Owner who spent more than 75 years working at Greeley, Colorado’s famous JB’s Drive-In has died
Jun 16, 2026, 4:39 PM
If there was a “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” type show just for Colorado, JB’s Drive-In in Greeley would be the cover model. The famous drive-in is mourning the loss of one of its matriarch.
Geneva Clark, who spent more than 75 years behind the counter at JB’s — breading shrimp, baking pies, keeping the books and refusing to give up the secret recipe — died Saturday, June 6, at Swedish HCA Health One after suffering a fall. She was 88.
Clark was born in Denver on Jan. 4, 1938, but was raised in Greeley, where her father, Jess Benjamin “JB” Taylor, had opened the drive-in at the corner of 8th Avenue and 25th Street in 1937. She started working there at 12 years old and never really stopped. She graduated from Greeley High in 1956 and earned a nursing scholarship to CU, but eczema kept her from attending. She went to work at First National Bank of Greeley before returning to the family restaurant for good. She and her husband, Clarence Clark, took over ownership and renamed it JB’s in honor of her father. Clarence died in February 2015.
The Denver Post once called Geneva the restaurant’s “heart and its brains.” She made 12 gallons of French dressing at a time, 40 gallons of tartar sauce a week, and pies every Monday — even on Labor Day. She hand-breaded the shrimp that made JB’s famous and kept the recipe locked in her head. When the Greeley Tribune profiled the restaurant’s 80th anniversary in 2017, Geneva was still working 16-hour days, even after a double knee replacement that left her with a limp. Asked about her legacy, she didn’t linger on it: “We just get up, we come to work, we go home and go to bed.”
The Clarks put more than 120 kids through college by employing them at the restaurant through high school and welcoming them back during breaks.
Son Rod Clark had been handling day-to-day operations in recent years, ultimately closing the drive-in during the pandemic and putting a food truck in it’s parking lot, with a handful of JB’s favorites available.
Services are being handled by Young’s Funeral Home in Johnstown.
