family-style service of island specialties, including its crab cakes and clam fritters.

Rounding out the all-you-can-eat menu, which hasn’t changed much since the restaurant opened, are baked ham, corn pudding, green beans, potato salad, coleslaw, pickled beets, homemade rolls and iced tea, with pound cake for dessert.

The Chesapeake House in addition to being a restaurant also is a bed-and-breakfast, with eight rooms for rent. The 1920 property includes two houses across the street from each other on Main Ridge Road.

Owners Dennis and Glenna Crockett bought the restaurant in 2003 from Hilda Crockett’s daughters and knew the founder personally. Dennis Crockett was the island school’s principal for 21 years before he retired in 2005.

cvvaughn@dmg.gannett.com

757-787-1200, ext. 115

On Twitter @cvvaughnESN