I am starting a new category. I call it “The Origins of Ordinary Things.”

Life has a way of desensitizing us so that we no longer notice what we encounter, experience, and come across every day. Places, things, persons are gradually taken for granted and we lose our interest in them because they’re “always there”. They become ordinary.

The Origins of Ordinary Things aim to capture the interesting story behind what we encounter everyday; because if their story is told, life ceases to be ordinary.

Have you ever wondered how Starbucks began? Or why we call the shoe brand Nike? Or maybe who invented this wonderful thing called a refrigerator? Or maybe who started blogging (was it really Doogie Howser MD?!)? I will write about the extraordinary stories of these seemingly ordinary things.

Kentucky Fried Chicken
Edited from Wikipedia

The company was founded as Kentucky Fried Chicken by Colonel Harland Sanders in 1952, but the idea of KFC’s fried chicken actually goes back to 1930. In the midst of the Great Depression, Sanders first served his fried chicken at a gas station he owned in North Corbin, Kentucky. The dining area was named “Sanders Court & Café” and was so successful that in 1936 Kentucky Governor Ruby Laffoon granted Sanders the title of honorary Kentucky Colonel, in recognition of his contribution to the state’s cuisine.

The following year Sanders expanded his restaurant to 142 seats, and added a motel he bought across the street. When Sanders prepared his chicken in his original restaurant in North Corbin, he prepared the chicken in an iron skillet, which took about 30 minutes to do, too long for a restaurant operation. In 1939, Sanders altered the cooking process for his fried chicken to use a pressure fryer, resulting in a greatly reduced cooking time comparable to that of deep frying. In 1940 Sanders devised what came to be known as his Original Recipe.

The Sanders Court & Café generally served travelers, often those headed to Florida, so when the route planned in the 1950s for what would become Interstate 75 bypassed Corbin, he sold his properties and traveled the U.S. to sell his chicken to restaurant owners. Sanders entered into franchise agreements paying him five cents for each piece of chicken sold. The first to take him up on the offer was Pete Harman in South Salt Lake, Utah; together, they opened the first “Kentucky Fried Chicken” outlet in 1952.

By the early 1960s Kentucky Fried Chicken was sold in over 600 franchised outlets in both the United States and Canada. Sanders sold the entire KFC franchising operation in 1964 for $2 million USD. Since that time, the chain has been sold three more times, most recently to PepsiCo, which made it part of its Tricon Global Restaurants division, which in turn was spun off in 1997, and has now been renamed Yum! Brands.

Colonel Sanders’ nephew, Lee Cummings, took his own Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises (and a chicken recipe of his own) and converted them to his own “spin-off” restaurant chain, Lee’s Famous Recipe Chicken.

The original handwritten recipe, along with vials containing samples of each of 11 herbs and spices, is kept locked away at the KFC corporate headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky. Only 2 executives have access to it and to maintain security, the company uses multiple suppliers each providing only a portion of the final ingredients.