109 A History of Howard Johnson's | Anthony Sammarco
Curiosityness
Travis DeRose
4.8 • 566 Ratings
🗓️ 1 June 2021
⏱️ 63 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
If you remember the orange-roofed, twenty-eight flavored Howard Johnson's empire that stretched along roadways from coast to coast, you're gonna love this nostalgic and historical episode!
If the name Howard Johnson's is only vaguely familiar to you (like it was to me), you're also gonna love this episode!
In this episode, I'm joined by Boston historian and author of the book, A History of Howard Johnson's, Anthony M. Sammarco.
Tune in to learn…
-Who Howard Johnson was,
-Why he is called the "Father of the Franchise Industry",
-What made Howard Johnson's restaurants so unique and successful,
-How Howard's son spearheaded the extinction of this once thriving restaurant chain,
-& so much more!
Grab a copy of Anthony's book, A History of Howard Johnson's: How a Massachusetts Soda Fountain Became an American Icon...
On Indiebound at https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781540206459,
On Amazon at https://amzn.to/2SClWGg (affiliate link)
Find Anthony on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AnthonyMSammarco/,
& check out his Lost Boston Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/666137636777594/
Check out my visit to an old Howard Johnson's still with the original A-frame roof and "Simple Simon & The Pie Man" Logo Weathervane: https://youtu.be/GmKeJ1FzxNg
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | A spontaneous and unrehearsed interview. |
| 0:07.7 | Hello, and welcome to the 109th episode of Curiosityness. |
| 0:13.5 | I am Travis DeRose, the host, and this episode we're talking about Howard Johnson, the man, Howard Johnson, and the restaurant and hotel |
| 0:23.6 | Howard Johnsons. So I have on Anthony Samarko. He is the author of a book called A History of Howard |
| 0:29.7 | Johnson's, How a Massachusetts soda fountain began an American icon. So I'm a bit young to remember |
| 0:37.3 | the Howard Johnson's restaurants, but definitely |
| 0:40.7 | recognize the Howard Johnson's name, the hotels, motel line. So it was kind of, it was kind of |
| 0:48.6 | fun to stumble into the story. Didn't super know the history of Howard Johnson's and how much of an |
| 0:53.8 | icon it was and how important |
| 0:55.4 | it was to the traveling the travelers of America. But good God, it's a fun story. It's really |
| 1:02.7 | cool. So glad I found Anthony. Thank you to Anthony for coming on and sharing this story. |
| 1:08.4 | Yeah, we just, we dive into the story of who Howard Johnson was as a guy, |
| 1:12.6 | how he got started with his restaurants and his 28 flavors and his orange roofs on those |
| 1:17.5 | Howard Johnson's restaurants. It's just fun. I think if you, especially if you know and |
| 1:23.5 | remember Howard Johnson's, you're going to really love this episode. But if you're like me and |
| 1:27.5 | don't know what the hell Howard Johnson's restaurant is like, you've never stepped foot in one, |
| 1:32.4 | I think you're still going to enjoy this episode because it's some new history that you may not |
| 1:37.1 | have been exposed to. So let's get to the episode. I'll let Anthony dive into it and share this whole |
| 1:42.5 | story. Oh, and unfortunately, there might be a little bit of an echo on this episode. We just kind of had a little bit of echo feedback in the recording with Anthony, but I did my best to try to get rid of it. So it shouldn't be too bad, but sorry about that if you hear that. Here is episode 109 right now. |
| 2:04.8 | Anthony, how you doing, man? Good to have you on. |
| 2:10.5 | Thank you for having me. It's great to meet you. Yeah, great to meet you too. Excited to talk about Howard Johnson's today. Because, I mean, for me, the name is, you know, is familiar, of course, but for me it's the hotel, you know. |
| 2:22.4 | Exactly. |
... |
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