BATON ROUGE - The owner of a historic Baton Rouge business is stepping down after 47 years at the reins. 

Henry Baptiste announced his retirement this week, leaving Chicken Shack fully in the hands of the Delpit family.

"It's hard to walk away from so many customers' smiling faces that I see in the Chicken Shack daily, but the time has come to fry that last piece of chicken," Baptiste said in a statement. 

The restaurant, first opened as the Suburban Ice Cream Parlor, was launched in 1935 by Thomas H. Delpit. Two years later, he revamped the menu and rebranded it as Chicken Shack, kicking off what would become a capital city institution.

Baptiste, who is a longtime friend of the Delpit family and worked under the original owner, teamed up with Joe Delpit and his wife, Precious, in 1981 to expand the business. 

Read Baptiste's full statement here.