I’m no big fan of KFC, but . . . Is it just me, or is this totally insane?
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – The world’s first Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant was demolished Tuesday, leaving the familiar sign bearing Colonel Sanders’ smiling face upside down atop a heap of rubble. By early August, however, KFC will be reborn on the same spot as a restaurant and museum that will tell how buckets of crispy fried chicken came to be sold at nearly 12,000 restaurants around the globe, generating annual sales of around $10 billion. “We’re definitely proud of our heritage in Utah,” said James Jackson, chief financial officer for California-based Harman’s KFC Corp. The new 4,000-square-foot KFC will display a narrative of the story on the walls with vintage pictures of the restaurant, early menus and the familiar full-size fiberglass statue of Sanders that can be posed sitting in a chair or on a bench. “It’s memorabilia that helps people remember KFC’s roots in Utah,” Jackson said.
A) How could raze that building? That restaurant was the original, and as such should probably have been registered as a national historical landmark. If it was falling into disrepair, then they should have made the necessary repairs while keeping as much of the original style as possible.
…or
B) Ummm, they’re a fast food chain. Not exactly something of great historical significance that merits a museum.
I wonder if the museum will detail the Colonel’s unfortunate era as a lawyer practicing without a license. He also tried several other professions without bothering to get any training or licenses or any of those other inconvenient qualification. Before he hit upon his famous recipe, that is. Which he probably stole from someone. I’m just sayin’.
Hmm, and all these years I thought Harlan Sanders started selling chicken in Kentucky. You know, what with the name and all. Oh, wait, he did .
Was this the first franchise he sold, or maybe the first one built after he sold the company? If so, I wonder how it made the leap from Kentucky to Utah without spreading to any of the states in between?
A) "We want to celebrate the history of our restaurants—so we are going to demolish the very first one, in order to put up a museum commemorating . . . ummm . . . the first restaurant . . . that we just demolished . . .
I have been in this “World’s First KFC” restaurant several times. The story is that Col. Sanders was visiting his friend Leon “Pete” Harman in Salt Lake City in 1952. Harman had a restaurant called the Dew Drop Inn, where Sanders persuaded Harman to let him cook up a batch of chicken for his customers. Harman was so impressed that he convinced Sanders to franchise the operation and came up with the name “Kentucky Fried Chicken.” So, even though Col. Sanders had sold his chicken before, this was the first KFC franchise.
Harman took care of the business operations and Col. Sanders provided the recipe and went around the country signing up franchises.
Strangely enough, I too have eaten at the “first” KFC, only it was in Kentucky. It may be the place that Sanders sold his chicken first (before franchising out of state). I’m not sure exactly what its claim to fame is, but it was clear when I visited that it was intended to be taken as “the first KFC, right here in Kentucky where you’d expect it to be.”
It’s already a museum, and there’s a modern KFC counter where the old counter used to be. It’s sort of double-wide. I’m non-plussed about the destruction of this Utah franchise, since the Kentucky location is well-preserved (and serves the same old delicious chicken as any other KFC).
I’ve eaten at “the world’s first KFC” in Salt Lake. It even said so in big bronze letters on the side. It was, as noted, the first franchise. William Poundstone’s book Big Secrets tells how Col. Harlan Sanders travelled the country trying to sell his franchise, finally succeeding in selling it to the Harman’s chain in Salt Lake.
While I was there, you had two kinds of KFC restaurants – the regular KFC franchises and the Harman’s ones. (Not that unusual – when I grew up in N.J. you could get KFC at regular KFC franchises or at “Gino’s” fast food places (run by Fottball player Ginmo Marchetti)). The Harman’s places had a distinctive “Harman’s” logo over the top, letting you now that this was Harman’s first, and KFC second. They were different inside, too – soft leatherette booths., plants and decor. One Harman’s had waiters, and you could get, for instance, baby carrots. (The Gino’ in NJ also had the Gino’s logo prominent, and you could also get McDonald’s -type hamburgers an cheeseburgers besides chicken).
My suspicion is that the KFC folk want o eliminate this dual system and standardize the operation. Gino’s disappeared ages ago, and it looks like Harman’s s goin, too. Good luck getting carrots.
As for fast food museums, it’s nt that unusual – McDonald’s put one up year ago.
“The building served its purpose for many, many years,” said Tracy Gingell, owner and manager of the historic restaurant. “We wanted to upgrade it and build a modern KFC there. We wanted it to be attractive for our customers.” –Deseret Morning News, 4/21/04
That’s their take on it. However, I certainly agree with you, Eve. I can go to an ultra-modern KFC anytime. If I were the type to go to a KFC museum, I’d be much more impressed with it being part of a really old-fashioned looking Kentucky Fried Chicken.
I’m sure it all comes down to finances, though. <shrug>
I disagree. Museums are (or should be) all about culture–both high and low; the proliferation of fast-food chains is a phenomenon that has had a profound effect on our (i.e. Western) culture. It ties in closely with the way automobiles have changed our cityscapes, particularly since the advent of big highways.
Of course, a museum designed and run by the company isn’t going to be delivering anything but a very slanted view of their own history–and certainly won’t be examining any negative aspects of fast food’s impact on North American culture.
That aside, I think KFC missed the boat on this one–if they wanted a museum, why not think big and build the big new museum building around the old restaurant? You would preserve the “first” KFC and at the same time by putting it in a controlled temp/humidity environment, you would make it a lot easier to preserve in the long run.
By extending the HVAC stacks up to the new roof, you could even have the damn thing operating and selling KFC to the hungry museumgoers…revenue opportunity! Of course, you wouldn’t want any take-out–too many greasy fingers touching the exhibits, walls, etc would not be good conservation practice.
I imagine that the building has had many interventions and renovations since its original configuration–the KFC museum would likely elect to restore it to its original 1952 appearance. Staff could wear the uniforms of the period. You could even have a couple of vintage cars “parked” outside (within the big museum). Your new museum building around the old one could be where you have your interpretive displays. I think it would look pretty cool, myself.
This would be more expensive than razing the site and just building a museum; but it would have shown vision, and demonstrated a little more respect for their own organizational history.
In the Cleveland (Ohio) area, Kenny King’s restaurants (sit-down diner-type places) co-existed with stand-alone KFC franchises when I was growing up. Since my dad doesn’t like poultry, we always went to Kenny King’s on “restaurant night” if anyone in the family really wanted Kentucky Fried Chicken. That way, Dad could get his Big King hamburgers, and someone else could order fish or pork. As i recall, I had graduated from high school by the time I first ordered the Colonel’s recipe from a “regular” KFC outlet.
(From a Chagrin Falls native) Good memory… I was wracking my brains trying to come up with this as I read down this thread… We always talked about going to Kenny King’s for dinner, not “KFC” or “Colonel Sanders”. I had completely forgotten this. There was one on Chagrin Blvd near Warrensville, I think.
And now, as a Kentuckian (“Huh???” Sternvogel must be thinking, “from Chagrin Falls???”) I must register my vote for the real home of KFC being in Corbin Kentucky, right down the road from here. Oddly enough, Lexington is also the home of both Fazoli’s and Long John Silver’s. Salt Lake may be the home of one of the fastest-growing religions in the world, but the home of fast food is Kentucky, dammit!