Hospitality Southwest Style

Hi folks! Linda Farmer Harris here. Thanks for stopping by.

I’m putting the final touches on my Easter Sunday menu. I’m thinking about Easter eggs – scrambled, not chocolate, served over Portobello mushrooms. That made me wonder how a Fred Harvey chef would prepare that dish.

I discovered the Harvey Girls and their style of Southwest hospitality in the February 1992 issue of Texas Highways. Rosa Walston Latimer wrote about this unique group of women in Southwest history. That began my admiration, no, my downright love affair, with these courageous young women who wanted to be independent and self-sufficient.

From a variety of backgrounds, many of them supported parents and siblings back home on $17.50 in wages plus tips, while they carved out a future for themselves. They also received free room, board, clean uniforms, and a train pass to their training facility. Your family tree may have a Harvey Girl among its branches.

From the late 1800s to the mid-1950s Harvey House restaurants and dining rooms upheld their tradition of quality food, high standards of service, and reasonable prices. The Harvey Girls served weary travelers gourmet meals in thirty minutes. Some served in restaurants, others in lunchrooms. All donned the standard uniform of black or white starched skirt, high-collared blouse, with a bib and apron. They served their patrons with practiced precision and polished etiquette.

Each patron would tell their waitress whether they preferred coffee, hot tea, iced tea or milk. The cup code enabled their choice to be served quickly. If the waitress left the cup right side up in its saucer, that meant coffee. Upside down meant hot tea. Upside down, but tilted against the saucer meant iced tea. Upside down, away from the saucer meant milk. Patrons who changed the positions of their cups risked getting the wrong drink.

The advertisement for “young women 18 to 30 years of age, of good character, attractive and intelligent” as waitresses in Harvey Eating Houses on the Santa Fe Railroad in the West is legendary. Their contribution to the growth of the American West is preserved in poetry, song, and film. The humorist, Will Rogers, observed that the Harvey Houses kept the West in food and wives.

You’ve probably seen the 1946 musical romance movie The Harvey Girls, starring Judy Garland, as a mail order bride. You may have sung “On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe” along with her. Visit http://harvey-house.info/blog-hg/category/fred-harvey/ to watch a 1946 trailer.

When Fred Harvey entered the hospitality arena, Americans were still looking to England and France to define style and substance of an elegant lifestyle. Harvey gave them a look at their own country, encouraged them to explore places like the Grand Canyon, take home Indian artifacts, dine on exquisite regional foods, all the while taking in the Wild West. He’s credited with inventing the “Santa Fe style.”

At a time when the American West had a reputation of being hospitality-challenged, Fred Harvey offered meals that were culinary masterpieces. Cowboys could eat a steak that wasn’t cooked to resemble shoe leather, and cowgirls could toss aside “mountain oysters” and taste fresh Maine oysters. Reading through the recipes in The Harvey House Cookbook by George H. Foster and Peter C. Weiglin and Stephen Fried’s Appetite for America: Fred Harvey and the Business of Civilizing the Wild West--One Meal at a Time will make you hungry and motivate you to try your hand at cooking up some of the recipes.

While you read recipes like Fred Harvey’s Chocolate Custard—yum—you will chuckle at some of the directions and ingredients in other recipes. I still wonder about macaroni that can be coiled around the bottom of a buttered mold or exactly what is loppered milk. I’ve gathered the ingredients for Hungarian Beef Goulash with Potato Dumplings for Sunday dinner.

At its peak, Harvey Girls worked in over sixty-five restaurants and lunch counters, at a dozen large hotels. We often take up the Fred Harvey story when he was at the height of being the “father of the American service industry.” We don’t hear much about him starting at the bottom of the ladder as a dishwasher — a pot walloper. He learned the restaurant business from the ground up. As a government postal worker, he participated in the nation’s first traveling post office. He had first hand experience about the miserable plight of travelers and their meals.

Stephen Fried’s Appetite for America gives a fresh look and some little known facts about Fred and the Harvey Girls. Fried called Fred Harvey “the founding father of the American service industry” and creator of one of the first nationally recognized American brands. Visit http://www.stephenfried.com/blog/ for a wealth of information about Fred Harvey and the Harvey Girls.

Lesley Poling-Kempes wrote The Harvey Girls: Women Who Opened the West (1989). It is one of the first definitive works on the topic. She also produced a two-book historical paper doll fashion series, which is very valuable for writers and researchers in describing outer and inner wear for the women at work and play. View her books at http://www.lesleypoling-kempes.com/mombooks.html.

There have been fictional accounts, created from historically accurate sources, about the Harvey Girls. My co-author, Artie Stockton, and I submitted our first Harvey Girl novel, Three Came by Rail, in May 1994. Tracie Peterson penned her delightful Desert Rose trilogy beginning with Shadows of the Canyon in 2002. Sheila Wood Foard wrote Harvey Girl (2006) for teens. Frances M. Wood wrote When Molly was a Harvey Girl (2010), a fictional account of her great-grandmother’s experience as a Harvey Girl.

During the research trips for Three Came by Rail, I had the opportunity to visit the Castaneda hotel and tour of some of the women’s room. Trips included Lamy, Belen, Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Las Vegas. Below, I’m at the Castaneda and below that is an old picture of the whole hotel.

Cynthia Hickey, who writes on the 3rd of each month for this CFHS blog, has an upcoming four book series "Finding Love the Harvey Girl Way" beginning in July, 2013. The first book is Cooking Up Love. Here's a preview-- TABITHA MCCLELLAND seeks employment as onr of "Harvey's Girls", moving to Topeka, Kansas, and a new life out West. Knowing one of the restrictions of her job is to remain single, Tabitha is dismayed when she begins to have feelings for the restaurant's cook. Surely, love can't be God's will for her life. It didn't go along with her plans at all. ADAM FOSTER works as a cook at Fred Harvey's restaurant in Topeka in order to save money to open his own restaurant in California. Although his parents are helping with half of the needed funds, he wants to pull his weight and signs a six-month contract with Fred Harvey. The last thing he wants is to fall in love. Tabitha wants a life of adventure. Adam wants to be an entrepreneur. Can they set aside their separate goals and find what truly matters?

The Harvey House web site at http://www.harveyhouses.net/index.html has a collection of photographs, links, and comments about various Harvey Houses in Arizona, California, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas.

Another site with pictures and information is http://harvey-house.info/.

New information about restored and renovated Harvey Houses is raising awareness and renewing interest in this era in history. The Castaneda Hotel in Las Vegas, New Mexico, considered one of the nation’s most promising and most endangered historical landmark is on the brink of rising from closure. News reports say that it will be restored. That’s great news.

Tom VanWormer, the "unofficial coordinator" for the Harvey Girls in Colorado, especially on the Colorado Midland, was able to document reimbursements from the Fred Harvey Company to the Colorado Midland in a 1893 ledger. Mr. VanWormer confirmed the discovery of three possibly four “new” Harvey locations in Colorado–which the company ran from 1890-1895, the years the Santa Fe owned the Colorado Midland. So it can now be reported there were Harvey Houses and Harvey Girls in: Cascade, Idyllwild, and Leadville.

It's been a pleasure sharing a bit about one of my passions with you.

Oh, the Harvey Chef served his eggs with minced chicken, mushrooms, and garnished with buttered asparagus tips.

Come back on April 27th and see what's going on.

Don't forget to leave a comment to be in the CFHS giveaways!

My give-away this month is a alpaca wool scarf knitted from an 1898 pattern used during the Spanish American war. Plus a fun scarf that’s all the rage now—Starbella Flash lace.

CFHS's GRAND PRIZE—Kindle.

Second Place winner will receive a $25 gift card to Amazon.

For each day you comment on a CFHS blog entry, you receive one entry in the Kindle and $25 Amazon gift card giveaway that will be drawn on April 1st. Comment on every post in the month of March and earn 31 entries! Enjoy the posts!

History of the Harvey Girls by Donna Schlachter

Outside a typical Harvey House c.1900

 

While Fred Harvey and his company changed how folks traveled the west from 1876 until the mid-1950s, perhaps the thing most folks recall are the waitresses in his restaurants, who came to be known as The Harvey Girls.

Dining cars were implemented in the 1880s, but food was expensive, and most passengers opted to purchase their meals at the train depots, which usually provided only sandwiches and coffee. Mr. Harvey felt there had to be a better way.


After building a string of hotels along the rail lines to serve for passengers who
were stopping over, he soon added dining rooms with full service guaranteed in half an hour.

Originally, Mr. Harvey hired only men to serve the meals, but in 1883, he had to fire his entire staff at one of his houses in New Mexico. His manager recommended he hire women because they were less likely to get into drunken brawls.

However, a ready supply of young, reputable women was in short supply west of the Mississippi, so he advertised in the east for women willing to train in Kansas City then travel west to their new home for at least the next six months.

Each Harvey Girl signed a contract and affirmed she wouldn’t date other employees, would observe the dress and conduct codes, would wear and maintain her uniform, and would generally do as she was told. In exchange, she received room and board, was introduced to a better class of patrons, and was paid an above-average salary while living in a part of the country she’d unlikely have had the opportunity to ever see otherwise.

The classic Harvey Girl uniform c. 1900

 

At first, the concept of a woman working outside the house engendered criticism, mostly because of past experience with employers and situations of low repute, including saloons and brothels. Mr. Harvey countered this disapproval by using stark uniforms reminiscent of a nun’s habit, forbidding makeup, enforcing curfews, and hiring women with good references.

The Harvey Girls worked six or seven days a week, often twelve or more hours a day, serving meals to train passengers. Food orders were telegraphed ahead so meals were ready when the train pulled in, since the stopover was most often only thirty minutes. In those days, other restaurants and dining rooms served bad food at exorbitant prices, so the Harvey House standards were much appreciated.

In fact, Mr. Harvey insisted that his chefs be professionally trained, and he limited the number of dishes available to customers to streamline both the ordering and the preparation of the meals.

Many young women replied to his ads, and records indicate that more than 100,000 women worked for him over the eighty years of business until the private automobile spelled the decline in train travel.

Harvey Girls taking a sun break c. 1900

Perhaps one of the most endearing facts about the Harvey House and its “Girls” is that many of them started working for Mr. Harvey in hopes of meeting a rich passenger from a train who would marry them and take them elsewhere. However, most ended up renewing their contracts many times. And even when their contract was done, more than half of the women stayed in the area, married and having families, helping to settle the Wild West. One of the longest-serving Harvey Girls worked for the company in excess of 40 years.


Resources:

https://truewestmagazine.com/harvey-girls/

https://cowgirlmagazine.com/wild-women-of-the-west-the-harvey-girls/

About Donna:

Donna writes historical suspense under her own name, and contemporary suspense under her alter ego of Leeann Betts, and has been published more than 30 times in novellas, full-length novels, and non-fiction books. She is a member of ACFW, Writers on the Rock, SinC, Pikes Peak Writers, and CAN; facilitates a critique group; teaches writing classes; ghostwrites; edits; and judges in writing contests. www.HiStoryThruTheAges.com

Thanksgiving All Month Long

By Linda Farmer Harris

Today, November 27, is the 331st day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 34 days remaining until the end of 2013. 

By now, tomorrow’s Thanksgiving meals and festivities are planned and, hopefully, under control. Tomorrow is also the first day of Chanukah/Hanukkah. What are you thankful for that you will be sharing with loved ones tomorrow?

On November first, a friend asked me to list something each day that I'm thankful for. However, there was one caveat, I couldn’t simply be thankful for my husband, our daughter, family, or this group of talented writers. It had to be specific and beyond how I’ve been thankful for them in the past.

For example: On the first day, I was thankful that I’m finally getting a handle on cooking for two after years of cooking for a larger family. Leftovers are fine, but not four days in a row. Naturally, I’m thankful for Jerry, my husband of 47 years who puts up with my love of trying historical recipes. He says more and more of them are "keepers."

On the 19th, I was thankful that 44 years ago, God had already set into motion the answer to our prayers for a husband for our new-born daughter. He brought John, born in October '69, and Amanda, born in November '69, together 40 years later – a first marriage for both – in a way that can only be called a God-incidence. Truly an example that God’s timing isn’t ours.

Early in our CFHS adventure, I wrote that I’m an ardent fan of the Harvey Girls and the empire that Fred Harvey built, including the Southwest Indian Detour Couriers. On the 20th, I was thankful for my mother preserving my grandmother’s box of “receipts” and passing these recipes on to me and my sister. Many of them are refined from my great grandmother’s recipes. Many of them still used weekly.

For fun, I consulted my print copy of The Harvey House Cookbook by George H. Foster & Peter C. Weiglin (1992, Taylor Trade Publishing) to see what would have been served at a Harvey House on Thanksgiving Day.

Sara Bonisteel, Epicurious, 6/18/2013, writes “Fried and his team have posted hundreds of recipes that haven't been followed in more than 80 years as a sort of living Americana cookbook, in the hopes that chefs and the culinarily curious will test the recipes.” http://www.epicurious.com/articlesguides/blogs/editor/2013/06/fred-harvey-railroad-restaurant-recipes-harvey-girls-cookbook-project.html
 
If you are interested in online recipes from The Harvey Girls Cookbook Project coordinated and compiled by Stephen Fried go to http://fredharveycookbook.tumblr.com/ or to the archives http://fredharveycookbook.tumblr.com/archive. This project posts original Fred Harvey recipes daily, and test-drives them weekly in their Test Kitchen.

 

I found a menu from the El Tovar-Grand Canyon Thanksgiving Dinner, November 27, 1930. The menu was the traditional turkey with stuffing and gravy; cranberry sauce; mashed potatoes; sweet potatoes; winter squash; yams; corn; green bean casserole. Dessert was traditional also with pumpkin pie; pecan pie; sweet potato pie washed down with apple cider.

Dinner isn’t the only meal of the day so I decided that we’ll start tomorrow’s festivities with the Harvey Girl Special Little Thin Orange Pancakes served with maple syrup and bacon crisps.

Recipe: 

1 cup pancake mix
1 cup orange juice
1/4 diced orange sections and juice (1/2 an orange)
1 teaspoon grated orange peel (also from 1/2 an orange)
Combine all ingredients.  Bake small pancakes on hot griddle, using one tablespoon butter for each pancake. Serve with maple syrup, honey, or jelly. Serves 12; 3 (2 1/4 inch diameter) pancakes per serving. (A favorite at St. Louis Union Station)

Courtesy of http://vincentennialcookblog.wordpress.com/

I love reading old recipes. Deciphering some of them can be challenging as well as interesting. How often do you serve Alligator Pears? Do you have a caster on your table?

Before supermarkets sold different varieties of sugar, cooks used a "caster" or "castor" to separate very fine grains of sugar, creating what we call "superfine" sugar. Since smaller grains dissolve more quickly, superfine sugar is used for delicate foods such as meringues. 

Probably no one uses casters anymore because superfine sugar can be bought or even "confectioner's" sugar, which is even finer. However, to create a little superfine sugar out of normal table sugar by grinding it in a food processor, a caster could be used to help filer the sugar being ground.

Interest in the Harvey Girls isn’t waning. In the 1880's, over 100,000 young women worked as waitresses along the transcontinental railroad opening the doors of both the West and the workplace to women. 

A new documentary, 'The Harvey Girls: Opportunity Bound' will air on PBS channel KCPT, tomorrow night, November 28 at 7pm. Katrina Parks <katrinaparks@mac.com>, Director/Producer, has put up information about the documentary on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/HarveyGirlsDocumentary, where an up-to-date list of events and all the press is available. DVDs of the documentary are for sale. The film made its debut this summer at the National Archives in Kansas City, in conjunction with their exhibit on Fred Harvey, The Man, The Brand, and the American West. The exhibit will be up through January 4, 2014.

The film explores the life of Fred Harvey and his company which left its mark by not only providing work opportunities for women, but by being among the first companies to promote cultural diversity in the workplace by hiring Hispanic and Native American women to be waitresses along with their Anglo peers. The Harvey Girls, whose workforce continued to flourish until the 1960s, were true pioneers and set a new standard of excellence for women in the workplace, paving the way for generations of independent young women to come.

For a sneak peek of the documentary go to http://www.harveygirlsdocumentary.com.

Don’t forget Cynthia Hickey’s book featuring the Harvey Girls Cooking Up Love (Heartsong Presents, July 2013) for a bit of sweet indulgence after the day is done. Reward yourself. Cynthia is the CFHS Blogger on the 3rd of each month.

Oh, by the way, an Alligator Pear is an Avocado.

My give-away this month is a $20 Amazon gift certificate. Leave a comment for a chance to win.

Have a happy and blessed Thanksgiving Day,

This year, Lin and Jerry celebrate their third Thanksgiving in Chimney Rock, Colorado. When she isn't researching the many fascinating things in and around their ranch, she is working on her new series Voices in the Desert. The first book, Treasures Among the Ruins, is set in 1926 and introduces Cornelia Miller and her adventures as a Southwestern Indian Detour Courier. The other four books span the years 1928-1932.

The Allure of the Harvey Girls by Donna Schlachter -- with a Giveaway!

Welcome to Heroes, Heroines, and History. Read all the way through the post to find out how to leave a comment and be entered into a random drawing for a print copy (US only) of MissAdventure Brides Collection, which includes my story, Detours of the Heart.

The idea for the story came from research on the Harvey House. Created by Fred Harvey, Sr,

Fred Harvey Sr

as an alternative to the seedy hotels and restaurants springing up along America’s railroads in the 1870’s, the Harvey House restaurants filled a huge need: Until Mr. Harvey and his iconic restaurants came along, it was virtually impossible to get a decent meal anywhere along the tracks.

But beginning in 1876, the Harvey House chain of restaurants changed all that. Mr. Harvey hired professional chefs, and in the beginning, personally trained the front-of-house staff, including the servers, busboys, and managers.

Harvey Girl and Customer

Up until then, girls who worked in restaurants were but a half-step—morally, at least—above soiled doves. Or so folks thought. Mr. Harvey wanted to create a safe and clean place to eat for the passengers on the trains, so he hired only young, clean, unmarried girls, mostly between the ages of 18 and 30. They had to sign a year-long contract, couldn’t date or court, had to meet curfew, had to work hard, and had to demonstrate good moral character. Passengers were promised their meals in 30 minutes or less, because the train would stop to allow them to eat and had a schedule to keep. If a meal took longer than that, somebody had to answer directly to Mr. Harvey.




While doing research for the first book, I came across an interesting reference to Mr. Harvey’s love of all things Southwestern. In fact, he acquired one of the largest collections of early-19th-century native artifacts.

Squaw Blossom Necklace

As the years went past, Mr. Harvey added hotels to his business line, and soon added gift shops in these hotels. In the Southwest, he realized passengers were enthralled with the native American culture they saw evidence of but had no real contact with, so in the early 1920’s, he established the Southwestern Indian Detours. These tours provided a bus ride out to a local Indian reservation where they could meet with the natives, see them at work, and purchase their goods such as woven blankets, clay pots, leather goods, and jewelry. Eventually, he carried similar items in his gift shops for those who either didn’t or couldn’t take the tours. As with all things good, counterfeiting soon sprang up, which troubled Mr. Harvey greatly, as he saw that such a practice would devalue the culture as well as the products.

La Alvarado, Albuquerque, NM

The entire Harvey House culture spanned about 100 years of our country’s history, ending in the late 1960’s when passenger trains began including dining cars, negating the need for trains to stop for meals. There are still a few original buildings left standing which have now been repurposed, and
many museums criss-cross the states between Kansas and California.


Perhaps one of the most endearing facts about the Harvey House and its “Girls” is that many of them started working for Mr. Harvey in hopes of meeting a rich passenger from a train who would marry them and take them elsewhere. However, most ended up renewing their contracts many times. One of the longest-serving Harvey Girls worked for the company in excess of 25 years.



Giveaway: which do you prefer: history or mystery? Leave a comment to be entered into a random drawing for a print copy (US only) of the MissAdventure Brides Collection.


About Donna:

Donna lives in Denver with husband Patrick. She writes historical suspense under her own name, and contemporary suspense under her alter ego of Leeann Betts, and has been published more than 30 times in novellas and full-length novels. She is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers, Writers on the Rock, Christian Authors Network, and Sisters In Crime; facilitates a critique group, and teaches writing classes. Donna ghostwrites, edits, and judges in writing contests. She loves history and research, and travels extensively for both. She is represented by Terrie Wolf of AKA Literary Management.





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About MissAdventure Brides Collection: These seven daring damsels don’t let the norms of their eras hold them back from adventure.



About Detours of the Heart: A tour guide who wants to move on, a playboy who’s never had a place to call home—can they overcome their own plans and allow God to make their path straight, or will they take yet another detour?

THE HARVEY GIRLS By Cynthia Hickey

Excitement! Independence! Adventure! The waitresses of the Fred Harvey Company were strong, moral-minded, and not afraid of hard work, and rarely did they fulfill their six-month contract with the company, although required to. Most were married a few months into their careers. Known as The Women Who Tamed the West, Fred Harvey was very particular about the type of women he hired. WANTED: Young women, eighteen to thirty years of age, of good moral character, attractive and intelligent as waitresses in Harvey Eating Houses on the Santa Fe Railroad in the West. Wages $17.50 per month with room and board. Liberal tips customary. Experience not necessary. Write Fred Harvey, Union Depot, Kansas City, Missouri.

Many of the Harvey Girls were young ladies with no family and no prospects. A job with the esteemed Harvey Company, traveling the railroad, meeting new people, often seemed like a dream come true to many of them. They didn't mind the strict rules and long hours. They were fending for themselves!

It wasn't until the Judy Garland movie in the 1940s that most people learned who these amazing women were. Garland romanticized a career choice that was often anything but glamorous. Not when trails pulled into stations with hungry passengers that needed to be fed, sometimes within a half hour. Still, young girls flocked to be accepted into the company.

Starting at the bottom, earning points for a job well-done, the girls could work their way up the ranks to the priviledged title of Head Waitress (called Wagon Boss) by some. The Harvey Girls made waitressing an honorable profession in a time when many people frowned on women working outside the home. These brave girls cleared a path not only to the west, but for women's freedom. The first of my Harvey books is newly released. Leave a comment for a chance to win Cooking Up Love, Finding Love the Harvey Girl Way.

On the Atchinson, Topeka, and the Santa Fe

By Tiffany Amber Stockton

Last month, I began a series highlighting Colorado Springs history. If you missed that post, you can read it here: https://www.hhhistory.com/2020/03/grand-opening-colorado-springs-take-2.html. Upon further reflection, I'll be expanding my focus on history throughout the state, not just one city, although Colorado Springs will be in the limelight more often than not. :)

This month, I'm going to shine the spotlight on the 10 stations in the state of Colorado which featured a Harvey House at their depots, and thereby also had Harvey Girls.

COLORADO's HARVEY GIRLS

Ever since I read Tracie Peterson's Westward Chronicles trilogy with the heroines working as Harvey Girls, I've been fascinated by their stories and the rich history that has come with this small bit of America's western past. For many years, I got excited every time I found a story about a Harvey Girl or learned something about the restaurant chain that once existed. I always wanted to visit one, but none of them are open and active anymore.

However, many of them have been re-purposed into other useful buildings or businesses. Unfortunately, they were all along the train routes that ran from Kansas into Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.

Or, so I thought!

Imagine my surprise when I was driving downtown in Colorado Springs and saw an older building that didn't fit with the rest of the buildings around it. My curiosity piqued, I crossed the road and pulled into the parking lot to investigate. What I discovered both thrilled and surprised me.

Santa Fe Depot, Colorado Springs, CO

There was a Harvey House restaurant at that very spot! One problem, though. There wasn't any railroad, and the building was situated in the middle of dozens of other buildings in all directions. Well, since I rarely let historical gems like this get away without further research, I went home and did some research.

As it turns out, there WAS once a railroad station there, and the track ran right out front. At the time, that station (called the Santa Fe station, oddly enough) was the easternmost point of Colorado Springs. Years passed, and the city expanded. With that expansion came the shifting of the railroad route to another track, thereby ending the need for a restaurant at a station that had been shut down. Eventually, the station and buildings became offices and warehouses for storage, but I can just see that area during its heyday in my mind.

Santa Fe Depot, Trinidad, CO

I have started and sketched out a few stories where that station will be the focal point, but I also plan to feature the other locations throughout Colorado once I can sell at least 1 of the books set right here in my hometown. One story is about a secret admirer and involves a combination of a Harvey Girl and what *would* have been a Pony Express rider, only that service only lasted from 1860-1861. So, I changed it to a mail delivery stagecoach driver. *grins* My second story features the daughter of a prominent family who is tired of her life being scheduled, so she rebels and takes a job as a Harvey Girl to gain some independence. The work proves much harder than she anticipates, and she finds an ally in the chef, a man with a secret identity of his own.

That's Colorado Springs.

Here are the other locations throughout the state:

El Otero Hotel, La Junta, CO

• Cascade (eventually moved to Woodland Park)
• Idyllwild
• Leadville
• Hugo
• La Junta
• Pueblo
• Trinidad
• Palmer Lake
• Colorado Springs

The restaurants or lunchrooms operated at train platforms or inside hotels starting in 1879, with the most active time from 1895-1920. The last Colorado Harvey House, El Otero Hotel in La Junta, closed in 1948.

If you want to read a great blog post briefly summarizing the Harvey House restaurants and their impact on American history, check out The Restless Native.


NOW IT'S YOUR TURN:

* Have you ever eaten at a Harvey House? If so, where?

* What little known gems exist where YOU live that many might not know exist?

* What did you like the most about today's post? What topics would you like to see covered in future posts?

Leave answers to these questions or any comments you have on the post below. Come back on the 9th of May for my next appearance.

---

BIO

Tiffany Amber Stockton has been crafting and embellishing stories since childhood, when she was accused of having a very active imagination and cited with talking entirely too much. Today, she has honed those childhood skills to become an award-winning and best-selling author and speaker who is also an advocate for literacy as an educational consultant with Usborne Books. She loves to share life-changing products and ideas with others to help better their lives.

She lives with her husband and fellow author, Stuart Vaughn Stockton, along with their two children and two dogs in Colorado. She has sold twenty (23) books so far and is represented by Tamela Hancock Murray of the Steve Laube Agency. You can find her on Facebook and GoodReads.

Southwestern Indian Detours ~ by Linda Farmer Harris

Even now the old Santa Fe Trail conjures up romance and Western adventure. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway laid tracks along that trail from Independence, Missouri to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Map courtesy of Maps and Art.com

My CFHS March 27th post centered around Fred Harvey and the Harvey Girls. He advertised for "young women 18-30 years of age, of good character, attractive and intelligent" as waitresses in his restaurants. He opened the first Harvey House in 1876 in Topeka, Kansas. By 1917, there were 100 Harvey Houses across the United States.

It wasn't long before Mr. Harvey and his staff saw another need and they set out to solve it. Travel in the Southwest was dismal, if not downright dangerous. There were few amenities to attract the wealthy travelers, who now wanted to get off the train and walk amongst the flora and fauna. Crossing the country in a private car was still a rugged undertaking with few surfaced highways.

The Indian Detours were formed to allow travelers to leave the train and take one to three day wilderness territory tours into the Indian Reservations of New Mexico and Arizona. In 1899, the "horseless carriage" was commissioned to be build for addition to the Harvey transportation stable of wagons and buckboards. With luxury ever the hallmark of Fred Harvey, the fleet of Harvey Cars were Cadillacs, Franklins, White Buses, and the Packards, which didn't last more than 30,000 miles on the rough roads. The large vehicles were to be used for sightseers from the Santa Fe station at Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River. In keeping with the railroad theme, the Harvey Cars were called road pullmans.

Fred Harvey Tour Car, Driver, and Courier at the Little Colorado River Gorge 

Grand Canyon Arizona

Source: My Historic Postcard Collection

Once the El Tovar opened at the Grand Canyon in 1905, the Harvey staff began organizing more extensive entertainment for guests. Tour areas and information on the culture of the Hopi and Navajo peoples were developed. Seven different routes, covering 13 to 66 miles, left from the El Tovar.  For a flat fee of $4, a guest could travel through pine forests, view amazing rock formations, natural springs, wells, waterfalls, and visit area ranches. For $30, a 66 mile round trip included Aztec ruins, dams, lakes, and wildlife.

The Fred Harvey El Tovar Hotel South Rim circa 1910

Grand Canyon Arizona

Source: My Historic Postcard Collection

By 1923, the Grand Canyon - the big gully - was dedicated as a National Park. Brochures advertised four of the most unique tours "in all the word": the Grand Canyon, the Petrified Forest, the Painted Desert, and the Indian Pueblos.

Traveling through these places was one thing, but learning about them was a whole new endeavor. The Indian Detours were organized in the spring of 1926 to conduct travel through oldest America, in the New Mexico Rockies between Las Vegas and Albuquerque.

The Albuquerque Morning Journal, August 20, 1925, carried the announcement. In part it advertised, "The three-day personally conducted educational tour will comprise visits to old Santa Fe, the inhabited Indian pueblos of Tesuque, Santa Clara, San Juan, Santa Domingo, and other points in the picturesque valley of the upper Rio Grande, as well as to the huge communal ruins of Puye, a cliff pueblo 20 centuries old."

This all-expense motor trip would cover nearly 300 miles, and include meals and hotel accommodations to well known, but "little seen places in the Indo-Spanish southwest." According the R. H. Clarkson, Assistant to Ford Harvey, Fred Harvey's son, "There is more of historic, prehistoric, human and scenic interest in New Mexico than in any other similar area in the world, not excepting India, Egypt, Europe, or Asia."

The "personally conducted" feature of the excursions would prove to be the secret of the Indian Detours success. A school for drivers and couriers was conducted by the Santa Fe and Harvey system to give the 'detourists' the ultimate experience.

Erna Fergusson, who had used women guides in her Koshare Tours, was hired to train the first twenty Harvey Detour Couriers.  When interviewed she said, "Couriers are expected to be young women of education and some social grace, able to meet easily and well all kinds of people. They are expected to be intelligent enough to learn many facts about this country and to impart them in a way to interest intelligent travelers. They are selected also with an eye to their knowledge of the southwest, their knowledge of Spanish, and any special knowledge or ability that will assist them in presenting this country properly."

The top training candidates were college graduates, at least 25 years old, and primarily natives of the area. They had to be willing to take a crash course in history, politics, sociology, anthropology, geology and arts. Unlike the Harvey Girls, there was no rule that they remain unmarried in order to continue working. Some of the first applicants were daughters of prominent New Mexicans - senators, secretary of state, judges, ambassadors. In the first group, professional backgrounds varied. Two had been guides for the Fergusson's Koshare Tours; some had been newspaper women; one was a writer; one, a member of an interior decorating establishment. There were teachers, one had taught at the U.S. Indian School at the Tesuque Pueblo, and another from the New Mexico School for the Deaf. Being fluent in other languages was also a plus.

A veritable army of instructors was assembled from all over the nation. The Couriers were expected to know enough Spanish to carry on a basic conversation at the pueblos. The Indians spoke not only their own tribal dialect, but, in many cases, also spoke Spanish. Classes were often conducted on-site at the pueblos, artist colonies and homes, art museums, and in the desert. The Indian Detours with the addition of the Couriers became so popular that new recruits were trained every six months.

Typical test questions might include: "How do Indian women bake bread in outdoor ovens?", "What language do they speak?", "When did the cliff dwellers inhabit Puye?", "How much is an acre of land in New Mexico, and how many crops of alfalfa can be raised in one season?"

They had to have statistics about the area on the tip of their tongues. Knowledge such as mountain heights, population of various pueblos, names of Taos painters and artisans, and explain the features of the desert.

Southwestern Indian Detour Couriers - part of the first group of trainees

They wore uniforms that were attractive, consistent with the theme of the tour, comfortable, and durable.

Detour Courier Outfit, History Room, Bright Angel Lodge, South Rim of Grand Canyon

Winifred Shuler in the patio of Fine Arts Museum, 1930 Indian Detour brochure

courtesy of Journal of the Southwest, University of Arizona,
College of Social & Behavioral Sciences

Couriers were as hearty and talented as their hand-picked counterpart, the HarveyCoach drivers.  They could fix a flat and pump gas, and a myriad of other automobile related chores. One of the Couriers, Anita Rose, was called by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a "pioneer hostess among cliff dwellers" and an example of the new college woman. Next month we'll talk a bit more about the Couriers and their Drivers.

Have you ever visited the wonders and felt the enchantment of New Mexico?

Leave a comment for a chance to win a book gift certificate. Please include your email address and specify that you would like to be in the drawing. Winner will be posted in the comments on this blog post no later than June 22nd and in the sidebar.

Lin grew up and graduated from Lovington High School, Lovington, New Mexico. The first book in her new Voices in the Desert series, Lost Memories, is set in 1926 and introduces Mariana Forbes and her adventures as a Southwestern Indian Detour Courier. The other four books span the years of the Indian Detour Couriers from 1926-1932.

RAILROAD RESTAURANTS OF OLD By Cynthia Hickey

It all began with a handshake between Fred Harvey and Charles F. Morse, superintendent of the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railway. Harvey would open the restaurants and Morse guaranteed the trains would stop at such restaurants. Harvey's slogan was "maintaining quality regardless of cost".

Continuing my blogging series on the Harvey girls, I thought I'd let you readers know a bit of what led Fred Harvey to open his first Harvey restaurant.

Often times, train passengers would be seated in a restaurant and not be served until the whistle blew to board again. Their plates would be removed and served to the next crowd and on and on until the food was no longer palatable. Fred Harvey was appalled.

The food was often beans, soda biscuits, and coffee, with little variation. The food was either undercooked or overlooked, and passengers ate at their own risk. Luxuries such as linen and china were unheard of. The average price of this meal was fifty cents and split between the restaurant and the railroad. It was a scam to make a buck.

Passengers became sick or died from spoiled food. The smell on the trains was often unbearable and attracted flies. Except for his decision to hire only women, drawing them from their safe homes in the east to work in the wilds of the west, Fred Harvey was viewed as a godsend.

Fred's first restaurants, one in Wallas, Kansas and the other in Hugo, Colorado, failed. Due to financial reasons, Fred was unable to quit his job in a restaurant and was unable to oversee his standards. he disagreed with the man hired to oversee the operations and the restaurants closed within a year. Fred did not give up.

When a group of traveling dignitaries stopped at Fred's lunch counter in Topeka, Kansas, his dream became a reality and Harvey restaurants popped up along the ATSF line.

The Harvey Girls became a reality and travelers could not be happier. Fred Harvey set a standard that still exists today in our modern restaurants. A standard of fine food and luxurious surroundings.

Cooking Up Love is the first book in Cynthia's Harvey girl series. The other three release in 2014.
Tabitha is in search of adventure
Tabitha McClelland knows accepting a job as a Harvey House waitress can be risky. Traveling alone to the rough-and-tumble West just isn't done by young ladies of good breeding. But far more dangerous is her powerful attraction to Adam Foster. Family means everything to the widowed chef, but the self-sufficient Tabitha cherishes her freedom above all else.

Adam is captivated by the fiercely independent Tabitha. Fraternizing with the female employees is strictly forbidden, but the Harvey Girl awakens feelings too compelling to ignore. Can Adam convince Tabby to share his dream of a future in California—together?

http://www.amazon.com/Cooking-Up-Love-Heartsong-Presents/dp/0373486650/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1379601964&sr=8-2&keywords=cooking+up+love

WHO WAS THE MAN BEHIND THE HARVEY GIRLS? By Cynthia Hickey

Very little are known about these amazing women called The Harvey Girls. They've often been described as "The Women Who Tamed the West", and that saying is very accurate. At the age of fifteen, Fred Harvey left England for America and began working in a restaurant. The Civil War, while hurting restaurants, were good for the railroad, and Harvey changed careers. He continued moving westward and worked in the railroad business, but never forgot what he'd learned in restaurants. At a time in history when railroad food was little better than pig slop, if it was offered at all, Fred Harvey opened his first restaurant in 1876 in Kansas. This man saw a need along the Atchinson, Topeka and Santa Fe railroads and acted on that need by providing gourmet food served by attractive, moral, white women. Hiring architects, he designed upscale dining rooms and hotels to serve the railroad guests, employing American men and women to serve those headed west. He kept the hotels to fit their surroundings and the culture of the towns in which they were built. Notice the Indian influence in this Lamy, New Mexico hotel. Fred Harvey's company would bring good food at reasonable prices in clean, elegant restaurants, to the travelling public throughout the Southwest. They also brought civilization, community, and industry to the Wild West. Over the next few months, I'll be digging deeper into the Harvey Girl history in celebration of my four contracted Harvey Girl stories. The first one, Cooking Up Love, (The Harvey Girl Way) releases July 1, 2013. These amazing women continued to inspire the women pioneers of today. I hope you continue to visit and follow the journey as we meet these amazing women.

Fred Harvey: Taming the West One Meal at a Time

Nothing changed America as much as the iron horse.  People were finally able to travel across country in relative comfort and not have to worry about the weather, Indians, or some of the other mishaps that plagued early travelers.  A train passenger’s greatest fear was food poisoning. That’s how bad meals were along the rails.

It took one enterprising Englishman to change the way travelers ate. His name was Fred Harvey and his Harvey House restaurants eventually stretched along the Santa Fe railroad tracks from Chicago all the way to Los Angeles and San Francisco—one every hundred miles.

Hear That Whistle Blow

Fred Harvey invented the “fast-food” concept long before Ray Kroc.  Passengers were allowed only thirty minutes to get off the train, eat and board again, so time was of the essence.  He devised a system in which train conductors would telegraph passenger food orders to the restaurant in advance. This allowed the restaurant staff to prepare the food before the train pulled into the station. 

From Dishwasher to Household Name

Harvey learned the business the hard way.  After traveling to America at the age of seventeen, he landed a job as a dishwasher at a famed New York restaurant, working his way through the ranks from dishwasher to line-cook.  He eventually landed in St. Louis where he took over the Merchants Dining Room Saloon.  His success lasted only a short time. The winds of war could not be ignored and after his partner joined the secessionist army, taking all the money the two men had saved, Harvey’s restaurant was doomed. 

After a series of jobs and personal losses, he eventually took over an eating

Harvey House in Barstow, CA.

house at the Santa Fe depot in Topeka.  He arranged for fresh fruit and meat to be railed in from Chicago and other states.  His food was so good that railroad officials worried that no one would want to travel past Topeka.

First Female Workforce

As the number of his depot restaurants increased, so did his troubles. Black men were hired as waiters, but this often created conflict with cowboys.  After one unpleasant midnight brawl at the Raton Harvey eating house, Harvey’s friend Tom Gables suggested a radical idea; why not replace black male waiters with women?   Harvey decided to give Tom’s idea a try.

Harvey ran ads in newspapers for “young women of good character, attractive and intelligent, 18 to 30, to work in the Harvey Eating Houses.” He offered a salary of $17.50 a month, a tidy sum for a young woman.  Soon he had all the help he needed.

The women lived in dormitories above the restaurants under the watchful eye of a house mother.  Their uniforms consisted of a black dress, black shoes and stockings, and a crisp white apron.  The women had to adhere to strict rules and were not allowed to marry for six months.

His new female staff was a great success and helped ease racial tensions. Even the roughest of cowboys and railroad workers were willing to don the required (and dreaded) dinner jacket just for the pleasure of being served a good steak by a pretty girl.

He Kept the West in Food—and Wives

That quote from Will Rogers says it all; Among his other talents, Fred Harvey not only “civilized the west” he was indirectly responsible for more than 5000 marriages. That’s enough to make you want to forgive him for inventing fast-food. Almost….

In case you're wondering, the reason I'm writing about Fred Harvey 

is because of my new book. 

Someone is killing off the Harvey Girls and undercover Pinkerton detective Katie Madison hopes to find the killer before the killer finds her—or before she burns down the restaurant trying. 

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