Single Mom Falls in Love with Customer at Her Fast Food Job. Decades Later, She Tells Their Love Story (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Connie Claxton.Photo:Courtesy of Whataburger

Courtesy of Whataburger

Connie Claxton, 83, of Forney, retired from Whataburger on Aug. 14 after 54 years of service. During her long tenure, she has worked at Whataburger’s 10 locations in the Lone Star State.

In an interview shortly after her retirement, Connie tells PEOPLE that she misses the place. The people, most of all.

“I miss the customers,” she says. “I had some good relations with a lot of friends I made — the customers and the employees. I miss them also.”

Connie had contemplated retirement before she finally stepped away. “I’ll be 84 before too long and I have several health issues, and so it was a time where I just felt like it was time to give it up."

Connie Claxton.Courtesy of Whataburger

“I just wasn’t making anything,” she says.

Then one Friday night, she ate at a Whataburger restaurant and really enjoyed the meal. “At the time I was living real close to [the restaurant],” Claxton now recalls. “And I thought, man, this would be so much easier and better for me to do. I thought, well, I could be doing this. And so I quit my job and I went to work for Whataburger.”

She started as a cashier and later worked her way up to become general manager at the chain’s Terrell location, where she has served the longest.

It was at the restaurant in Terrell where she met Glenn Claxton, a businessman (he owned drive-in grocery stores). Like Whataburger, he changed Connie’s life forever.

“He used to come in quite frequently,” she says, “and he had a special needs son [named Ronnie] who would always be with him. They would stop there to eat, and he would always so kind to that boy. I thought, ‘Man, he must be wonderful.’ We’d chitchat across the counter. And that went on for a good while.”

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Connie calls it love at first sight. “Then finally, one Friday evening, he asked if he could take me to dinner. Oh, I was so excited," she says. “He said I was the first lady who ever blushed.”

A relationship soon blossomed. Connie and Glenn shared their Christian faith, and the couple attended church together. About 10 months later, Connie returned to her home state of North Dakota to spend some time there and the thought of marriage entered her mind.

“[But] he never would approach me on it,” she says.” “He said, ‘We’ll decide what we’re going to do [when I came back].’ Well, when I came back, he asked me to marry him.”

Connie and Glenn got hitched in July 1983. They were together for 30 years, until Glenn died in 2013 following health issues; his son Ronnie, Connie’s stepson, died of health issues, at age 52, before his dad.

“We had a wonderful life together,” Connie says of Glenn. “He was a blessing beyond a blessing to me.”

Connie Claxton with her late husband Glenn Claxton.Courtesy of Whataburger

“He was the kindest person I’ve ever in my life met,” she says of her late husband. “And he loved the Lord better than anything in the world. And he loved me, but he loved the Lord and he loved his son. And so we had many good times together because we both had the same beliefs.”

In addition to Glenn, Connie says she has other special memories from her time at Whataburger, particularly the kindness of John Heiman, the company’s owner.

“On one occasion when I was really down and out, I was at the office and he met me at the car and said he had something for me. He was a very frugal person, so he wasn’t one to just give away something for nothing, but he said he had something for me,” Connie says. “I opened it up and it was a check, and I said, ‘What is this for?' And he said, ‘It’s for doing a good job.’ I’ll never forget that day.”

Connie remembers another fond moment, after she was diagnosed with breast cancer about 10 years ago but still needed the normalcy of being able to get out of the house and go to work.

“Mr. Heiman’s wife called me at home and she said, ‘What can we do to help you?' And I said, ‘Don’t take me off the [work] schedule.’ She said, ‘Oh, [we’d] never do that.’ I never will forget those words.”

The Whataburger company celebrated Connie’s retirement on Aug. 16, two days after her last shift.

Her friends and customers attended the event and she received cards and gifts. Outside of spending time with her church friends, Connie says she has no desire to travel and would rather stay home in Forney during her retirement.

In addition to being a mother to her two sons, she is also a grandmother and great-grandmother.

“Deep down, I’m very thankful,” she says of her decades at Whataburger. “I’ve been very blessed that they’ve always taken good care of me. We all have our bad days, but I had many more good days. I made a lot of friends and acquaintances. Overall, I just am so thankful that I was able to be here as long as I was.”

source: people.com