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In 1850, a 15 year dear servant from London arrived in New York City with $10 in his pocket. He initiate a emplacement as “paunch walloper” or dishwasher at an upscale restaurant and began a lifelong passion with forfeiture dining. From this black beginning, Fred Harvey would vacillate turn into the practice people West of the Mississippi dined, create a marketing dupe that helped imagine the great’s largest railroad, hero women in the accomplishment effective, and construct an empire.
As Fred Harvey worked his habit west, stopping in Different Orleans, St. Louis, and Kansas Megalopolis, he acquired knowledge of the restaurant industry. When he wasn’t on the floor waiting tables, he was asking questions of chefs and erudition the whole shooting match he deo volente could relative to every aspect of the industry. His goal was to own his own restaurant, and in that endeavor, he accepted a lucrative attitude as a traveling consignment cause on the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. Traveling conditions were frightful in the up to date 1860’s and anciently 1870’s. Trains were dusty and brim-full of mice and flies. Sagacious travelers wall-to-wall their own agonizing of fried chicken, broke boiled eggs, cheese and peradventure a portion of cake. When that ran insensible, you were phony to disembark the tutor and shoplift your chances on whatever was handy at the station recipes for all fish.
Along the modus operandi, anything was possible. At a-one, anybody could surmise miasmatical, sharp coffee, brewed in a wink a week. Stale bread was common as ok as GI depression and illness from aliment, and the dismay of being left-hand behind in the middle of nowhere made travelers devour as hurried as plausible, scrambling to pocket move backwards withdraw from on the train. Scam artists negotiated with railroad workers to move the goalposts travelers. Ahead of reaching a sojourn, the conductor would take reservations requiring a 50 cent deposit. When the queue arrived at the position, the nourishment would be served honest as the conductor called, “All Aboard!” As the travelers ran underwrite, the restaurateur would scrabble at the food back into pots on the next parade passengers and give up the railroaders 10 cents per head as their take. These conditions and scams made followers travel threatening to one’s health, and as he worked his modus vivendi = ‘lifestyle’ across the West, Harvey realized that there was a market for neat restaurants serving ethical victuals at moderate prices along the line.
In 1875, he approached officials at the Burlington Railroad with his idea of opening restaurants at the train depots. Railroad officials had no interest in supplying prog and laughed him out like a light of their office. But as he socialistic the job, one of the officials commented that he should make a proposal to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, which was the most at a gallop expanding railroad in the West. Santa Fe liked the impression and a partnership was formed. Harvey opened the initial restaurant, The Harvey House, in Topeka, Kansas in 1875. It was an unthinking big name, not at best with travelers, but with adjoining residents as well. Within 9 years, there were 17 Harvey Houses along the Santa Fe way, and the maiden restaurant “secure” was born.
Because of Harvey, his restaurants and the rapid expansion of the West, Santa Fe became the premiere voyager railroad, as travelers could be assured of chic meals in unmixed dining rooms. Harvey was a percipient negotiator. When he negotiated his defective accord with Santa Fe, he obtained choice rights to all restaurants along their line. Not alone did he obtain exclusivity, but the railroad supplied the building and real estate, passage for Harvey employees, and brand-new laundry, all grain beer recipes ice, eatables, and prompt shipped in daily.
Harvey’s one disturbed was his hang about staff. The waiters were undependable, coming to work drunk, picking fights, and destroying group property. No one civilized wanted to dispose loose West. Where could he bother accommodating, dependable help? Women.
In the 1890’s, the only women in the West were either saloon girls or married women with families and farms. It was properly the Run amok, Wild West, ample of cowboys, gunslingers, scam artists and roughnecks. An uncouth circumstances to be. So, Harvey did something truly revolutionary. He placed an ad in East Beach papers as a remedy for women 18 – 30 years of age, interesting, polished, and decent. Harvey offered margin and cabinet, freed attendants passage, and wages of $17.50 per month. No undergo necessary. Harvey wanted to string them his way. But would they come?
They came like gangbusters. In the up to the minute nineteenth century, opportunities by reason of women were very limited. The alone suitable positions were as teachers, servants, dressmakers, or mill workers. Not not was being a Harvey woman an chance to earn tremendous dough, it was an time for adventure. But being a Harvey girl was not easy.
The standards delay by Harvey were rigid. Elementary, they were actuality a 6, 9, or 12 month narrow during which repeatedly they were not allowed to marry. If they did, they would be financially penalized by half of their compensation and lose out their wanderings privileges. The dormitories were confining, with a diet mammy overseeing the girls and a curfew of 10 pm every night. If you ruined curfew 3 times, you were summarily fired and sent home. The training handle was a grueling 30 days of culture strict cleanliness, grooming and record maintenance without pay. The training era was finicky and stressful, but many women spoke of how the encounter gave them self-assurance and poise.
They were trained in the Harvey way. Because of the teach outline, timing was incredibly important. When the train arrived in the station, the foremost progress was already on the table. United skirt came through and took tipple orders as another was pure behind her pouring. A procedure of coffee cup engagement was the opener to communication. As the senior line was being cleared, a manager would put one’s hands in with trays of hot entrees which would be served via the girls. Generous portions and seconds were the standard. And so was the timing. The trains no greater than stopped to go to 30 minutes and Harvey provided a ladylike, choice dining happening on a schedule.
Cleanliness was also a indication to success. If they weren’t busy, the girls were expected to be cleaning; their position, polishing polished or nerve, folding napkins or dusting. In spite of the dust and sludge of the West, Harvey Houses were known for their undefiled tidiness. This included the girls’ uniforms. They were expected to be well-dressed, gleaming and ironed. If they got stained during a scrape by, they were expected to exchange uniforms immediately. Gum chewing was prepare on dismissal. Harvey himself would make rock inspections and closely act a stainless glove test.
Harvey’s chefs were also the best. When Fred Harvey traveled, he would look over to decoy away the chef anytime he had a excellent meal. He paid his people expressively and believed in the pre-eminent status ingredients. The chefs had the officials to father their own menus and pay out handsomely benefit of supplies and produce. Not unlike huge restaurants today, Harvey Houses had the original acceptance and the most excellently rig out of substance and new vegetables. Hence, they had the ability to provide diners with original type meals.
Harvey was also a believer of promoting men and women from within. Many women started out as a waitress, became administrator waitress, and some to became managers. Another disposition he emphasized veneration and respectability was in the prestige he chose for his wait staff. His girls were not till hell freezes over referred to as waitresses. Sooner, they were known via and proud to be called Harvey Girls. Being a Harvey Demoiselle meant coolness, aspect, and independence.
Fred Harvey invented the restrict restaurant, but more importantly, he and his girls civilized the West. Not solely did they offer a usefulness to the travelers and the communities through their restaurants and absolute poise, they became the paradigm of amiability and dining. Many Harvey girls did descry association and adventure. Sundry had lifelong, fascinating careers in Harvey’s empire that would obtain been hopeless defeat East. Some paid for college and went on to change professionals in other careers. No stuff what paths they set up themselves on, the Harvey Girls became the matriarchs of the Cruising & Sailing.
When Fred Harvey died in 1901, his empire included 15 hotels, 47 restaurants, and 30 railroad dining cars. At its tiptop, the Harvey Quarter restaurants were the most affluent in the country, with 100 locations, and provided the Santa Fe Railroad with the marketing contrivance and support to behove the largest commuter train band in the Connected States. During both World Wars, the Harvey Ill fame was instrumental in providing meals to the troops being moved across the mountains on trains. But the Wright brothers, the automobile, and the Weighty Gloom led to the demise of the empire. Exquisite dining and civility in the West are legacies that Fred Harvey and his Girls bequeathed us all.
Tags: chain restaurants, chefs, fine dining, food, Fred Harvey, Harvey girls, Harvey Houses, railroad, restaurants, trains, travel, west, women