Story by Brooke Elliott
Graphic by Olivia Goodson
More than 65 years ago, Walter Hilliard Greene played with members of the UNC-Chapel Hill basketball team that won the NCAA Division I championship.
Greene, 96, no longer plays for crowds of fans. Instead, he welcomes crowds of people as a restaurant greeter in Raleigh’s most famous steakhouse, and he couldn’t be happier.
“I questioned whether or not I would be able to carry on a conversation with people, when I had no idea who they were,” he said, “or sit at the door and repeat myself over and over. ‘Welcome to Angus Barn, have a good evening, good night.’ But that really comes easy.”
Greene was born Sept. 11, 1928, making him older than the discovery of penicillin and the creation of Mickey Mouse. A prophetic July 1947 issue of the Zebulon Record, his hometown’s newspaper, describes a 19-year-old Greene as “quite an athlete, having been high-scorer for the Wakelon Bulldogs basketball team for two years.” He turned down a basketball scholarship from Presbyterian College to serve out his printer’s apprenticeship, but was later convinced to attend Chapel Hill on a full-ride scholarship by star player Lennie Rosenbluth and coach Frank McGuire.
A man who played basketball with legends like Rosenbluth, Tommy Kearns, and Joe Quigg — and later became vice president at the Commercial Printing Company of Raleigh — had every reason to sit back and enjoy his retirement. He spent most of his time with his family, his beloved choir at First Presbyterian Church in Raleigh, and woodworking in his home’s private shop. But when Greene’s wife passed away in 2019, he was left alone in his house; and in his own words, he had nothing to do and was tired of talking to himself. He needed an outlet, and that outlet came when the owners of his favorite restaurant asked him to build new tables for their lounge.
“He would be sitting there, after he built the tables; everybody would walk in, and he would just say hello like he worked here,” Angus Barn co-owner Steve Thanhauser said. “I mean, the man does not know a stranger. He is one of the kindest, most sincere, most thoughtful people I’ve ever met in my whole life. And we decided, you know what? If Walmart could have a greeter, why couldn’t we have the greatest greeter on the entire planet?”
The Angus Barn is one of Raleigh’s busiest restaurants, especially as the winter holidays draw near. The elaborate process of decorating the steakhouse for Christmas begins in mid-October and ends in December, and according to both Greene and Thanhauser, every possible reservation from mid-November through February was booked back in January 2024. “Hectic” doesn’t even begin to describe an evening for the cooks, staff, and coordinators who keep the front and back-of-house running every night.
Despite this, Greene is always happy to talk to guests, engaging with all of them as personally as he would his friends. Greene joked that many customers mistake him for the owner of the restaurant; Thanhauser said it’s because Greene has the ability to make any customer feel like “the most important person in the world.” Ali Thanhauser, Steve’s daughter and a member of the Angus Barn management team, appreciates Greene’s sincere and joyful presence in the restaurant and in their life.
“We live in such a fast-paced world, where people are just talking to get something out of you, or just looking to tell you something rather than to listen,” Ali Thanhauser said. “But he just wants to hear about your life, and what you’ve learned, and what we can teach each other.”
Greene is a “walking encyclopedia for Carolina basketball,” according to Steve; he has a wealth of stories about iconic figures like Dean Smith and Roy Williams. While he works only on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, he’s always there to greet the current UNC basketball team when they arrive for their annual holiday dinner. Greene is a living legend for a current generation of players, but he’s much more interested in listening to others than sharing information about himself.
In fact, you might not even know Greene’s basketball bonafides if you didn’t ask about it explicitly. Sarah Versace — who worked hospitality with him as a teenager and young adult before moving to bussing — had no idea that she’s the coworker of a former UNC basketball star until her interview in early October.
“What? Mr. Greene, really? Oh, I’m going to have to say something to him this weekend,” she said. “We have the Carolina basketball team come in and eat every year, and they always stop and talk to him. I honestly didn’t put it together, but now it makes total sense — even the coach would stop and say hi!”
As a nonagenarian, Greene isn’t quite as agile as he was during his days at UNC; the other employees of Angus Barn make sure he has a clear path to get inside with his walker and a comfortable place to sit and greet guests. The steakhouse valets make sure his car is waiting right outside for him at the end of the day. Greene joked that he’s not sure why people treat him so well, but ask anyone on staff, and they’ll tell you how much they love him; Versace called him “ the sweetest and most wholesome guy [she’s] ever met.” The owners and employees of Angus Barn are happy to help Greene when he needs it, and he’s grateful for the consideration his coworkers show every time he arrives for his shift.
“I used to make fun of that ad, ‘I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up.’ Believe me, that ain’t nothing to make fun of, because when you get my age, you fall,” Greene said. “The only way you’re going to get up is if somebody is there to pick you up. But it has been a wonderful, wonderful life.”
At the Angus Barn, someone is always there for Greene, whether it be a coworker, the Thanhausers, or any of the customers who love to see him at the door. He takes care to remember the first names of his fellow staff members, though he admits he knows only the surnames of the owners; he knows about 50 people on the staff, and has their names written on a list he’s kept since he started working. He knows the regular customers, too, and was even there to greet them during the limited hours of operation caused by COVID in 2020.
“It’s his sincerity that makes him so incredibly special,” Steve Thanhauser said. “You know, it’s one thing to do your job. It’s another thing to do it with joy and exuberance and thoughtfulness. And that’s Mr. Greene, a hundred percent.”
Greene plans to work as long as he’s able, and he plans to live for a while yet. He has three sons — Mark, David, and John Greene — who help him navigate his day-to-day life, whether they’re checking in on him, buying his groceries, or driving him to see his grandchildren and other loved ones. John, who also played college basketball for UNC-Chapel Hill, just welcomed a grandson, making Hilliard Greene a great grandfather. He wryly remarked he’s determined to be around to celebrate the boy’s 6th birthday in 2030; at that time, he’ll be 102 years old. Greene said he’s proud to be a Tar Heel, proud to work at Angus Barn, proud of the choir at First Presbyterian he sang with for 63 years, and most proud of his family.
“If there’s such a thing as loving everybody, I’m kind of one of those people where I probably have enemies, but I don’t know it,” Greene said. “And there’s this freedom to talk to people, to welcome them to a place that I know they’re going to enjoy. Somebody can come in with a kind of a frown on their face, like they weren’t quite as happy as one should be. And as soon as you speak to them, they smile.”
