1916 - Walter Anderson from Wichita, Kansas, a fry cook, developed buns to accommodate the hamburger patties. The dough he selected was heavier than ordinary bread dough, and he formed it into small, square shapes that were just big enough for one of his hamburgers. He quit his job as a cook and used his life savings to purchase an old trolley car and developed it into a diner featuring his hamburgers. In 1921, Anderson co-founded the White Castle Hamburger with Edgar Waldo "Billy" Ingram, an insurance executive, in Wichita, Kansas. It is the oldest hamburger chain. They serve steam-fried hamburgers, 18 per pound of fresh ground beef, cooked on a bed of chopped onions, for a nickel.
Wimpy holding a hamburger
1931 - Popeye the sailor man, a cartoon figures in the comic strip created by American cartoonist Elzie Crisler Segar (1894-1938) in 1929, and syndicated by the Hearst newspaper's King Features syndicate featured the character J. Wellington Wimpy, known as Wimpy. Wimpy joined the Popeye comic strip in 1931, and he played a significant role in popularizing the hamburger in the United States. Wimpy is probably best know for his consumption of hamburgers. Wimpy loves to eat hamburgers, but is usually too cheap to pay for them. A recurring joke is Wimpy's attempts to con other members of the diner into buying him burgers. Wimpy often tries to outwit fellow patrons with his convoluted logic. His famous line is "I'd gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."
The popularity the character Wimpy spawned a successful chain of hamburger restaurants called Wimpy's, that flourished for over a decade. This burger went for the upscale market at 10 cents a burger. In keeping with the founder's wishes, all 1,500 restaurants were closed down when he died in 1978.
1941 - A California Supreme Court decision, that arose from a sales tax dispute where the plaintiff wanted a refund of taxes paid, under protest, on sales made during the 1937-39 World’s Fair on San Francisco’s Treasure Island. Operating food booths, it “sold only frankfurter (commonly referred to as ‘hot dog’) and hamburger sandwiches, together with coffee, milk, ale and beer,” the per curiam decision said. The issue was whether these sandwiches constituted a “meal,” rendering them exempt from the sales tax. Resolving the issue against the concessionaire, the high court said:
A 'hot dog' or hamburger sandwich is the type of food frequently offered for sale to and desired by persons who wish to eat something while walking about. It is not the type of food generally ordered by a person who patronizes a hotel, restaurant or other public eating establishment with the intention of securing a ‘meal’. It may not be said that one has ‘served’ a meal who merely prepares a sandwich for consumption, wraps it in a paper napkin and hands it to a purchaser without offering any facilities for its consumption on the premises, and with the intention that it be consumed elsewhere.
Cheeseburger
There is also a dispute between Denver, Colorado, Louisville, Kentucky, and Pasadena, California on who and where the cheeseburger was invented.
1920s - Pasadena, California:
According to the 1995 book called Welcome To Hamburger Heaven by Jeffrey Tennyson:
Tennyson said he interviewed former restaurant employees who confirmed that the Rite Spot is where the cheeseburger debuted — although it was called the cheese hamburger.
From the article, Who Invented Hamburger Sandwich? And What About the Cheeseburger? By Roger M. Grace, Metropolitan News-Enterprise, Thursday, January 8, 2004:
Lionel C. Sternberger is believed to have invented the “cheese hamburger” in the 1920s in the Northeast portion of Los Angeles County. Tales differ, however, as to precisely when this occurred, and where. Some peg the date as 1924, others as 1926. The site is usually said to be Pasadena, though that has been called into question.
Steve Harvey, in his column in the L.A. Times, wrote on March 27, 1991: “American Heritage magazine points out that a local restaurateur was identified as the inventor of the cheeseburger at his death in 1964. Cooking at his father’s short-order joint in Pasadena in the early 1920s, the lad experimentally tossed a slice (variety unknown) on a hamburger ‘and lo! the cheeseburger sizzled to life.’
1934 - Louisville, Kentucky:
According to Robin Garr's Louisville Restaurant Reviews:
Charles Kaelin and his wife opened the restaurant in 1934, the menu claims, dubbing the old brick building at the corner of Newburg and Speed "The birthplace of the cheeseburger." The standard hamburger had already become "an established staple of the diet" by then. But Kaelin was an inveterate experimenter, always looking for new food ideas. "One day in the kitchen ... it occurred to him that if he put a slice of cheese on top of the hamburger patty just before it was done, the cheese would melt down into the patty and add a new tang to the hamburger. It was an inst