McDonald’s Mystery: Solved!

Courtesy of George’s flickr page

A week ago (here), I mentioned that local historian Dennis Thompson was attempting to compile a list of the consecutive numbers that were assigned to the early McDonald’s restaurants as they opened. He was particularly interested in the number associated with Lorain’s first McDonald’s, which was located down on West Erie Avenue just west of Leavitt Road.

A few days after my post, Dennis reached out to the McDonald’s corporate archivist and got “Speedee" results. As Dennis noted in an email to me, “At long last… the Lorain McDonald’s was #195. Not quite as early as I had thought when I started this quest several years ago, but a nice low number. They were franchising them so fast at that time, a couple of months made a big jump in the store number.”

Dennis pointed out one anomaly. The Fairview Park store has a lower number (#174) than the Lorain store, making it by his count the lowest numbered restaurant in Northeast Ohio. But, as Dennis notes, “Lorain actually opened a year earlier than #174, thanks to a lawsuit that delayed the Fairview Park store.”

During a trip to the Lorain Building Department, Dennis also found a few interesting tidbits about the particular property where the McDonald’s was located at 2500 West Erie. Apparently in early 1955 there was the intention to open a trailer sales business there, which was denied by the Board of Appeals. In December that same year, a gas station was proposed for the same location.

In December 1959, a restaurant building was approved to begin construction at that address, and Lorain’s first McDonald’s – #195 in the chain – opened in June 1960.

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Dennis wasn’t kidding when he noted that a few months made a big difference in a store’s number. McDonald’s 500th store opened in Toledo, Ohio in early July 1963. Here’s the ad celebrating that milestone, courtesy of vintagetoledotv.squarespace.com.

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All this blogging about McDonald’s gave me a hankering for a good old-fashioned McDonald’s hamburger – which I had for dinner tonight. I got it from the store on Henderson Drive, which (according to my receipt) is Store #24316.

McDonald's on West Erie Opens – June 29, 1960

Vintage postcard promoting the McDonald's on West Erie Avenue in Lorain

This is rapidly becoming Reader Suggestion Week here on the Brady Blog...

Back in early June, I received an great email from Rick Kurish. He wrote, "Dan, how about the grand opening of McDonald's on West Erie Ave, on June 26, 1960? On summer evenings my parents would pack me and my three brothers into the 1957 Ford Station Wagon and drive to McDonald's for a late night snack. No "Happy Meals" then. You could get a hamburger for 15 cents, or a cheeseburger for 19 cents. The treat I liked was the fries for 10 cents."

Rick's memory is right on the money. You can see for yourself with the price list included on the back of the postcard (below). Also, note the West Erie Avenue address imprint.

It really is strange to think of a time when there were no McDonald's in the area. But on June 24, 1960, this small ad (below) appeared in the back of the Lorain Journal on the same page as the TV listings.

A few days later, the ad below appeared – and the dining scene in Lorain would never be the same.

When I was a kid, there was something exciting about seeing that original restaurant on West Erie with its unique Golden Arches and giant flickering sign featuring an animated Speedee. I would watch for it if we were going to Lakeview Park to check out the fountain on a summer night. 

We didn't eat at McDonald's very often; we went to Sandy's on Meister Road instead. But as Rick noted in his reminisce, back then fast food was a treat. For us, it was a rare treat, reserved for a night when my parents were going out to dinner without us kids.

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The McDonald's on West Erie lasted until the mid-1990s or so. By then, of course, the original walk-up building was a dim memory, replaced by the newer style restaurant that robbed the chain of much of its identity.

The building was eventually modified and became Dianna's Deli Restaurant & Grill. Since then, there have been a variety of other restaurants there, including Yanni's Delicatessen & Restaurant beginning in the late 1990s, Stratos on the Lake, and most recently Route 6 Family Restaurant.

Today the building sits sadly vacant. The McDonald's portion of the building sits near the rear of the property, undisguised.

But it was 54 years ago this weekend that an exciting new era of modern fast food began for us locally.

(I still enjoy a simple McDonald's hamburger now and then for lunch. No fries, though, although they are still the best of all fast food french fries.)

McDonald’s Filet o’ Fish Ad – Feb. 10, 1964

If you’ve been a fan of McDonald’s classic Filet-O-Fish sandwich for a long time, you’re probably familiar with how it first got onto the menu of the fast food giant.

According to this Wiki entry (and this great Smithsonian article), it was back in 1962 that a McDonalds’s franchise owner in Cincinnati noticed the drop in hamburger sales on Friday in his store, which was located in a largely Roman Catholic neighborhood. Looking for something that his Roman Catholic patrons (who abstained from eating meat on Fridays) could enjoy, he invented the Filet-O-Fish sandwich.

However, McDonald’s owner Ray Kroc has his own idea for meatless Friday fare: a grilled pineapple and cheese sandwich. As a result, the two sandwiches competed for a permanent spot on the national menu with sales to determine the winner. The Filet-O-Fish won, and was slowly added to McDonald’s menus beginning in 1963.

As the ad above (which appeared in the Lorain Journal on Feb. 10, 1964), the sandwich had reached Lorain the following year. By 1965, it had reached nationwide status.

Today the sandwich remains popular, especially with people whose diet requires them to avoid meat.

Anyway, I still enjoy a McDonald’s Filet-O-Fish now and then, although I am pretty nostalgic for the price that I remember from the 1970s: forty cents.

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McDonald’s has been a regular topic on this blog since the beginning, including this early post from 2009.

I also wrote about the 1960 Grand Opening of the West Erie Avenue store here; a 1962 Christmas ad for the West Erie store here; the 1963 Grand Opening of the Colorado Avenue store here; an article about the new store coming to Elyria Township here; a 1968 ad for the new Big Mac sandwich here; and a few posts about the system which McDonald’s uses to assign a number to its restaurants here and here.

McDonald's Grand Opening – July 30, 1963

It was exactly 55 years ago today that the McDonald's on Colorado Avenue opened. Above is the ad that appeared in the Lorain Journal on July 29, 1963, on the eve of the big event.

It was the second  restaurant with the Golden Arches to open in Lorain, following the June 29, 1960 Grand Opening of the one on West Erie Avenue.

Both of Lorain’s original McDonald’s locations are no more. The restaurant on West Erie no doubt suffered with the lack of traffic due to the opening of the new limited-access Route 2 in the 1960s. The Colorado Avenue McDonalds was possibly too far off the beaten track in a location between the city’s two bridges, unable to take advantage of the traffic crossing either one.

I’m not exactly sure when the McDonald’s on Colorado closed. However, a new McDonald’s appeared just around the corner on Henderson Drive at a former Kentucky Fried Chicken location.

The former McDonald’s restaurant on Colorado Avenue has housed a few businesses since then, most recently the home of the relocated Margie’s Magpie Inn.

The former McDonald’s this past weekend

McDonald's Restaurants by the Numbers: Can You Help?

Did you know that every McDonald's restaurant has a number assigned to it?

Ever since the launch of the chain, each new store has been assigned a consecutive number identifying its special place in the historical timeline.

Thus, a low number store has been around for a long time. If a store closes for good, its number gets retired.

Which brings me to today's McTopic.

Regular blog contributor and historian Dennis Thompson has been compiling a numerical list of all the original McDonald's restaurant from the very first one. He’s been doing pretty well and has many of the first one hundred stores identified. Now he’s working on the second hundred, and trying to fill in the gaps caused by the stores that are no longer in business.

His problem? He’s trying to find out what number was assigned to Lorain's original (and defunct) McDonald's restaurant on West Erie Avenue. He knows that it’s in that second hundred batch, because he already knows the numbers of some other local ones that came later and are still in business.

He’s reached out to McDonald’s corporate offices but hasn’t heard back.

Trying to research it locally, we've looked in the Lorain city directories, in phone books and in the ads that appeared in the Journal when it first opened in June 1960.

Unfortunately, the store's number is not mentioned anywhere.

So if any former employees of Lorain’s very first McDonald’s can help solve this problem, be sure to drop me an email. Dennis would sure appreciate it.

One place to possibly find it is on an old store cash register receipt. Anyone have one in a scrapbook as a treasured memento?

McDonald's comes to Lorain

Remember this guy? He's Speedee - the original 1950s hamburger-headed mascot of McDonald's and the symbol of their speedy service. (Speedee was eventually replaced by another mascot named Archie McDonald, who was replaced in the mid-1960s by another mascot, a fella named Ronald McDonald.)

   For years, Speedee adorned a magnificent blinking sign at the McDonald's down at 2500 West Erie at the end of Leavitt Road. I can still see it in my mind's eye, even though both the sign and McDonald's have been gone from that location for many years.

   The McDonald's on West Erie was the first in the Lorain area, appearing in the Lorain phone book in 1960. Despite my fondness for the McDonald's mascot and sign, I don't think my family ever ate there very much, if at all, when I was a kid. And where did my family go for fast food burgers? Stop back here tomorrow and I'll tell you!

   I'll give you a hint, though: if you were wearing a kilt, you'd be right at home in this restaurant!

Clash of the Burger Titans

It’s been a while, but I’ve featured Sandy’s many times on this blog over the years. The Scottish-themed hamburger chain with Thrift ’N Swift service held the Grand Opening of its Meister Road location in the Lorain Plaza Shopping Center back on June 18th - 20th of 1965.

Since Sandy’s was so close to where we lived, it was the hamburger chain that my family patronized –although it was a rare treat. The nearest McDonald’s was down on West Erie Avenue, and consequently we only caught a glimpse of it on the way to Lakeview Park. (We never passed it when we went to Vermilion, as we always took the short cut via W. 21st Street.)

Since the McDonald’s on West Erie Avenue had opened in June 1960, however, it had a five year head start in Lorain on Sandy’s, which had some catching up to do.

Thus it’s not too surprising to see the section of the restaurants page of the June 24, 1965 Lorain Journal above. Note the ads of the two strange burger bedfellows, right next to each other: recently-opened Sandy’s (with its large ad featuring the winsome Miss Sandy) and McDonald’s (with the now forgotten, bizarre Archy McDonald in a puny ad).

Despite the sex appeal of Miss Sandy, however, McDonald’s eventually won the battle – conquering Hardee’s (the successor of Sandy’s) and even taking over the chain’s location on Meister Road. Today, only a few grizzled local Baby Boomers (like me) even remember that Sandy’s was ever there.

But hold on to your french fries – there’s a rematch of sorts about to happen.

A Hardee’s is planned for Avon as part of a proposed Love’s Travel Stops and Country Stores truck stop complex on Chester Road. Its neighbor? None other than McDonald’s.

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Click here to visit a terrific, unofficial Sandy's website with tons of links to great vintage photos of store restaurants. Click here to explore three pages of Sandy's memorabilia, such as original napkins, cups and ads!

Finally, be sure to visit the RoadsideArchitecture.com website, which includes a page devoted entirely to former Sandy's restaurants!

1969 Burger King Phone Book Ad

1969 Lorain Phone Book ad

Last week I posted the late June 1960 Grand Opening ad for the McDonald's on West Erie, which got me wondering when McDonald's arch-nemesis – Burger King – entered the local fast food market.

Burger King was kind of a latecomer to the area, arriving after McDonald's and Sandy's. Its first ad appeared in the November 1969 phone book (above), promoting two locations: one out in South Lorain on Fairless Drive near Kmart, as well as one in Elyria on Broad Street. By the time of the 1970 phone book, Burger King had added the restaurant on Leavitt Road (Route 58) near W. 21st Street.

The 1969 phone book ad is interesting to me because it includes the original, little-remembered king mascot that looks like he belongs in a nursery rhyme. He was replaced in the late 1960s by the more cartoony guy at right, who was featured in TV commercials and had a blustery personality. The burger chain later went with a live-action king.

To visit a great website with a visual history of not only Burger King advertising but McDonald's, Wendy's, Dairy Queen, Arby's, Hardee's, and a few others, click here. And to learn specifically about all of the various Burger King mascots through the years, click here.

The Burger King restaurant on Leavitt Road was the one my family went to once in a while. I remember we were fairly excited to give it a try after seeing all those Whopper commercials – and we weren't disappointed.

Speaking of commercials, here's a few vintage ones to jog your memory. The one I remember well – with the poor guy in handcuffs trying to eat his Burger King french fries – is in there too.

I don't make it to Burger King too often these days, although ironically there is one just a little over a mile from my house. But it comes in handy once in a while.

In contrast to McDonald's, who closed all three of the original Lorain locations (and built new restaurants elsewhere), Burger King still has restaurants at both the Leavitt Road and Fairless Drive locations.

The Burger King at Leavitt Road & W. 21st Street today

McDonald's Holiday Ad – Dec. 1962

Here's a nice seasonal ad for the McDonald's restaurant that used to be located on West Erie (U. S. 6) at Leavitt Road. It appeared in The Lorain Journal in late December 1962.

The ad is particularly well-written, with some genuinely heartfelt copy.

The West Erie Avenue restaurant held its Grand Opening on Wednesday, June 29, 1960.

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Although I can't say that my family patronized the restaurant very much (we went to Sandy's instead), that great, original McDonald's sign with the Speedee mascot really left an impression on me whenever we drove by it.

It's just too bad that the various national and regional restaurant businesses along that stretch of the highway – McDonald's, Howard Johnson's, Manners, etc. – just couldn't make it. The siphoning off of east-west traffic by the new Route 2 probably doomed them.

If they had succeeded, more businesses might have been attracted to that side of town and Lorain would have a good strip of tax-paying businesses on its outskirts to rival Vermilion.

However, it's nice that, along with a couple of motels, a few mom-and-pop restaurants still remain down there (although the latest to occupy the former McDonald's location unfortunately didn't last very long).

McDonald’s on North Ridge Grand Opening – June 1968

McDonald’s has long been a favorite topic on this blog, even though it’s not my favorite place to grab a quick bite to eat.

My lack of enthusiasm for eating there is probably because it’s really not a fast food place anymore. You can tell that by the number of parking spaces reserved for drive-through customers who ordered something that might take a while to prepare. The food is still good – perhaps better than ever – but it’s not cheap.

I’m in the minority, however, because the chain is still the worldwide leader in fast food.

Anyway, I’ve posted the 1960 Grand Opening for the McDonald’s on West Erie here, and the 1963 Grand Opening for the Colorado Avenue store here. So in the interest of being historically complete, above is the ad for the opening of the store on North Ridge Road across from Sheffield Center. It ran in the Journal on June 28, 1968 – 51 years ago this week.

The ad is interesting because good ol’ Ronald McDonald is front and center. It’s a nice reminder of the days when eating at McDonald’s was fun and its advertising was focused on kids.

Today, Ronald has been pretty much invisible, especially since the wave of clown sightings back in 2016.

"New Look" McDonald's Comes to Lorain – July 1973

Have you ever noticed how new fast food restaurants all seemed to have been designed by the same architect?

They all look very boxy, with strong horizontal and vertical lines dominated by pillar-like structures (pilasters, I guess) near the entrance. While the buildings are attractive – almost classy looking – they have no personality and aren't very distinctive. In fact, there's no way of knowing what restaurant chain it is until the logo is installed in the large open area reserved for it.

It's almost as if the design is insurance that in case the marketing gurus made a boo-boo and the restaurant fails, the building can easily repurposed by another business. 

It's quite a difference from when you could look at a Taco Bell under construction and know it's a Taco Bell.

Anyway, I think this trend might have its roots in the 1970s, when McDonald's did away with its iconic walk-up restaurant design, with the building supported by those Golden Arches, and went with the (ugh) mansard roof look. Ironically, that mansard roof became as standard and recognizable as the design it replaced; it just wasn't as fun to look at. 

And fifty years ago this month, that 'new look' came to Lorain at both the West Erie (US Route 6) store and the east side outlet on Colorado Avenue. The ad below, which ran in the Journal back on July 17, 1973, made the announcement.

Of course, the main reason for the change was the necessity of adding indoor seating. 

And to sugar-coat the transition, the chain gave away a bicycle at both stores, with no purchase necessary. 

Looking at the ad, one thing leaps out at me: the image of Ronald McDonald. You really don't see the jolly clown spokesperson any more, on TV commercials or at the store. And that's too bad, because having him in the commercials again would really liven up the proceedings a bit and remind us that fast food used to be 'fun.' But fun or not, McDonald's is still the number one restaurant chain in America.

And to think it was only ten years earlier, at the end of July 1963, that McDonald's opened its original design restaurant on the East side.

McDonald's Coming to Elyria Township – Jan. 1968

To close out the month, here's a nice little clipping from the January 1, 1968 Lorain Journal that provides a preview of what the new McDonald's in Elyria Township was going to look like.

It's really too bad McDonald's abandoned their iconic Golden Arches as an architectural motif. They were bold, distinctive and fun. They made eating at a McDonald's a festive and memorable occasion.

Here’s a detail from an advertisement promoting the newly remodeled stores with their mansard roofs. I wonder if those structural elements on the roof were supposed to look like french fries?

Anyway, the Elyria Township store has been home for some time now to the popular Rosie’s Family Restaurant. The remodeling done to the building over the years has almost completely disguised its fast food roots.

McDonald’s Big Mac Ad – December 8, 1968

Fifty years ago, McDonald’s was rolling out the Big Mac nationwide.

Above is an ad that ran in the Lorain Journal on December 8, 1968, introducing the double-decker burger with special sauce to our area.

Obviously, the Big Mac was designed to compete with the iconic Big Boy. But while Big Boys were available only at sit-down restaurants (such as Manners in our area), the Big Mac was a “fast food” offering, which undoubtedly contributed to its popularity.

The Big Mac also became a character on the McDonalds TV commercials: “Officer Big Mac," the symbol of beefy justice.

You can read about how the Big Mac came to be created here on its Wiki page. Interestingly, the article points out that “Big Mac” was not its original name. “Aristocrat” and “Blue Ribbon Burger” were two names that failed with consumers during its early rollout.

Big Mac already had some competition in our area. The Midway Oh Boy sandwich – also inspired by the Big Boy – had already been around since 1953 in the Lorain County area. And the Sooper Hooper double decker burger was being served up at the Hoop Drive-in in the 1950s, until those restaurants became part of the Manners chain and Big Boys replaced them on the menu.

Nevertheless, the Big Mac has been one of the most popular and best-selling menu items in McDonald’s history. The classic sandwich is still quite wonderful in its simplicity; no bacon or artisan designation is needed.

And the restaurant chain did not let Big Mac’s 50th Anniversary go unnoticed this summer. As part of the celebration, McDonald’s gave away a special coin (a MacCoin, what else?) with the purchase of a Big Mac that could be redeemed for a free Big Mac at any participating location world-wide. Now that’s global currency.

You can read all about it here.

Courtesy mcdonalds.com

Forgotten Fast Foods: Sandy's Part 1

Although there was a McDonald's at the corner of Leavitt Road and W. Erie Avenue as early as 1960, I don't remember ever eating there as a kid. The drive-in my family patronized was Sandy's on Meister Road, which was closer to our home.

   Although Sandy's is largely forgotten now, at one time the chain seriously challenged McDonald's and Burger King. The story of how the company began is an interesting one.

   Sandy's origin had a McDonald's connection. The company was started by a group of four businessmen from Kewanee, Illinois who jointly owned a successful McDonald's franchise in Urbana. However, when the group attempted to exercise their option to open additional franchises in Peoria and Decatur, Ray Kroc denied them permission as he had decided to limit new franchises to single owners. Frustrated, the four businessmen decided to start their own drive-in chain and in 1958 Sandy's was born.

   

Burger Chef Ad – October 5, 1971

Hamburgers used to rule the fast-food world, but times have changed.

These days, it’s impossible to find a simple ‘hamburger' even listed on the giant McDonald’s digital menu board, as the classic fast food item has been crowded out by more exotic (and expensive) offerings. 

I often wonder how many hamburgers are even ordered there these days? 

Anyway, back in 1971, hamburgers were still king, and the burger barons – McDonald’s, Burger King, Sandy’s, Casey's and Burger Chef – were all battling it out in Lorain.

Burger Chef seemed to run the most ads in the Journal, and here’s one of them. It ran in the paper on October 5, 1971 – fifty years ago this month.

The theme of the ad is giving mothers a break from cooking on Wednesdays, with specially priced Burger Chef burgers on that night. It’s a great idea, and I’m sure it drummed up business on perhaps what was normally a slow weekday.

Nowadays, of course, eating out is something that happens several times a week for many families, and every day for some people.

But fifty years ago, like I’ve mentioned many times on this blog, having food from McDonald’s or Sandy’s was a rare treat for us, something that only happened when Mom and Dad were going out to eat themselves with some friends. Then they would ask my siblings and me what we would like, and Dad would be dispatched (like a true food gatherer) to pick it up.

McDonalds Anniversary Ad – July 22, 1964

Sixty years ago today, McDonald's ran the above ad in the Journal on July 22, 1964, announcing an Anniversary Festival at its two locations in Lorain: 2500 West Erie Avenue, and 1342 Colorado Avenue.

Some of the enticements to attend the gala event included free balloons for the kiddies, more than 100 free prizes (dolls, bicycles, games, toys, guest cards), free coffee (that would've worked to lure me in) and cup cakes.

I'm not exactly sure what anniversary was being celebrated. It might have been the one year anniversary of the outlet on Colorado Avenue, which opened on July 30, 1963 (which I wrote about here). The one on West Erie was having its four year anniversary, having opened in June 1960. (The one across from Sheffield Center followed in June 1968).

The ad is kind of nice in that it depicts the old style walk-up design of the beloved fast food giant. The sit-down version of the restaurant was unveiled locally in July 1973.

What's kind of lousy is that all three of the locations above are long-gone. Meanwhile both of Burger King's original locations (on Leavitt Road and Fairless Drive) are still going strong more than 50 years later.

I don't eat at McDonald's (or any fast food outlet) very much any more. This summer I've been trying to support local businesses like Dog N'Suds when I'm too lazy to cook. But I did have a hankering for a vanilla milk shake last week and visited my Vermilion McDonald's. It was great, but the price (almost five bucks) not so much.

Grand Opening of Kelly's Jet System Hamburgers – August 24, 1962

There were many hamburger chains that were launched in the 1950s and 60s to compete with McDonald's. Unfortunately, most of them (except for Burger King) ended up flattened like a burger under a heavy spatula by the staggering power of the mighty Golden Arches.

I've written about a few of the burger wanna-be's that tried their luck in Lorain County, including Sandy's Hamburgers and Casey's Drive-in. But there was one that came and went so fast that it is little-remembered today: Kelly's. That's why it's ironic that its building remains there on North Ridge Road, across from the old Sheffield Center.

And below is the full-page Grand Opening ad for Kelly's that appeared in the Journal back on August 24, 1962.

It seems like McDonald's was certainly the template for Kelly's. McDonald's had its 'Speedee Service System;' Kelly's was called 'Jet System.' Even Kelly's sign featured an arch of sorts.

This green, vintage paper hat makes me think that the name Kelly's might have originally signaled an Irish theme. 

But somehow the mascot resembling a butler doesn't jive with that theory, or the whole futuristic 'Jet System' gimmick either.

Like I said back on this post, Kelly's became a Casey's Drive-in by the time of the 1966 city directory. I guess people just didn't 'love that Kelly's' enough to keep it in business.

Hardee's Ad – Sept. 5, 1973

Sandy's became Hardee's in Lorain in May 1973 (which I wrote about here). The Sandy's sign at the hamburger restaurant at Oberlin Ave. and Meister Road came down, and gone forever was the lovely, tam-o-shanter-wearing 'Miss Sandy' mascot.

But who or what was a Hardee? 

According to its Wikipedia page, it was the name of the man who, in 1960 in Greenville, North Carolina, launched the chain: Wilber Hardee. (I think they should have gone with the more memorable "Wilber's.")

The funny thing is that Hardee himself was out of the picture early in the game, when there were only a few restaurants. But by the end of the 1960s, the company had expanded to hundreds of locations; it bought Sandy's in 1972.

In an apparent effort to mimic McDonald's, Hardee's introduced its own advertising characters designed to appeal to children. Gilbert Giddyup was a mustachioed, tin-star-wearing cartoon cowboy with two bullet holes in his ten-gallon hat. His nemesis was Speedy McGreedy, the 'burger rustler" who was dressed more like a gangster. (Hey, wasn't McDonald's original mascot also called Speedy?)

Anyway, I'm not sure how well known Gilbert Giddyup was at the time of the Hardee's ad below, which ran in the Journal back on September 5, 1973. Nevertheless, his face was emblazoned on the 'back sack' mentioned in the ad and sold for a buck.

By George, maybe Hardee's originated the whole backpack phenomena for schoolkids, fifty years ago.

Amazingly, several of these Gilbert Giddyup Back Sacks have survived and are for sale on eBay right now.

Other Gilbert Giddyup promotional items are out there as well, no doubt triggering (no pun intended) much head scratching over his identity.

The flicker ring is kinda cool.

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UPDATE (Sept. 10, 2023)

I stopped at the Blue Heron Service Plaza (eastbound) on the Ohio Turnpike over the weekend, and decided to do a little follow-up to this post by grabbing a burger at the Hardee's there. I was prepared for it to be not-so-good, seeing as it was a Turnpike outlet and, well, I couldn't remember the last time I ever ate a Hardee's (the last one I ate at was in Burbank, Ohio near I-71, decades ago).

Amazingly, my Big Cheeseburger was one of the best burgers I've had anywhere – superior to McDonald's, Burger King and Wendy's! The 1/4 pound of burger meat was top-quality, the combination of sliced onions, pickles and a very flavorful ketchup was great, and the egg bun enhanced the whole taste experience. It was prepared quickly and was less than five bucks. I was in a state of blissful shock.

I couldn't tell you if it was charco-broiled or not, but it didn't matter – it was delicious.

Sad to say, though – no sign of Gilbert Giddyup anywhere! Guess he rode off into the sunset to the Retired Ad Mascots Ranch.