In 1948, the newly married Snyders moved to Southern California and opened their first In-N-Out stand in Baldwin Park, across the street from the house on Francisquito Avenue where Harry Snyder had grown up. Their sales and food service experience was minimal, but on their first night of business they sold 47 burgers, according the company's website.
Post-World War II hamburger shops typically featured carhops serving customers in their vehicles, and McDonald's and Carl's Jr. added walk-up windows.
But Harry Snyder had a different idea for his tiny shop, which had no seating and little parking space. Capitalizing on the emerging twin cultures of cars and fast food, he introduced a two-way speaker through which drivers could order food and then have it handed to them without leaving their vehicles.
Many credit the Snyders with introducing California's first drive-through restaurant. At the very least, the Snyders made the innovation so popular and practical that other fast-food establishments soon followed their lead.
For more than half a century, the chain has stuck to its basic menu of cooked-to-order hamburgers made with 100% beef, hand-torn lettuce and slow-rising, freshly baked buns; French fries made from California-grown Kennebec potatoes, hand-cut and fried in cholesterol-free vegetable oil; and milkshakes made with real ice cream. There are no kids' meals, no breakfast items, no chicken strips or nuggets, no salad bars and no franchises -- the restaurants are all owned by the company. And the stores are still open until 1 a.m. or later.
"Everything was going to be fresh," Esther Snyder said in an interview in 2000. "Harry would go to where he bought the meat, and he'd watch them cut it up and be sure he got what he ordered. He would go around at night and check on stores."
Devotees learned a lexicon to order items not on the menu, including "animal style," a burger with pickles, grilled onions and a mustard-cooked patty with extra sauce; the "Flying Dutchman," two meat patties and cheese and no bun; and the "four-by-four," with four patties and four slices of cheese.
Esther Snyder remembered the early days, when "we hoped every car that drove by would stop in." She did everything from peeling onions and making hamburger patties to handling the bookkeeping.
And she had full faith in her husband's vision: "Anything he decided to do usually turned out well because he would work quite hard. He was a person who, if you gave him a job and it was difficult, he would figure it out and not let go until he knew it well," she said.
