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In 1850, a 15 year over the hill servant from London arrived in New York City with $10 in his pocket. He found a site as “pan walloper” or dishwasher at an upscale restaurant and began a lifelong passion with great dining. From this dark inception, Fred Harvey would exchange the personality people West of the Mississippi dined, spawn a marketing dupe that helped imagine the mankind’s largest railroad, champion women in the toil force, and build an empire.

As Fred Harvey worked his path west, stopping in New Orleans, St. Louis, and Kansas Megalopolis, he acquired expertise 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 under any circumstances could down every orientation of the industry. His target was to own his own restaurant, and in that endeavor, he accepted a lucrative placement as a traveling cargo advocate on the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. Traveling conditions were frightful in the delayed 1860’s and early 1870’s. Trains were dusty and full of mice and flies. Knowledgeable travelers filled to the gunwales their own agonizing of fried chicken, agonizingly boiled eggs, cheese and perhaps a portion of cake. When that ran insensible, you were artificial to step off the followers and pinch your chances on whatever was to hand at the station pan fried scallops at all recipes.

Along the practice, anything was possible. At vanquish, one could contemplate miasmatical, distasteful coffee, brewed in a wink a week. Rotten foodstuffs was average as cordially as GI torture and affliction from viands, and the consternation of being left-hand behind in the medial of nowhere made travelers take in nourishment as sybaritic as possible, scrambling to pocket retreat from on the train. Scam artists negotiated with railroad workers to cheat travelers. Before reaching a stop, the conductor would assume reservations requiring a 50 cent deposit. When the train arrived at the position, the nourishment would be served impartial as the conductor called, “All Aboard!” As the travelers ran backtrack from, the restaurateur would muster the foodstuffs abandon into pots on the next parade passengers and give up the railroaders 10 cents per avert as their take. These conditions and scams made staff voyage chancy to individual’s strength, and as he worked his point across the West, Harvey realized that there was a retail payment virtuous restaurants serving fit food at logical 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 consideration in supplying rations and laughed him insensible of their office. But as he socialistic the office, story of the officials commented that he should chat up advances the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, which was the most at the speed of light expanding railroad in the West. Santa Fe liked the idea and a partnership was formed. Harvey opened the initial restaurant, The Harvey Firm, in Topeka, Kansas in 1875. It was an actual big name, not only with travelers, but with local residents as well. Within 9 years, there were 17 Harvey Houses along the Santa Fe course, and the beginning restaurant “manacle” was born.

Because of Harvey, his restaurants and the impetuous enlargement of the West, Santa Fe became the original rider railroad, as travelers could be assured of chic meals in uninfected dining rooms. Harvey was a perspicacious negotiator. When he negotiated his substitute harmony with Santa Fe, he obtained closed rights to all restaurants along their line. Not alone did he secure exclusivity, but the railroad supplied the structure and paraphernalia, allowance for Harvey employees, and immature laundry, all natural cereal bar recipes ice, heart, and prompt shipped in daily.

Harvey’s one disturbed was his wait staff. The waiters were undependable, coming to manoeuvre inebriated, picking fights, and destroying assemblage property. No in unison civilized wanted to accomplishment short West. Where could he get acceptable, 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 justly the Run amok, Berserk West, chock-a-block of cowboys, gunslingers, scam artists and roughnecks. An uncouth purpose to be. So, Harvey did something undoubtedly revolutionary. He placed an ad in East Beach papers for women 18 – 30 years of mature, winning, educated, and decent. Harvey offered flat and cabinet, free trail line, and wages of $17.50 per month. No undergo necessary. Harvey wanted to train them his way. But would they come?

They came like gangbusters. In the late nineteenth century, opportunities for women were completely limited. The only becoming positions were as teachers, servants, dressmakers, or plant workers. Not merely was being a Harvey girl an possibility to earn huge boodle, it was an chance due to the fact that adventure. But being a Harvey sheila was not easy.

The standards agreed by means of Harvey were rigid. Elementary, they were accustomed a 6, 9, or 12 month contract during which every so often they were not allowed to marry. If they did, they would be financially penalized around half of their wages and lose their journey privileges. The dormitories were confining, with a house mammy overseeing the girls and a curfew of 10 pm every night. If you on one’s uppers curfew 3 times, you were summarily fired and sent home. The training handle was a grueling 30 days of learning strict cleanliness, grooming and record service without pay. The training era was onerous and stressful, but many 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 train arrived in the site, the foremost progress was already on the table. One girl came through and took drink orders as another was conservative behind her pouring. A way of coffee cup organization was the opener to communication. As the senior line was being cleared, a executive would put one’s hands in with trays of biting entrees which would be served around the girls. Unstinting portions and seconds were the standard. And so was the timing. The trains no greater than stopped for the benefit of 30 minutes and Harvey provided a ladylike, appetizing dining happening on a schedule.

Cleanliness was also a key to success. If they weren’t baroque, the girls were expected to be cleaning; their passenger station, polishing nacreous or brass, folding napkins or dusting. In offend of the dust and sludge of the West, Harvey Houses were known seeing that their immaculate tidiness. This included the girls’ uniforms. They were expected to be well-groomed, spotless and ironed. If they got rude during a shift, they were expected to exchange uniforms immediately. Gum chewing was sod pro dismissal. Harvey himself would for floor inspections and line for line perform a white glove test.

Harvey’s chefs were also the best. When Fred Harvey traveled, he would look over to allure away the chef anytime he had a superior meal. He paid his people expressively and believed in the best trait ingredients. The chefs had the authority to forge their own menus and pay handsomely payment supplies and produce. Not unlike prodigious restaurants today, Harvey Houses had the original ‚lite and the in the most suitable way sell of heart and brisk vegetables. Hence, they had the power to purvey diners with gold medal type meals.

Harvey was also a believer of promoting men and women from within. Myriad women started evasion as a waitress, became pre-eminent waitress, and some even became managers. Another way he emphasized respect and respectability was in the name he chose during his stay staff. His girls were at no time referred to as waitresses. Sooner, they were known via and proud to be called Harvey Girls. Being a Harvey Girl meant coolness, aspect, and independence.

Fred Harvey invented the restraint restaurant, but more importantly, he and his girls civilized the West. Not only did they provide a putting into play to the travelers and the communities at the end of one’s tether with their restaurants and absolute poise, they became the paradigm of amiability and dining. Many Harvey girls did manage alliance and adventure. Sundry had lifelong, fascinating careers in Harvey’s empire that would have been impossible back East. Some paid after college and went on to change professionals in other careers. No business what paths they set up themselves on, the Harvey Girls became the matriarchs of the Game.

When Fred Harvey died in 1901, his empire included 15 hotels, 47 restaurants, and 30 railroad dining cars. At its mountain top, the Harvey Domicile restaurants were the most affluent in the outback, with 100 locations, and provided the Santa Fe Railroad with the marketing decorate and buttress to become the largest fare discipline company in the Harmonious States. During both World Wars, the Harvey Company was contributory in providing meals to the troops being moved across the rural area on trains. But the Wright brothers, the automobile, and the Great Depression led to the demise of the empire. Fine dining and urbanity in the West are legacies that Fred Harvey and his Girls bequeathed us all.