Original Pizza Hut, 1958
If you were a late ’50s customer at the original Pizza Hut, please send us your story or use the Comment box below.
Jim Hamilton: In 1958 Mrs. Orr, owner of Orr’s Bookstore, 2226 East Douglas, took several of us out for dinner at a new restaurant called Pizza Hut. We were working at Orr’s Bookstore after school, East High School, stocking shelves (Left, Jim Hamilton)
Earlier that year, two brothers, Dan and Frank Carney dropped out of Wichita University and borrowed $600 from their mom to open a pizza place in Wichita. They named it Pizza Hut because their sign only had room for eight letters. The location was at the corner of Kellogg and Bluff Street. (Pizza Hut – Wikipedia)
Rich Hayse: It must have been my first hand-tossed pizza, and I’m sure it tasted fantastic. You remember: they hand tossed all crusts, which was really fun to watch, and served only Pepsi products of which we drank a lot during the long wait for our orders to be made, cooked and served. (Right, Rich Hayse)
Editor’s Note: After we watched the cooks toss the crusts in the air, spinning the dough to thin it to the right size, we drank Pepsi, inhaled the delicious smell of pizzas in the oven, and, like Rich, drank more Pepsi. When the pizza was finally in front of us, we dived on the first pieces and burned our palates into tatters. Didn’t matter. The pizza tasted that good.
Jim: It was probably one of the few times I ever ate pizza that wasn’t Carryout or Delivery. And yes, that first bite could be hot.
Don Anderson: One of the first Pizzas I ever ate. At WSU I started out my first two years as an art major and spent free time with friends Kent Noller and Larry Noggle, in the eveniing and weekends, drinking 3.2 beer and absorbing the odors of oil paints and turpentine being transferred to canvas. Of note, the character of the Italian Pizza Man that graced the take out boxes for many years was done by Larry Noggle, for Pizza Hut.
Marcia Benjamin O’Donnell: I was one of the Peppy Pilots who ate at the Hut and flirted with the cooks! About two years into my marriage to T.J. O`Donnell, he came to me and said “Now I know where I knew you from: you were part of those girls who used to bother us cooks at the Hut. “ T.J. went on to work as an accountant for the Carneys. When he asked for a raise and they said no, he quit. In the 70`s we moved to Washington, Mo. to run our franchise Pizza Hut. It helped to employ our nine children who have tales of their own. The Hut was sold back to the company in the 90`s.
Thanks to Barb Hammond for generating the following story from her brother Jim.
Jim Hammond, ’63: My Hot Date at Pizza Hut
In my baby blue, 1953 four-on-the-floor Plymouth, I arrived at a house on 24th Street North (who knew that people lived way over there?). I rang the doorbell and Mrs. Tomlin opened the door. In my very best Eddy Haskell impersonation, I introduced myself. I was probably wearing my letter jacket because that’s just how cool I was. She gave me the once-over, called Patty, and let me in. Patty came out and reassured her mother that I was an ok boy and that she would be home before curfew. Off we go to an new place on the other side of town.
Inside the “Hut,” we stepped up to order a pizza. Not sure we had a choice; they might have had only one kind. Pizza arrived and I think each table had two shaker jars, one with parmesan cheese and another with chili peppers. We both shook a little cheese on our slices. I asked my date if she would like the chili shaker because…I ALWAYS put hot peppers on pizza. Then I, with all the bravado of a seventeen-year-old stud, liberally doused my slice with little red flakes. We began to eat.
Shy, wistful green eyes connecting with blue “googly-ah-oogah” eyes. A dream date – only to be mortifyingly interrupted by a severe case of hiccups in the owner of the studly blue eyes. I think they lasted all the way back to 24th Street.
Jim and Patty Hammond have been happily married since 1967 and still eat pizza. They live in Arlington, Virginia.
Jim Hamilton provided the following links to more info about Pizza Hut and the photo of the original building being moved to the WSU campus. Click here for more info about Frank Carney.
https://blog.pizzahut.com/our-story/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_and_Frank_Carney
