World's Oldest Hardee's

In 1960, soon after North Carolina's first McDonald's opened on Summit Avenue in Greensboro, Wilber Hardee drove from his home in Greenville to have a look at this new fast-service hamburger place that he'd been hearing so much about.  So impressed was he that he returned home and built himself a hamburger stand almost identical to the red-and-white tile building with walk-up windows that he had seen in Greensboro.

He called his place Hardee's, and the big difference between it and the McDonald's in Greensboro was that his place had big red Hs instead of golden arches.  Like McDonald's, he sold fifteen-cent hamburgers, french fries, and milkshakes, and his location on Fourteenth Street near the campus of East Carolina University brought him lots of customers.

Business was so good that it attracted the attention of an accountant in Rocky Mount named Leonard Rawls and a budding young businessman, Jim Gardner, who later became a congressman and lieutenant governor.  They talked Wilbur into joining them in a corporation to create a chain of hamburger stands to be called Hardee's.  Shortly after they opened the second Hardee's on Church Street at the intersection of Falls Road in Rocky Mount, Wilber became disillusioned because he was always outvoted by his partners and had no real say in company decisions.  He sold out to them for $20,000.

Wilber went on to open numerous other restaurants, most of which failed.  The first restaurant opened by the chain still operates as a company showpiece in its original design on Church Street.

 

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