Dawn DiBlasi marched into the McDonald’s restaurant on Main Street in Waterville 50 years ago and demanded to see the manager.

“I need a job and my sister does, too!” she declared.

DiBlasi was 15. Her sister, LouAnn, was 16. DiBlasi wouldn’t take no for an answer. The manager hired them on the spot, and they were to be paid less than $2 an hour.

“We didn’t even fill out an application,” LouAnn, now 66, recalled.

DiBlasi, 64, worked there seven years, but LouAnn, now LouAnn Lindie, stayed longer. Much longer. Fifty years, in fact.

On Tuesday, she was feted by restaurant officials for her longevity and dedication. They hung red and yellow balloons, the eatery’s signature colors, and presented her with a red, white and yellow McDonald’s crew jacket. The restaurant’s local owner-operator, Ron Lydick, gave her a big hug.

“This is a gift that represents one-in-eight,” he said. “One in eight Americans at some point has worked at a McDonald’s restaurant.”

DiBlasi, an attorney and former Somerset County administrator and Skowhegan town manager, sat beside her sister as they sought to answer a question about how many burgers Lindie has flipped over 50 years. DiBlasi, the more assertive of the two, said it was a lot.

“When we first started, she could flip 72 burgers on the grill before the timer went off,” she said. “The timer was set for one minute. I think she’s probably flipped a million burgers in 50 years.”

Of course, the technology changed over the years and workers no longer flip burgers, which are cooked on both sides with automated equipment, they said.

“I started as a crew person, which means I started on doing french fries for a little bit, then I was waiting on customers and then I had the grill area,” Lindie said. “I wanted to learn everything right off. I just liked to learn, like a sponge, back then.”

Workers back then had to add up the cost of menu items using paper and pencil and issue the customer a total, she said.

“We didn’t have all these registers. We had to remember all the prices, the taxes. I loved it. I liked to stay busy, liked the hustle and the people.”

Now the restaurant’s breakfast manager, Lindie arrives at the restaurant three days a week at 3:30 a.m., makes sure the lobby is clean and even helps unload trucks. Two days a week she arrives at 2:30 a.m. When she first started, she worked 5 a.m. to 1 p.m. She has trained thousands of employees over the years.

“Life went on and I said you know what? I’m really enjoying what I’m doing and it really fits my life. I had two children and it was a good schedule, so I stayed.”

Lindie has been married 47 years to Michael Lindie, and they have two grown children. Michael did maintenance at the McDonald’s a few years before going to work at what was then Scott Paper Co. in Winslow, she said.

The DiBlasi family moved to Maine from Massachusetts when the girls were pre-teens. McDonald’s, at 336 Main St., was built in the 1970s and the family lived across the street for a time.

“My sister and I came here before school and got an almond danish,” DiBlasi recalled. “After we started working here, she and I and two other people were the first to ever work inside a drive-thru. This McDonald’s had the first drive-thru in the state of Maine.”

Their brother, Sam, of Unity, also was in the food industry years ago, working as a chef at the nearby former Bonanza restaurant at Elm Plaza and at The Silent Woman on Kennedy Memorial Drive.

Serving customers was a lot different at McDonald’s 50 years ago, Lindie said.

“Now, we have Door Dash, we have mobile orders, we have curbside orders, kiosks,” she said. “We’re a lot faster. We have a larger menu, too.”

That menu includes pancakes and English muffins, which Lindie says she often has for breakfast.

“They’re really good. I don’t eat eggs. I’m a picky eater. I drink hot tea.”

She remembered a former boss named George Starkey who was very kind, and surprised her one day.

“It was my 18th birthday and I came to work and he made my day incredibly special. Every freezer, every refrigerator, every walk-in I opened had birthday signs and balloons. He just went all out and I will never forget it. We became really good friends.”

A group of gentlemen known as the Old Geezers meet at the restaurant every day for coffee and Lindie takes special care of them. The group gave her a card recently with $50 in it to celebrate her 50 years at the restaurant. One of the group’s members, state Sen. Scott Cyrway, R-District 16, joined McDonald’s officials Tuesday to celebrate Lindie.

“Every time I come in, if she sees anything out of place, she’ll come right over and take care of it,” Cyrway said. “She says, ‘Is there anything I can get for you?’ The group members all love her.”

Owner Lydick described Lindie as sincere, down-to-earth and committed to the crew.

“It’s fun to watch someone with that amount of commitment and dedication,” he said.

Her sister, DiBlasi, insisted McDonald’s is lucky to have had her for 50 years.

“I’m very proud of my sister,” she said.

Amy Calder has been a Morning Sentinel reporter 37 years. Her columns appear here Sundays. She is the author of the book, “Comfort is an Old Barn,” a collection of her curated columns, published in 2023 by Islandport Press. She may be reached at [email protected]. For previous Reporting Aside columns, go to centralmaine.com.