BEANERIES

Thanks to excellent research at the Nebraska State Historical Society by Phyllis Fogerty, we now know Charlie Thorson's name choices and working life with few exceptions.

The first listing for him in Lincoln was in 1893 when he was 18. He was listed as Alexis and as a waiter at O.G. Osmer's Palace Dining Hall at 1130 N St. All of the dining establishments shown here are in the vicinity of the rail yards, bearing in mind that those yards have expanded and contracted over time.

In 1902 "Charles" is listed as a laborer for B&M (?).

In 1905 he is listed as Manager of the RR Eating House at 5th & O. He remained manager of that establishment for many years although it became Houck's Beanery in '08. His home address in '07 was 2034 S.

From 1920 until retirement he was shown as owner of a restaurant at 701 L. This is without doubt "the beanery" of which much has been written and spoken over the years we have been investigating our ancestors. Ceda and I stopped in at what I believe was 701 L about three years ago and asked if anyone knew the history. We were told that it had most recently been a dry cleaners and, therefore, was probably not the place we were looking for. Then one of the Fogertys stopped in a year or so later and the owner now thought it was the place. Perhaps the annual traffic of descendants had convinced him.

I hereby surrender on the question of whether "beaneries" served passengers meals at stopovers. It certainly appears that the eating establishments shown above could have served that purpose. RRs followed such a practice because dining cars did not appear for a long time and, when they did, they were both fancy and expensive. "Beanery" suggests to me that these places were neither fancy nor expensive. They were competing for the low end of the business.

Charlie Thorson lived in a two-story house (1321 Garfield, now divided into a duplex), drove a car*, sent his children to college, and generally seemed to have all the money he needed -- and all this from serving one meal a day in the beanery. Do you suppose he was a beanery genius? Family lore has it that he was his only employee, doing all the cooking, cleaning and waiting himself.

*He rode a bicycle to work everyday (leaving the car in the garage,) stopping and buying his food supplies along the way. By the time he got to the beanery, the back end was piled high with food.