FAST FOOD: ROADSIDE RESTAURANTS IN THE AUTOMOBILE AGE, by John A. Jakle and Keith A. Sculle, Johns Hopkins University Press, 380 pages, $34.95.
Fast food was a staple of the American diet, and of the American roadside landscape, long before anyone thought to attach that catchy and slightly derogatory term to it. In fact, the industry is entering a new century with a less-than-ideal image. Rare is the patron who would praise fast food’s quality or applaud a decision to bypass a nice, sit-down restaurant in favor of the breathless pace of a drive-through. Yet who are we trying to kid? “Billions and billions” of us have made fast food synonymous with American culture for the past 45 years.
Jakle and Sculle craft a more upbeat image of roadside restaurants. One that should prove immensely enjoyable for the over-40 crowd who are old enough to remember the early days and the long-gone names and logos. These were times when fast food meant drugstore soda fountains and diners where even the menus seemed to be made of stainless steel. I’m sure I’m not the only one who remembers his first A&W Root Beer and 15-cent hamburgers. These were the days when Howard Johnson’s was a place to eat–not to sleep–and McDonald’s drive-ins were little more than glass-and-tile boxes wedged between two towering golden arches. Memories such as these elevate fast food to the status–dare I say it–of a national treasure. Nutritionists may look down upon it with scorn, but as far as Americana and our national identity goes, we are what we eat.
In Fast Food, the authors very rightly tie together a nation’s passion for eating with its love of the automobile. This provides an explanation for the fast food industry’s phenomenal success, as well as for some of its more distinctive innovations, such as the nearly-vanished carhop and still-thriving take-out food.
Capsule histories of many of the big-name restaurant chains, both successful and defunct, complete the picture and provide ample proof of the key ingredients to success in this business, where the quality of the food is no more important than packaging and recognizable architecture.
Bruce Heydt is an editor and freelance writer who still remembers Horn & Hardart restaurants and eating at an automat.