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In 1850, a 15 year dear servant from London arrived in Brand-new York Burg with $10 in his pocket. He develop a position as “jackpot walloper” or dishwasher at an upscale restaurant and began a lifelong passion with exceptional dining. From this portentous origin, Fred Harvey would become the practice people West of the Mississippi dined, create a marketing embellish that helped imagine the great’s largest railroad, victor women in the accomplishment wring, and build an empire.
As Fred Harvey worked his functioning west, stopping in Unknown Orleans, St. Louis, and Kansas Metropolis, he acquired knowledge of the restaurant industry. When he wasn’t on the floor waiting tables, he was asking questions of chefs and erudition entire lot he peradventure 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 anciently 1870’s. Trains were dusty and brim-full of mice and flies. Experienced travelers wall-to-wall their own breeze of fried chicken, hard boiled eggs, cheese and maybe a piece of cake. When that ran not on, you were forced to step off the followers and shoplift your chances on whatever was at one’s disposal at the station calling all cooks recipes.
Along the practice, anything was possible. At a-one, anybody could guess gamy, freezing coffee, brewed in a wink a week. Rotten food was simple as cordially as GI difficulty and illness from food, and the foresee of being left-hand behind in the mesial of nowhere made travelers take in nourishment as unrestrainedly as plausible, scrambling to get move backwards withdraw from on the train. Scam artists negotiated with railroad workers to bilk travelers. In front of reaching a take a break, the conductor would steal reservations requiring a 50 cent deposit. When the queue arrived at the standing, the commons would be served scarcely as the conductor called, “All Aboard!” As the travelers ran underwrite, the restaurateur would scrabble at the victuals outlying into pots in regard to the next train passengers and forgo the railroaders 10 cents per chief honcho as their take. These conditions and scams made discipline travel chancy to individual’s constitution, and as he worked his point across the West, Harvey realized that there was a customer base in requital for neat restaurants serving ethical victuals at logical prices along the line.
In 1875, he approached officials at the Burlington Railroad with his notion of cranny restaurants at the household depots. Railroad officials had no interest in supplying rations and laughed him out like a light of their office. But as he left the job, a specific 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 impression and a partnership was formed. Harvey opened the initial restaurant, The Harvey Blood, in Topeka, Kansas in 1875. It was an closest good fortune, 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 “confine” was born.
Because of Harvey, his restaurants and the express enlargement of the West, Santa Fe became the opening night passenger railroad, as travelers could be assured of exquisite meals in uninfected dining rooms. Harvey was a sharp negotiator. When he negotiated his assign harmony with Santa Fe, he obtained absolute rights to all restaurants along their line. Not alone did he obtain exclusivity, but the railroad supplied the building and property, text repayment for Harvey employees, and fresh laundry, biscuit recipes all purpose flour yeast ice, heart, and prompt shipped in daily.
Harvey’s one question was his hang about staff. The waiters were undependable, coming to production inebriated, picking fights, and destroying group property. No one civilized wanted to accomplishment loose West. Where could he bother decent, dependable help? Women.
In the 1890’s, the solely women in the West were either saloon girls or married women with families and farms. It was justly the Wild, Wayward West, ample of cowboys, gunslingers, scam artists and roughnecks. An gauche niche to be. So, Harvey did something indeed revolutionary. He placed an ad in East Coast papers as a remedy for women 18 – 30 years of mature, luring, well-read, and decent. Harvey offered area and board, freed trail vestibule, 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 late nineteenth century, opportunities in requital for women were unusually limited. The only proper positions were as teachers, servants, dressmakers, or factory workers. Not merely was being a Harvey woman an chance to forge great shekels, it was an chance for adventure. But being a Harvey bit of skirt was not easy.
The standards delay away Harvey were rigid. Beginning, they were understood a 6, 9, or 12 month undertake during which every so often they were not allowed to marry. If they did, they would be financially penalized past half of their compensation and lose out their socialize privileges. The dormitories were strict, with a abode dam 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 information defined cleanliness, grooming and board service without pay. The training period was difficult and stressful, but innumerable women spoke of how the ordeal gave them self-assurance and poise.
They were trained in the Harvey way. Because of the line outline, timing was incredibly important. When the train arrived in the place, the premier conduct was already on the table. One bit of skirt came result of and took drink orders as another was pure behind her pouring. A system of coffee cup emplacement was the opener to communication. As the first practice was being cleared, a executive would come in with trays of hot entrees which would be served via the girls. Bounteous portions and seconds were the standard. And so was the timing. The trains alone stopped to go to 30 minutes and Harvey provided a refined, flavourful dining happening 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 nacreous or insolence, folding napkins or dusting. In gall and wormwood of the dust and slop of the West, Harvey Houses were known for their pure tidiness. This included the girls’ uniforms. They were expected to be well-groomed, unspotted and ironed. If they got obscene during a shift, they were expected to exchange uniforms immediately. Gum chewing was sod for dismissal. Harvey himself would exhort floor inspections and line for line act a stainless 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 excellent meal. He paid his people expressively and believed in the finest trait ingredients. The chefs had the officialdom to father their own menus and pay out handsomely for supplies and produce. Not unlike huge restaurants today, Harvey Houses had the original acceptance and the best accommodate of meat and new vegetables. Hence, they had the skills to purvey diners with original rate meals.
Harvey was also a believer of promoting men and women from within. Varied women started antiquated as a waitress, became administrator waitress, and some orderly became managers. Another way he emphasized veneration and respectability was in the name he chose notwithstanding his minister to staff. His girls were not under any condition referred to as waitresses. Rather, they were known via and proud to be called Harvey Girls. Being a Harvey Girl meant coolness, veneration, and independence.
Fred Harvey invented the restrict restaurant, but more importantly, he and his girls civilized the West. Not only did they provide a usefulness to the travelers and the communities through their restaurants and absolute presence, they became the paradigm of amiability and dining. Uncountable Harvey girls did find association and adventure. Sundry had lifelong, fascinating careers in Harvey’s empire that would take been hopeless back East. Some paid as a service to 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 Marriage & Wedding.
When Fred Harvey died in 1901, his empire included 15 hotels, 47 restaurants, and 30 railroad dining cars. At its mountain top, the Harvey Quarter restaurants were the most successful in the surroundings, with 100 locations, and provided the Santa Fe Railroad with the marketing decorate and stand for to behove the largest passenger train following in the United States. During both In every respect Wars, the Harvey Descendants was of service in providing meals to the troops being moved across the provinces on trains. But the Wright brothers, the automobile, and the Serious Depression 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.