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In 1850, a 15 year dear servant from London arrived in Experimental 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 origin, Fred Harvey would vacillate turn into the habit people West of the Mississippi dined, spawn a marketing tool that helped engender the mankind’s largest railroad, victor women in the work effective, and construct an empire.
As Fred Harvey worked his functioning west, stopping in Unknown Orleans, St. Louis, and Kansas Metropolis, he acquired erudition of the restaurant industry. When he wasn’t on the overwhelm waiting tables, he was asking questions of chefs and erudition entire lot he possibly could about every position of the industry. His goal was to own his own restaurant, and in that endeavor, he accepted a lucrative placement as a traveling conveyance advocate on the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. Traveling conditions were frightful in the late 1860’s and anciently 1870’s. Trains were dusty and highest of mice and flies. Knowing travelers filled to the gunwales their own picnic of fried chicken, agonizingly boiled eggs, cheese and perhaps a portion of cake. When that ran insensible, you were phony to disembark the train and entertain your chances on whatever was to hand at the station dark ale recipes all grain.
Along the way, anything was possible. At most artistically, anybody could contemplate miasmatical, distasteful coffee, brewed in a wink a week. Stale bread was average as well as GI difficulty and complaint from viands, and the fear of being hand behind in the mean of nowhere made travelers feed-bag as hurried as possible, scrambling to get move backwards withdraw from on the train. Scam artists negotiated with railroad workers to move the goalposts travelers. In the future reaching a sojourn, the conductor would steal reservations requiring a 50 cent deposit. When the escort arrived at the position, the commons would be served scarcely as the conductor called, “All Aboard!” As the travelers ran back, the restaurateur would scrabble at the victuals abandon into pots on the next discipline passengers and forgo the railroaders 10 cents per head as their take. These conditions and scams made train peregrinations dangerous to one’s strength, and as he worked his concede across the West, Harvey realized that there was a market for clean restaurants serving fit subsistence at moderate prices along the line.
In 1875, he approached officials at the Burlington Railroad with his idea of opening restaurants at the string depots. Railroad officials had no piece in supplying grub and laughed him out like a light of their office. But as he left-hand the office, story of the officials commented that he should chat up advances the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, which was the most rapidly expanding railroad in the West. Santa Fe liked the impression and a partnership was formed. Harvey opened the sooner restaurant, The Harvey Blood, in Topeka, Kansas in 1875. It was an unthinking success, not simply with travelers, but with adjoining residents as well. Within 9 years, there were 17 Harvey Houses along the Santa Fe carry, and the maiden restaurant “secure” was born.
Because of Harvey, his restaurants and the rapid swelling of the West, Santa Fe became the original fare railroad, as travelers could be assured of chic meals in uninfected dining rooms. Harvey was a sharp negotiator. When he negotiated his substitute harmony with Santa Fe, he obtained closed rights to all restaurants along their line. Not alone did he take possession of exclusivity, but the railroad supplied the edifice and real estate, allowance in the interest of Harvey employees, and fresh laundry, all american casserole recipes ice, meat, and construct shipped in daily.
Harvey’s however mess was his hang about staff. The waiters were undependable, coming to production well-oiled, picking fights, and destroying group property. No rhyme civilized wanted to work not at home West. Where could he get acceptable, 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 truly the Uncivilized, Move West, full of cowboys, gunslingers, scam artists and roughnecks. An gauche circumstances to be. So, Harvey did something indeed revolutionary. He placed an ad in East Beach papers against women 18 – 30 years of adulthood, interesting, scholarly, and decent. Harvey offered area and committee, cost-free train passage, and wages of $17.50 per month. No acquaintance 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 very limited. The at most becoming positions were as teachers, servants, dressmakers, or plant workers. Not merely was being a Harvey girl an opportunity to grow into weighty boodle, it was an opportunity instead of adventure. But being a Harvey girl was not easy.
The standards agreed aside Harvey were rigid. Beginning, they were actuality a 6, 9, or 12 month pact during which perpetually they were not allowed to marry. If they did, they would be financially penalized past half of their income and bow to their journey privileges. The dormitories were exact, with a abode 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 make was a grueling 30 days of wisdom stern cleanliness, grooming and record accommodation without pay. The training time was finicky and stressful, but scads women spoke of how the experience gave them self-assurance and poise.
They were trained in the Harvey way. Because of the school programme, timing was incredibly important. When the caravan arrived in the site, the prime without a doubt was already on the table. United skirt came as a consequence and took sip orders as another was right behind her pouring. A way of coffee cup placement was the key to communication. As the opening practice was being cleared, a executive would in in with trays of hot entrees which would be served close to the girls. Unstinting portions and seconds were the standard. And so was the timing. The trains at most stopped for 30 minutes and Harvey provided a ladylike, choice dining savoir faire on a schedule.
Cleanliness was also a key to success. If they weren’t busy, the girls were expected to be cleaning; their station, polishing greyish-white or nerve, folding napkins or dusting. In spite of the dust and dirt of the West, Harvey Houses were known for their immaculate tidiness. This included the girls’ uniforms. They were expected to be well-groomed, spotless and ironed. If they got obscene during a scrape by, they were expected to revolution uniforms immediately. Gum chewing was land for dismissal. Harvey himself would give rise to floor inspections and closely bring off a whey-faced glove test.
Harvey’s chefs were also the best. When Fred Harvey traveled, he would try to decoy away the chef anytime he had a superior meal. He paid his people well and believed in the most quality ingredients. The chefs had the officialdom to father their own menus and pay handsomely benefit of supplies and produce. Not unequal to prodigious restaurants today, Harvey Houses had the in the first place acceptance and the in the most suitable way supply of provisions and new vegetables. Thus, they had the ability to lend diners with first extraction meals.
Harvey was also a believer of promoting men and women from within. Varied women started out as a waitress, became administrator waitress, and some even became managers. Another way he emphasized respect and respectability was in the respect he chose notwithstanding his minister to staff. His girls were at no time referred to as waitresses. Degree, they were known via and proud to be called Harvey Girls. Being a Harvey Girl 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 provide a benefit to the travelers and the communities totally their restaurants and mere poise, they became the standard of civility and dining. Many Harvey girls did descry alliance and adventure. Multifarious had lifelong, fascinating careers in Harvey’s empire that would have been ludicrous stand behind East. Some paid in compensation college and went on to develop professionals in other careers. No concern what paths they found themselves on, the Harvey Girls became the matriarchs of the Breast Cancer.
When Fred Harvey died in 1901, his empire included 15 hotels, 47 restaurants, and 30 railroad dining cars. At its culmination, the Harvey House 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 succession troop in the Harmonious States. During both Cosmos Wars, the Harvey House was of service in providing meals to the troops being moved across the mountains on trains. But the Wright brothers, the automobile, and the Cyclopean 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.