In the series “Agent Carter” she frequently stops at an Automat. On the show she sits and talks to the waitress while being served food. I always thought the idea of an Automat was that you when in, stuck a couple coins in the slot, got the food, then sat down to eat. Did the old time Automats have waitresses that served food? What would be the point of having an Automat in the first place?
I thought the waitress was mostly serving coffee…?
Maybe it’s an automat where you have the option of serving yourself or being served?
OK, I got nothing, but I was sort of wondering the same thing.
Automats were heavily staffed. Someone had to bus the tables, refill the slots, take the money, etc. I would expect that someone serving coffee, tea, etc. would have been standard.
I don’t recall any waitresses in the automats. There was the woman in a little booth who exchanged your money for nickels, and there were the women who cleaned up when you left. But I don’t remember any waitresses (or male employees either).
Well, of course there weren’t any male employees, you could legally pay women less for the same work so it was more profitable to keep an all woman staff.
Knock yourself out.
I remember them when I was a kid.
From Automatic for the People: Remembering the Automat Restaurants
NO waitresses serving coffee.
In the show the automat is on one side of the restaurant and the booths and tables are on the other side, where there is also a grill for hot food. That doesn’t strike me as unusual.
Of course, the show *has *to have a waitress, so she can be victimized by all the awful evil white men.
The OP might look at some movie clips:
Horn & Hardart is the name everyone remembers, but they had competitors.
Possibly some had counter service for some items, like eggs that had to be served fresh, and vending slots for other foods that could be centrally produced.
Horn and Hardarts (I ate at several in the 1950s and 60s) had not waitstaff. Coffee came from a spigot; you put in a coin and it would fill the cup. Food was kept behind windows. Someone staffed the cash register and others bussed the tables and cleaned up. Most people were in the kitchen, behind the wall, and they’d fill up any empty compartments.
Hot water was free (but you’d pay for a tea bag). I’ve seen accounts of people who would fill a cup with it and with ketchup from the dispenser for some free “soup.” Though you had to make sure no one caught you.
There’s a pretty bleak automat in Dark City: At the Automat, pt. 12 - YouTube
I see the last automat in NYC closed in 1991. I hadn’t realized they had lasted that long.
There’s a Wikipedia entry on the Horn & Hardart chain that gives somewhat conflicting info about this.
“But Automats weren’t truly automatic. They were heavily staffed. As a customer removed a compartment’s contents, a behind-the-machine human quickly slipped another sandwich, salad, piece of pie or coffee cake into the vacated chamber.” (quoted from Crowley, Carolyn Hughes. “Meet Me at the Automat,” Smithsonian Magazine, August 2001.)
On the other hand, the subheading on the decline of H&H says: “The restaurants remained popular into the 1960s with automats, sit-down waitress service restaurants, cafeterias, and bakery shops.”
The fact that they contrast “automats” next to “sit-down waitress service restaurants” seems to imply automats had no waitresses.
I give the tv show credit for remembering or researching the fact that automats were a thing in the 40s. Maybe they can be excused for this lapse if we assume the waitress is mainly bussing tables. Maybe part of her complaint about the harassing customers is that they expect her to act like a full-service waitress. I could have sworn she poured coffee in one episode though.
I wish I knew how they made their coffee; it was indeed the best . . . as well as their baked beans chicken pot pie, lemon meringue pie, etc.
What’s up with that 1930’s style CCTV camera on the second video, at 4:45?
I’ve always wondered why this business model went extinct.
The followup question would be why. It sounds like burger joints explicitly replaced automats, in some cases acting as direct upgrades. Why would places specializing in beef sandwiches and greasy potatoes replace the automat fare?
The same reason they have changed the lunchtime dining experience in the US the last 50 years. How can you explain success?