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In 1850, a 15 year over the hill boy from London arrived in Fresh York Megalopolis with $10 in his pocket. He rest a emplacement as “pot walloper” or dishwasher at an upscale restaurant and began a lifelong passion with forfeiture dining. From this dark inception, Fred Harvey would exchange the practice people West of the Mississippi dined, create a marketing dupe that helped imagine the world’s largest railroad, champion women in the work weight, and build an empire.

As Fred Harvey worked his way west, stopping in Modish Orleans, St. Louis, and Kansas See, he acquired knowledge of the restaurant industry. When he wasn’t on the overwhelm waiting tables, he was asking questions of chefs and information entire lot he peradventure could about every aspect of the industry. His goal was to own his own restaurant, and in that endeavor, he accepted a lucrative contention as a traveling freight power on the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. Traveling conditions were frightful in the tardily 1860’s and at 1870’s. Trains were dusty and highest of mice and flies. Sagacious travelers crowded their own breeze of fried chicken, hard boiled eggs, cheese and peradventure a kind of cake. When that ran minus, you were artificial to detrain the procession and shoplift your chances on whatever was handy at the station chevapci all recipes.

Along the way, anything was possible. At best, anybody could contemplate rancid, freezing coffee, brewed once a week. Perverted food was run-of-the-mill as affectionately as GI difficulty and illness from nourishment, and the dismay of being nautical port behind in the middle of nowhere made travelers take in nourishment as sybaritic as credible, scrambling to get retreat from on the train. Scam artists negotiated with railroad workers to move the goalposts travelers. Before reaching a thwart, the conductor would take reservations requiring a 50 cent deposit. When the queue arrived at the station, the nourishment would be served impartial as the conductor called, “All Aboard!” As the travelers ran backtrack from, the restaurateur would survive the scoff abandon into pots on the next train passengers and give the railroaders 10 cents per head as their take. These conditions and scams made train peregrinations threatening to one’s fitness, and as he worked his concede across the West, Harvey realized that there was a retail to save clean restaurants serving ethical food at logical prices along the line.

In 1875, he approached officials at the Burlington Railroad with his estimate of cranny restaurants at the household depots. Railroad officials had no piece in supplying grub and laughed him unlit of their office. But as he socialistic the commission, inseparable of the officials commented that he should make a proposal to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, which was the most like greased lightning expanding railroad in the West. Santa Fe liked the impression and a partnership was formed. Harvey opened the beforehand restaurant, The Harvey House, in Topeka, Kansas in 1875. It was an closest good fortune, not only with travelers, but with adjoining residents as well. Within 9 years, there were 17 Harvey Houses along the Santa Fe route, and the first restaurant “manacle” was born.

Because of Harvey, his restaurants and the express enlargement of the West, Santa Fe became the original voyager railroad, as travelers could be assured of chic meals in clean dining rooms. Harvey was a perspicacious negotiator. When he negotiated his substitute harmony with Santa Fe, he obtained absolute rights to all restaurants along their line. Not alone did he be relevant exclusivity, but the railroad supplied the building and real estate, passage for Harvey employees, and fresh laundry, recipes for all german coffee cakes ice, heart, and put shipped in daily.

Harvey’s not question was his hang about staff. The waiters were undependable, coming to production well-oiled, picking fights, and destroying train property. No one civilized wanted to accomplishment short West. Where could he bother acceptable, dependable help? Women.

In the 1890’s, the at most women in the West were either saloon girls or married women with families and farms. It was truly the Desert, Berserk West, chock-a-block of cowboys, gunslingers, scam artists and roughnecks. An uncouth place to be. So, Harvey did something indeed revolutionary. He placed an ad in East Strand papers against women 18 – 30 years of adulthood, luring, polished, and decent. Harvey offered margin and cabinet, free attendants passage, and wages of $17.50 per month. No trial necessary. Harvey wanted to attendants them his way. But would they come?

They came like gangbusters. In the up to the minute nineteenth century, opportunities in requital for women were exceptionally limited. The solitary apt positions were as teachers, servants, dressmakers, or works workers. Not not was being a Harvey woman an opening to forge huge shekels, it was an possibility instead of adventure. But being a Harvey girl was not easy.

The standards agreed by means of Harvey were rigid. Sooner, they were given a 6, 9, or 12 month narrow during which every so often they were not allowed to marry. If they did, they would be financially penalized by half of their income and lose their travel privileges. The dormitories were exact, 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 course of action was a grueling 30 days of learning defined cleanliness, grooming and record service without pay. The training era was finicky and stressful, but sundry women spoke of how the ordeal gave them self-assurance and poise.

They were trained in the Harvey way. Because of the train outline, timing was incredibly important. When the string arrived in the site, the premier conduct was already on the table. Equal bit of skirt came thoroughly and took drink orders as another was pure behind her pouring. A way of coffee cup placement was the indication to communication. As the first course was being cleared, a executive would come in with trays of searing entrees which would be served around 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 courteous, choice dining encounter on a schedule.

Cleanliness was also a indication to success. If they weren’t baroque, the girls were expected to be cleaning; their station, polishing silver or brass, folding napkins or dusting. In offend of the dust and sludge of the West, Harvey Houses were known pro their undefiled tidiness. This included the girls’ uniforms. They were expected to be clean-cut, spotless and ironed. If they got obscene during a shift, they were expected to revolution uniforms immediately. Gum chewing was prepare on dismissal. Harvey himself would exhort surprise inspections and truly bring off a stainless glove test.

Harvey’s chefs were also the best. When Fred Harvey traveled, he would have a stab to charm away the chef anytime he had a superb meal. He paid his people expressively and believed in the finest trait ingredients. The chefs had the sage to father their own menus and pay handsomely payment supplies and produce. Not contrasting prodigious restaurants today, Harvey Houses had the in the first place determination and the a- rig out of substance and brisk vegetables. Thus, they had the power to lend diners with gold medal class meals.

Harvey was also a believer of promoting men and women from within. Varied women started at liberty as a waitress, became pre-eminent waitress, and some even became managers. Another disposition he emphasized reverence and respectability was in the respect he chose over the extent of his interval 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 Fianc‚e meant coolness, respect, and independence.

Fred Harvey invented the bond restaurant, but more importantly, he and his girls civilized the West. Not only did they accord a benefit to the travelers and the communities totally their restaurants and absolute presence, they became the paradigm of courteousness and dining. Many Harvey girls did lay one’s hands on marriage and adventure. Diverse had lifelong, fascinating careers in Harvey’s empire that would obtain been ludicrous assist East. Some paid for college and went on to develop professionals in other careers. No business what paths they build themselves on, the Harvey Girls became the matriarchs of the Negotiation.

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 profitable in the country, with 100 locations, and provided the Santa Fe Railroad with the marketing tool and stand for to evolve into the largest traveller succession band in the United States. During both Cosmos Wars, the Harvey Descendants was conducive in providing meals to the troops being moved across the mountains on trains. But the Wright brothers, the automobile, and the Great Indentation led to the demise of the empire. Exquisite dining and diplomacy in the West are legacies that Fred Harvey and his Girls bequeathed us all.