The largest chain of restaurants owned by a mormon: over 1,400!!! This was back in the late 1970s, per a book about mormon world records.

The owner was Sam Battistone, Sr., and the restaurants were all named Sambo's.

That's the sum total of the entry in the book...

Per Wikipedia, Sam partnered with Newell Bohnett, and they used Sam's first name and the first two letters of Newell's last name to come up with "Sambo". That was in 1957. Sambo's restaurants became associated with "The Story of Little Black Sambo" and the owners tried to capitalize on it, with wall paintings depicting a dark skinned young lad and a tiger... As the years went by, the boy's skin got lighter and lighter and one of the tiger's native lands, India, got a lot more play on the walls.

Finally, the pressure became too great and the name was abandoned, but the damage had been done and the business went down the tubes. Many of them were sold to Baker's Square and Denny's. Now all are gone, except for one restaurant, in Santa Barbara, which is owned by one of Sam's grandsons. No mention is made of what is on the walls of that location.

But a mormon author thought the achievement was worthy of mention. I honestly don't know what they were thinking...

As for the original story of "Little Black Sambo", here's the Wikipedia synopsis:

"Critics of the time (1899) observed that (Helen) Bannerman presents one of the first black heroes in children's literature and regarded the book as positively portraying black characters in both the text and pictures, especially in comparison to the more negative books of that era that depicted blacks as simple and uncivilised.

"However, it would become an object of allegations of racism in the mid-20th century. Both text and illustrations have undergone considerable revisions since.

"Sambo is a South Indian boy who lives with his father and mother, named Black Jumbo and Black Mumbo, respectively. While out walking, Sambo encounters four hungry tigers, and surrenders his colourful new clothes, shoes, and umbrella so they will not eat him. The tigers are vain and each thinks he is better dressed than the others. They chase each other around a tree until they are reduced to a pool of ghee (clarified butter). Sambo then recovers his clothes and collects the ghee, which his mother uses to make pancakes."


It's my recollection that Sambo was up in that tree at the time the tigers were reducing themselves to butter...

You know, I remember those tigers running in a circle till they turned into butter. And I remember sitting around a table with my siblings, asking my father about the little boy and about the Aunt Jemima syrup that was on the table. I think he said the restaurant was losing popularity because of the way it portrayed black people.

I have no idea when that was, but damn: those tigers in their circle. . . Unforgettable.

Was it the menu that had those sequential pictures of the tigers running faster and faster till they turned into butter or was there a storybook at the table?

My first grade teacher would read to us about "Little Black Sambo". There was also another book - "Little Brown Koko." I do remember the tigers turning to butter. This was 1949-50.

Somewhere at home I have my mother's illustrated copy of the book from the 1930's. It was just a cute story. To me it was more about the demise of the tigers than the child.

I had one of these restaurants in my town. I remember passing it 4 times every Sunday until the 3 hour block debuted. I also remember seeing the ruins after a fire. I think it was arson.

I remember those places: ate dinner or maybe breakfast at one in 1969, on a bus trip from Las Vegas to Tucson. It was in either Searchlight, NV or Needles, CA. Later I heard that they got in trouble over the name, which was perceived as racist. IIRC, the owners denied that it was a racial epithet, since it was just constructed from their own names. I don't remember any pictures on the walls.

The things you learn on this board....

Curious, after EOD awakened my memories as an itty bitty child of what must have been one of the last of those restaurants, I did a bit of research.

Originally, Sambo was a black African kid. Later they made him lighter skinned and eventually an Indian or something. The book I encountered either at the restaurant or somewhere else had him African.

Keep in mind that Little Black Sambo, the book, definitely is set in Southern India,

Interesting.

When I google "black Sambo," I get a lot of clearly African images. For instance, the kid who is eating 169 pancakes, a page that I remember seeing and reading long ago, doesn't look Indian at all.

But of course, the people who wrote and published that book probably didn't know or care what an Indian boy would look like anyway.

Hey, I was a dishwasher at a Sambo's one summer. If my memory serves me, it seems like you could buy coffee for a dime and it was a bottomless cup. People would come in and just drink coffee all night. I would always find a way to not wear their stupid little hat. The owner would usually give me a pass on that. I was such a good dishwasher.

The original Sambo's is in Santa Barbara. It's still open and serves a great breakfast. They have old articles displayed throughout the restaurant that highlight its history.

It should be noted that Sam Jr. was running the corp in the 70's. He also founded the New Orleans Jazz and eventually moved the NBA team to SLC in 1979. By 1985, the team was having financial troubles and Larry Miller bought 50% of the franchise, stabilizing the Utah Jazz.

Loved Sambos.

Theme song:

"Just what the family ordered! Saaammmbos!"

As a kid, that was one of my favorite stories. You could always find Little Black Sambo storybooks in the department stores. My mind did not pick up on it as biased at all; I just thought it was cute. I remember the little boy as looking African.