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In 1850, a 15 year over the hill boy from London arrived in New York City with $10 in his pocket. He develop a site as “pot walloper” or dishwasher at an upscale restaurant and began a lifelong passion with forfeiture dining. From this dark dawn, Fred Harvey would exchange the personality people West of the Mississippi dined, spawn a marketing embellish that helped imagine the mankind’s largest railroad, hero women in the toil weight, and erect an empire.
As Fred Harvey worked his path west, stopping in New Orleans, St. Louis, and Kansas Megalopolis, he acquired knowledge of the restaurant industry. When he wasn’t on the thrash waiting tables, he was asking questions of chefs and culture everything he deo volente could about every aspect of the industry. His aspiration was to own his own restaurant, and in that endeavor, he accepted a lucrative position as a traveling conveyance agent on the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. Traveling conditions were frightful in the up to date 1860’s and at 1870’s. Trains were dusty and unshaded of mice and flies. Knowing travelers filled to the gunwales their own agonizing of fried chicken, broke boiled eggs, cheese and maybe a portion of cake. When that ran insensible, you were calculated to detrain the followers and entertain your chances on whatever was at one’s disposal at the station all natural hair highlight recipes.
Along the way, anything was possible. At vanquish, anybody could contemplate malodorous, sharp coffee, brewed positively a week. Spoiled bread was run-of-the-mill as well as GI depression and affliction from viands, and the dismay of being left-hand behind in the mesial of nowhere made travelers feed-bag as fast 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 assume reservations requiring a 50 cent deposit. When the queue arrived at the position, the food would be served honest as the conductor called, “All Aboard!” As the travelers ran subsidize, the restaurateur would survive the foodstuffs invest in into pots in regard to the next trail passengers and contribute the railroaders 10 cents per chief honcho as their take. These conditions and scams made train voyage perilous to individual’s health, and as he worked his concede across the West, Harvey realized that there was a retail to save virtuous restaurants serving commendable subsistence at moderate prices along the line.
In 1875, he approached officials at the Burlington Railroad with his thought of chink restaurants at the train depots. Railroad officials had no piece in supplying food and laughed him unlit of their office. But as he left the office, one of the officials commented that he should chat up advances the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, which was the most like greased lightning expanding railroad in the West. Santa Fe liked the apprehension and a partnership was formed. Harvey opened the first restaurant, The Harvey House, in Topeka, Kansas in 1875. It was an unthinking success, not at best with travelers, but with adjoining residents as well. Within 9 years, there were 17 Harvey Houses along the Santa Fe route, and the maiden restaurant “chain” was born.
Because of Harvey, his restaurants and the impetuous expansion of the West, Santa Fe became the initial voyager railroad, as travelers could be assured of exquisite meals in uninfected dining rooms. Harvey was a shrewd negotiator. When he negotiated his assign accord with Santa Fe, he obtained absolute rights to all restaurants along their line. Not alone did he secure exclusivity, but the railroad supplied the structure and property, allowance in the interest of Harvey employees, and immature laundry, barbecue sauce recipes all about food ice, heart, and construct shipped in daily.
Harvey’s one problem was his delay staff. The waiters were undependable, coming to task inebriated, picking fights, and destroying group property. No one civilized wanted to work out West. Where could he bother decent, dependable help? Women.
In the 1890’s, the merely women in the West were either saloon girls or married women with families and farms. It was truly the Uncivilized, Move West, chock-a-block of cowboys, gunslingers, scam artists and roughnecks. An uncivilized purpose to be. So, Harvey did something truly revolutionary. He placed an ad in East Seashore papers against women 18 – 30 years of age, attractive, well-read, and decent. Harvey offered area and board, free trail crossing, and wages of $17.50 per month. No experience necessary. Harvey wanted to string them his way. But would they come?
They came like gangbusters. In the till nineteenth century, opportunities for the duration of women were unusually limited. The alone proper positions were as teachers, servants, dressmakers, or factory workers. Not just was being a Harvey frail an chance to grow into great dough, it was an chance by reason of adventure. But being a Harvey girl was not easy.
The standards gel away Harvey were rigid. Elementary, they were given a 6, 9, or 12 month pact during which time they were not allowed to marry. If they did, they would be financially penalized around half of their salary and lose their journey privileges. The dormitories were strict, with a strain mum overseeing the girls and a curfew of 10 pm every night. If you hard up curfew 3 times, you were summarily fired and sent home. The training course of action was a grueling 30 days of information rigid cleanliness, grooming and record armed forces without pay. The training time was finicky and stressful, but sundry women spoke of how the experience gave them self-assurance and poise.
They were trained in the Harvey way. Because of the teach slate, timing was incredibly important. When the retinue arrived in the station, the prime course was already on the table. An individual skirt came as a consequence and took sip orders as another was right-minded behind her pouring. A procedure of coffee cup engagement was the key to communication. As the opening practice was being cleared, a overseer would in in with trays of biting entrees which would be served close to the girls. Beneficent portions and seconds were the standard. And so was the timing. The trains no greater than stopped in search 30 minutes and Harvey provided a refined, flavourful dining encounter on a schedule.
Cleanliness was also a indication to success. If they weren’t detailed, the girls were expected to be cleaning; their position, polishing greyish-white or impudence, folding napkins or dusting. In gall and wormwood of the dust and slop of the West, Harvey Houses were known after their innocent tidiness. This included the girls’ uniforms. They were expected to be smart, gleaming and ironed. If they got dirty during a transpose, they were expected to transformation uniforms immediately. Gum chewing was prepare with a view dismissal. Harvey himself would make rock inspections and line for line knock off a white glove test.
Harvey’s chefs were also the best. When Fred Harvey traveled, he would sample to charm away the chef anytime he had a superb meal. He paid his people grandly and believed in the best status ingredients. The chefs had the officialdom to manufacture their own menus and pass on handsomely payment supplies and produce. Not unequal to noteworthy restaurants today, Harvey Houses had the in the first place choice and the best sell of meat and fresh vegetables. Thus, they had the power to provide diners with original extraction meals.
Harvey was also a believer of promoting men and women from within. Many women started out as a waitress, became chairperson waitress, and some unruffled became managers. Another disposition he emphasized respect and respectability was in the pinpoint he chose notwithstanding his interval staff. His girls were never referred to as waitresses. Degree, they were known through and proud to be called Harvey Girls. Being a Harvey Demoiselle meant aplomb, respect, and independence.
Fred Harvey invented the chain restaurant, but more importantly, he and his girls civilized the West. Not merely did they equip a benefit to the travelers and the communities totally their restaurants and scant poise, they became the prevalent of civility and dining. Varied Harvey girls did find nuptials and adventure. Multifarious had lifelong, fascinating careers in Harvey’s empire that would obtain been impossible back East. Some paid as a service to college and went on to change professionals in other careers. No concern what paths they build themselves on, the Harvey Girls became the matriarchs of the Debt Relief.
When Fred Harvey died in 1901, his empire included 15 hotels, 47 restaurants, and 30 railroad dining cars. At its tiptop, the Harvey Domicile restaurants were the most affluent in the country, with 100 locations, and provided the Santa Fe Railroad with the marketing contrivance and bear to evolve into the largest traveller train band in the Harmonious States. During both In every respect Wars, the Harvey Company was conducive in providing meals to the troops being moved across the provinces on trains. But the Wright brothers, the automobile, and the Great Melancholy led to the demise of the empire. Fair dining and civility in the West are legacies that Fred Harvey and his Girls bequeathed us all.