Mammy’s Chicken Inn, Salt Lake City

Mammy's Chicken Inn menu cover, Salt Lake City
Image adapted from worthpoint

Mammy’s Chicken Inn was located at 890 W 2100 South (now Flying J Travel Center parking lot). This is a new one for me.

The restaurant was owned by George Gerard-Theodoracopulos) (1891-1965) who was born in Crete, Greece, and came to SLC in 1910, and his wife Mary L. H. Gerard, originally from Grand Junction, Colorado, and came to SLC in 1917.

The Gerards (as they were commonly known) were associated with several restaurants throughout the years including Mammy’s Chicken Inn, Silver Slipper, Charlott Club, Streamliner, and Dahlia Inn. And many of these got into some trouble with the law regarding bootlegging, bribery, and gambling devices.

The Silver Slipper Inn operated about 1930-1941 and is notable for its location at 3100 Highland Drive, just down the street from another restaurant owned by a different family but also using racist icons, the Coon Chicken Inn at 2960 Highland Drive, which operated 1925-1957.

The Coon Chicken Inn featured an overembellished character of a bald Black man with a porter’s cap. I have posted about this in the past and there is a Wikipedia page on this one.

The Gerards opened Mammy’s Chicken Inn in 1947 at the corner of 900 West and 2100 South SLC. It used the Mammy caricature throughout its branding, including on menus and souvenirs. I could not find a photo of the restaurant but the illustration on the menu shows a large Mammy sign on top of the building’s entrance.

Mammy's Chicken Inn menu. Image adapted from worthpoint

 

Mammy's Chicken Inn menu. Image adapted from worthpoint

Mammy's Chicken Inn menu. Image adapted from worthpoint

Mammy's Chicken Inn advertisements, from the Salt Lake Tribune

The last reference I could find to Mammy’s Chicken Inn being operational was their New Year’s Eve advertisement in December 1960. By this time, the Coon Chicken Inn had already closed.

In SLC (and presumably elsewhere) the term “Mammy Chicken” was used to describe the style of fried chicken as well as to infer authenticity.

I found other references to the use of the term Mammy Chicken for Utah restaurants. A selection of those: 

• 1919: A “real colored mammy” Mammy Margette at Roselawn 4374 Highland Drive
• 1930: Delicious Mammy Fried Chicken, Cabaret Dancing after 9 pm, at Blue Moon Car Service, 3618 Highland Drive
• 1931: Mammy’s Friend Chicken at Glaus’ Coffee Shop, cooked by a different process, 169 S Main SLC
• 1937: Home Cooked Food, Mammy Fried Chicken at Sugar House Café 1058 E 2100 S
• 1941: Mammy Fried Chicken and J. Dean’s Rhythm Boys at Dixieland Tavern, Ogden Highway
• 1948: Mammy Fried Chicken, Home Cooked Meals, Ethel’s Café in Roy, Utah

For additional historical context:

• 1889: Aunt Jemima as a Mammy caricature
• 1909: NAACP founded in NYC
• 1919: Salt Lake Branch of the NAACP founded
• 1925: Lynching of Robert Marshall in Price, Utah
• 1954: Brown v. Board of Education
• 1955: Emmitt Till murder, Rosa Parks bus arrest
• 1960: MLK and others were arrested for a sit-in protest
• 1963: MLK’s I Have a Dream Speech and the March on Washington
• 1978: LDS Church Official Declaration 2 removed the racial restriction of priesthood

Some historic buildings that were saved from demolition in 2021

These are some of the historic buildings that were saved from demolition in 2021! Visit @demolishedsaltlakepodcast for some buildings that were lost this year.

 

Descriptions clockwise from the upper left corner:

1. Hyland Exchange, 847 S 800 E SLC. It will be converted to housing. But, 2 Victorian homes were demolished.

2. The Annex Apts, 150 E South Temple SLC. A project plans to rehab the Annex but it also demolished the Carlton Hotel next door.

3. Elks Block, 139 E South Temple SLC. Most buildings will be preserved, the Elks building will be renovated, the Elks tunnel entrance will be partially preserved.

4. House at 235 S 600 E SLC. The owner plans to add an addition to the back of the house and start repairs and rehab of the rest of the house.

5. Utah Pickle and Hide buildings at 737-741 S 400 W SLC. Some selective demolition has occurred but the main buildings are planned to be rehabbed.

6. Central Warehouse at 520 W 200 S SLC. The back half of the building has been demolished; the remaining front is to be integrated into a multi-use development.

7. These 5 houses on 200 East were subject to a rezone application which would result in their demolition. The rezone was not approved, and the houses are now being repaired.

8. 15th Ward Chapel at 915 W 100 S SLC was listed for sale which could have resulted in demolition; it was purchased by the Utah Arts Alliance and is now known as the Utah Art Castle.

9. Redwood Drive-In and Swap Meet at 3688 S Redwood WVC was proposed for demolition for a large housing project. Largely due to the backlash from the swap meet community the prospective owner decided to cancel the sale and development.

10. University of Utah’s Einar Nielsen Fieldhouse has undergone a seismic retrofit and will be converted to a theater.

11. Apt complex at 230 West 300 North SLC will be preserved while the area behind it will become additional multi-family housing.

It is important to note that only 2 of these projects had local historic preservation requirements for the property. All the others were only preserved because the owners desired it.

A big thanks to the owners, architects, engineers, and builders who all worked to keep some of Utah’s history standing.

International Peace Garden Cherry Tree Fiasco

Japanese Garden at SLC International Peace Gardens, ca. 1951. From UDSH

Importing cherry trees from Tokyo for planting at SLC’s International Peace Garden resulted in an international fiasco.

On July 11 1950, the Japanese garden of the International Peace Garden (IPG) was formally dedicated located in Jordan Park just off 900 West (1160 Dalton Ave SLC). It was the first garden section to be developed in the IPG and was developed in cooperation between SLC and the Japanese-American community of SLC.

Included in the dedication was a letter from the Japanese people in Tokyo promising a gift of 3,000 cherry trees to arrive in the fall.

It was largely through the efforts of Tokyo’s Mr. Tomatsu Murayama in which items from Japan were donated to the SLC garden. He secured the donation of the 17th-century stone lanterns that currently adorn the garden and he arranged shipment to SLC through General MacArthur’s office in Tokyo.

He also arranged for the boy scouts of Tokyo to raise money to buy the 3,000 cherry trees destined for SLC’s new IPG.

Murayama sent word to SLC that he was going to send the first shipment of 1,000 cherry trees by air as they would arrive in better condition than if by sea. Just as he had done with the stone lanterns, he shipped the trees payable on delivery assuming SLC would pay the freight as they had before.

The cherry trees arrived in Seattle and SLC was notified of the $1,482 freight bill (~$15K today) by Pan American Airlines. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) then notified SLC that new customs regulations prohibited the entry of the trees due to potential diseases they may introduce to domestic crops. The USDA stated that the Japanese government was informed of these new requirements 2 days before the shipment of the trees.

Some members of Congress got involved to see if a waiver could be obtained but ultimately the gifted cherry trees were burned at the Seattle city dump on Friday the 13th of April 1951.

As SLC never received the trees the City refused to pay the freight charge. Mr. Murayama then understood the bill to be his responsibility. Not having the 500,000 yen, he needed to mortgage his house in Tokyo to pay the bill. Even then, the SLC Commissioners refused to pay the bill.

Mayor Glade and the SLC Boy Scouts then formed a committee to raise the funds to pay the freight bill. Within a couple months enough money was raised to more than cover the bill. By that time Pan American Airlines had cancelled the debt.

There was enough money raised to purchase 1,000 new cherry trees for the IPG (from a domestic source) and to purchase camping equipment to send to the Boy Scouts in Tokyo. In March 1952 the Boy Scouts of Tokyo were presented with 275 camping tents from the Boy Scouts of SLC at a ceremony in Tokyo’s Hibiya Public Hall and with the participation of the US military

The cherry trees were planted in the Japanese garden and along the west bank of the Jordan River. However, all these trees died or were stolen. Replacement cherry trees were added to the Japanese garden in 1988.

A note: Murayama was born in Seattle but had gone to Japan and was drafted into the Japanese Army during WWII, as such he lost his American citizenship. After WWII he revived the Boy Scouts movement in Japan.  

Sources SL Telegram 1950-07-08; SL Trib 1951-03-20; Des News 1951-04-29, SL Telegram 1951-04-16; IPG NRHP form.

Japanese Garden at SLC International Peace Gardens, June 2019