page_title: Horn & Hardart
section_title: Automated food
hierarchical_section_title: Horn & Hardart / Description and offerings / Automated food
caption_attribution_description: Postcard photo of a Horn &amp; Hardart automat depicting how the automat works.
context_page_description: Horn & Hardart was a food services company in the United States noted for operating the first food service automats in Philadelphia and New York City.
  Philadelphia's Joseph Horn and German-born, New Orleans-raised Frank Hardart opened their first restaurant together in Philadelphia, on December 22, 1888. The small lunchroom at 39 South Thirteenth Street had no tables, only a counter with 15 stools. The location had housed the print shop of Dunlap & Claypoole, printers to the American Congress and George Washington.
  By introducing Philadelphia to New Orleans-style coffee, which Hardart promoted as their "gilt-edge" brew, they made their tiny luncheonette a local attraction. News of the coffee spread, and the business flourished. They incorporated as the Horn & Hardart Baking Company in 1898.
context_section_description: Inspired by Max Sielaff's Automat Restaurants in Berlin, they were among the first 47 restaurants, and the first non-Europeans to receive patented vending machines from Max Sielaff's Automat GmbH factory in Berlin, the creators of the first chocolate bar vending machine for Ludwig Stollwerck. The first automat in the U.S. was opened June 12, 1902, at 818 Chestnut St. in Philadelphia by Horn & Hardart. The first New York Automat opened in Times Square July 2, 1912. Later that week, another opened at Broadway and E 14th St, near Union Square.
  In 1924, Horn & Hardart opened retail stores to sell prepackaged automat favorites. Using the advertising slogan, "Less Work for Mother," the company popularized the notion of easily served "take-out" food as an equivalent to "home-cooked" meals.
  The Horn & Hardart Automats were particularly popular during the Depression era, when their macaroni and cheese, baked beans, and creamed spinach were staple offerings. In the 1930s, union conflicts resulted in vandalism, as noted by Christopher Gray in The New York Times:
  In 1932 the police blamed members of the glaziers union for vandalism against 24 Horn & Hardart and Bickford's restaurants in Manhattan, including the one at 488 Eighth Avenue. Witnesses said that a passenger in a car driving by used a slingshot to damage and even break the plate glass show windows. Glaziers union representatives had complained about nonunion employees installing glass at the restaurants.
  By the time of Horn's death in 1941, the business had 157 retail shops and restaurants in the Philadelphia and New York areas, and served 500,000 patrons a day. During the 1940s and the 1950s, more than 50 New York Horn & Hardart restaurants served 350,000 customers a day.
  In 1953, the company split into two independent corporations: the New York company was named the Horn & Hardart Company, while the Philadelphia company was named the Horn & Hardart Baking Company. New York was traded on the American Stock Exchange, and Philadelphia was traded on the Philadelphia Stock Exchange.
caption: Horn & Hardart postcard, circa 1930s
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