1921 | Restaurants
Restaurants
The first White Castle hamburger stand opens in March with five counter stools in a plain 10-by-15-foot cement-block building at Wichita, Kansas. Local insurance and real estate agent Edgar Waldo "Billy" Ingram, 40, last year met professional cook Walter Anderson, who in 1916 rented a remodeled street car, procured a griddle plate and icebox, and went into business. Ingram has sold Anderson a house, helped him obtain financing for a third hamburger stand, and solved a problem that arose over leasing a fourth location by putting his own name on the lease agreement and going into business with Anderson. The partners have borrowed $700 to start the enterprise, repay the loan in 90 days, and will never borrow again, financing their growth from profits. Instead of round beef patties, they make square ones, and when they find that pancake turners do not stand up under the pressure of flattening hamburger patties, they have two-inch-square wedges cut out of handsaw blades and create spatulas by having handles brazed to each wedge (a manufacturer will later produce proper spatulas for them). Ingram and Anderson will incorporate in 1924 as the White Castle System of Eating Houses, and Ingram will buy out Anderson's interest in 1933 (see 1925).
Lindy's Restaurant opens at 1626 Broadway in New York under the management of German-born restaurateur Leo "Lindy" Lindeman, 33, whose crullers, cheesecake, and coffee will be favored by newspapermen, politicians, and theater people for half a century.
Sardi's Restaurant opens in West 44th Street, New York, under the direction of Italian-born restaurateur Vincent Sardi, 35, and his wife, Eugenia, whose canneloni and other dishes will attract the Broadway theater world for more than 70 years. Sardi's will move to 234 West 44th Street in 1927 when the first building is razed to make way for construction of the St. James Theater.