The Worcester Lunch Car Company monopolized the New England market with its colorful diners. Although Worcester sent a smattering of diners as far as Florida and Michigan, the cars were most popular in their home territory. From 1906 to 1961, the company built six hundred fifty-one diners, with as few as ten or as many as seventy seats. Known for their small size, solid construction, and old-fashioned styling, the cars featured oak and mahogany woodwork, intricate ceramic tile patterns, and a backbar of stainless steel. Their distinctive porcelain enamel exteriors with names emblazoned on them proudly proclaimed their presence along the roadside. Day and night, these diners fed generations of New England's working class; today, fewer than one hundred lunch cars still operate.
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The Worcester Lunch Car Company features unpublished materials from the company archives, preserved at the Worcester Historical Museum. It also draws on the personal collection of the author, Richard J. S. Gutman, who owns two thousand slides and photographs of Worcester diners. Photographs show the first and last diners built by Worcester, and all styles in between. Gutman has been documenting the company for three decades and interviewed key company employees before their deaths. The leading authority on diner history, he is the author of American Diner Then and Now. He has curated two large museum exhibitions on diners, has assisted other institutions with preservation efforts, and has been involved with the restoration of countless diners across the country.
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Inside This Book
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First Sentence:
The diner was not born in Worcester, but it was in Worcester where diner building became an industry. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
lunch car, new diner, first diner, lunch wagon, porcelain enamel Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Worcester Lunch Car Company, Worcester Historical Museum, Main Street, White House, World War, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, John Baeder, Charlie Gemme, Jimmie Evans, Fred Crepeau, New York, Southern Artery, Southhridge Street, Sterling Streamliner, Art's Filling Station, Casey's Diner, Courtesy of Don, Don Parks, Johnnie's Diner, Nite Owl, Wales University, Wilfred Bernard New!
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Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
The diner was not born in Worcester, but it was in Worcester where diner building became an industry. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
lunch car, new diner, first diner, lunch wagon, porcelain enamel Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Worcester Lunch Car Company, Worcester Historical Museum, Main Street, White House, World War, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, John Baeder, Charlie Gemme, Jimmie Evans, Fred Crepeau, New York, Southern Artery, Southhridge Street, Sterling Streamliner, Art's Filling Station, Casey's Diner, Courtesy of Don, Don Parks, Johnnie's Diner, Nite Owl, Wales University, Wilfred Bernard New!
Books on Related Topics | Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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- New Hampshire: An Explorer's Guide (Explorer's Guides) by Christina Tree on page 36
- Santa Claus by Rod Green on page 83
- Diners of the North Shore (Images of America: Massachusetts) by Gary Thomas on page 50, and page 77
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