My friend Buzz Bissinger loves a good argument, and we’ve been having one for the past year–privately–that he’s now invited the nation into, via his very lively column in the Daily Beast. It’s about race and professional basketball.

Last year at this time, I did a piece for Parade about what was wrong with the NBA, and what needed to be fixed as the game headed into its most important negotiation on a collective bargaining agreement in recent years. I contacted a couple of friends who are sportswriters–especially Buzz and Jon Wertheim from SI–and also spoke to agents David Falk and Steve Mountain and many others, including commissioner David Stern, all of whom spoke pretty candidly about issues the NBA really needed to address–rule changes, incentives for more team play, structural changes to the CBA.

I have to say honestly that race didn’t come up in ANY of these discussions (although it did come up in the many online comments to the Parade piece.) Then Buzz, who actually got back to me too late to be included in the story, called me. We got into a heated discussion about race and hoops, which we continued on his radio show in Philadelphia in August, and now it’s in the Beast.

Read his piece here and see what you think. Then read the original piece I did for Parade, as well as the online-only sidebar in which we continued the discussion.

While I appreciate that Buzz quoted me in his piece and let me get a word in edgewise, we actually had a longer, more impassioned dialogue about this yesterday by email–as I was sitting in 30th Street Station waiting for my train to NY to teach my class at Columbia J-school. For those interested in more of my side of the discussion about Buzz’s notion that the biggest problem for the NBA is that white fans don’t want to watch a game with predominantly black players, I’ve included more of my email to him below:

<< While racism is a part of America and American sports and always will be, I really don't think the main problem with the NBA is racial, and I think it's kinda racist and certainly reductionist to say it is. I think the basic problems with the NBA are the ones I tried to get at in the story--too many teams, too much focus on expansion to Europe and Asia rather than improving the core US game, and fewer and fewer players who have fundamentals when they arrive in the league. Take a look a the new book Playing Their Hearts Out which explores something most people don't realize about b-ball--the best players are being "coached" not to play a fundamentals game as early as 5th and 6th grade, by AAU and other youth programs that are even more star-oriented than the NBA, and only care about offensive stats. Jrue Holiday, probably my favorite Sixer at the moment, is a small character in the book, but whenever we discuss why this enormously winning and talented and promising point guard has these incredible defensive lapses--when he has the speed and intelligence to never get beat--you realize that when he was a little pee-wee star in California, he was already in a system that is unregulated but full of sneaker contracts, where kids are taught a bad version of the game from the moment they are tall enough to appear promising. white or black. The problem is that the game does not reward team play, except at the elite college level, and the rules don't force kids to remain at the elite college level long enough to learn that lesson. Everyone wants a star, and the idea that we're moving from the Kobe era to, maybe, a Durant era, is a good thing. But we don't need white or black or green stars, we need stars who play the game, every night, like it matters. The rise of the spurs this year, a multicultural team with no huge stars (now that Duncan is fading) is actually a great thing for the league--it shows the game can be played at its highest level by well-coached, disciplined teams. This year's San Antonio Spurs, with the Thunder as the hope for the future in the west, is actually a great model for the NBA, while the Celtics and Heat stockpiling stars under the old CBA is the beginning of the end for that era, one would hope. But it all depends on whether there is a seamless transfer to a new CBA that allows teams more leeway to trade and, perhaps, the league the chance to let one of the struggling franchises fail. The idea that they can put a team in Europe to fix the problems of the American game is a really bad idea, but something stern wants. And by the way, your notion that the complaint about players not playing hard is one that only white people have is, in my opinion, really racist. And also horseshit. When was the last time you watched a hoop game with black people? In my row at the Wells Fargo Center, section 104 row 10, my brother and I are the only white season ticket holders. I can assure you there are no racial differences between our fan reactions and our often hilarious conversations. And the fact that the NBA has the most multicultural fan base in the country is one of the great things about the sport. >>

Back to you Buzz.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Today is the 25th anniversary of the first time I laid eyes on my wife, Diane.

We met at a Valentine’s Day party that I threw with several single friends, all in our twenties. Diane came to the “Passion Bash,” as we optimistically named it, as the guest of one of my best buddies from college, who was crashing that weekend on my couch (or, more accurately, on one axis of my “conversation pit.”) But then she and I danced together. And their date, and everything else that came before it in both of our romantic lives, was history.

It took a while to tie up all the loose ends of our social lives, but we both knew right away this was going to be it. I never met anyone so beautiful and smolderingly sexy, yet so loving and lovable (which are not the same thing); so smart, talented and focused, yet willing to draw another into her artistic and intellectual passions. We love a lot of the same movies and music, and when we disagree, the discussions are epic and fascinating.

Diane also has a great giggle.

I waited until the next Valentine’s Day to propose only because it seemed like nice romantic symmetry, popping the question in front of the building we had rented out for the Passion Bash. That night it was being used for a concert of Ukrainian string music. So, on bent and shivering knee (it was about eight degrees outside) and with the sound of a balalaika quartet in the background, I asked Diane the question we had both known the answer to for so long.

Back in the car, I put on a mix-tape I had prepared: every version I could find of “My Funny Valentine” and “My Foolish Heart.” We sat for a long time listening to it and making out.

Twenty-five years later, we both still tell this story as if it happened just a few weeks ago. And we tell the story more than I ever would have predicted, because people often ask us how we hooked up. They ask because we seem like a couple who never really got over the astonishment of falling in love at first sight, but also because we are pretty open about how hard we work on our relationship–no matter how hard our relationship has worked on us.

We have survived professional setbacks in our lives as writers and teachers, and we’ve even survived professional successes, which can be as threatening to a marriage as setbacks. We have survived the stunning early death of a parent. We have survived medical catastrophes. And we remain, in sickness and in health, in love.

When I listen to that mix-tape I made over two decades years ago, it turned out to be a prescient soundtrack for the life we made for ourselves. The renditions of those two songs were remarkably diverse, everything from Mel Torme and Sarah Vaughan to Elvis Costello and Rickie Lee Jones. And some aren’t really romantic at all. They’re dark, mysterious, challenging.

Together, however, these tracks reinforce what I have come to understand about being and staying in love: A great marriage is a song both brilliant and resilient, one that can be performed over and over, with different nuances being discovered, or rediscovered, on every take.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Saw in the paper this morning that that National Pancake Day was fast approaching, on March 1. (Miss Pennsylvania is scheduled to make an appearance at the local IHOP–dare I speculate if her invitation had anything to do with her being “stacked”?) So I thought it was a perfect time to share the most beloved Fred Harvey breakfast recipe, for Harvey Girl Little Orange Pancakes.

This dish was invented at the St. Louis Union Station Harvey restaurant over 100 years ago–and it’s still as sweet and delicious today. In fact, we made it with friends for a brunch recently–our only addition was spiking the syrup with Cointreau.

HARVEY GIRL SPECIAL LITTLE THIN ORANGE PANCAKES
Combine one-quarter cup diced orange sections and juice (half an orange), one teaspoon grated orange peel (also from half an orange), one cup pancake mix, and about one cup orange juice. Bake small pancakes on hot griddle, using one tablespoon butter for each pancake. Serve with maple syrup, honey or jelly.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Here are two of my favorite desserts from Fred Harvey chefs that seem the right color and sweetness for, as my wife Diane (Black Bart) Ayres calls it, Valentime’s Day. One is from the recipe appendix for Appetite for America, the other more recently discovered in a secret Harvey chef archive.

HOT STRAWBERRY SUNDAE
Marinate one pint of strawberries, cut in half, in four tablespoons Jamaican rum for one hour. Bring three-quarters of a cup of strained honey, four tablespoons of lemon juice and the rind of one orange, cut into strips to boil; remove orange rind and combine flavored honey with strawberries. Serve over vanilla ice cream immediately. (Inspired by a sundae that a Harvey restaurant manager had at the Chicago world’s fair—which combined hot maple syrup and strawberries—this became the favorite dessert at Kansas City Union Station.)

CHERRY CUSTARD PIE
Line pie plate with pie dough, fill half full with pitted cherries and bake in oven for about ten minutes. Fill to rim with homemade custard and finish baking in oven until set, for about another ten to fifteen minutes. Dust with powdered sugar and serve. HOMEMADE CUSTARD: one quart milk, three eggs, eight ounces sugar, one and on-half ounces flour and one teaspoon vanilla extract. Mix eggs, sugar, flour and vanilla extract. Add boiling milk, strain, pour over fruits and bake.

May Fred be with you and your Valentime!

This article is copyright © 2024 

If you’ve never been to Dodge City, KS–and, honestly, anyone interested in the history of the American West should visit there, it’s really fun and interesting–you would probably find it hard to believe what has become of the old Fred Harvey hotel building, the El Vaquero, and the adjoining train depot.

It has been fully and wonderfully restored, and is now the home to a really smart and innovative theater company, The Depot Theater, with a state-of-the-art stage and complete digital recording facility.

We visited Dodge during the research for Appetite for America, and details on how to do the trip appear in the appendix of the book. For anyone looking to do an extended “Tour de Fred,” it’s a perfect stop between Kansas City and the Great Southwest.

And if you’re going by train, the town is small enough that you could get off the train, take in the major tourist sites, get a meal and a hotel room, and get back on the next morning without bothering to rent a car.

If you decide to do it, don’t miss the Boot Hill Museum, which includes the famous cemetery with the boots sticking out of the ground but is more fascinating for Fredhead because the complex includes the actual downtown home of rancher Jack Hardesty, Fred’s brother-in-law, with whom he was very close. Hardesty was married to Fred’s sister-in-law, Maggie; Fred, Sally and their kids spent many a Dodge City vacation at this house, which isn’t so much restored as was left exactly the way it was found during the last years when the Hardesty family lived there.

Black Bart and I hope to get back to Dodge City soon!

This article is copyright © 2024 

I was honored to speak at the James Beard House in New York this week, for their Beard on Books program. Afterward, we got into a discussion about links between the great American culinary legacies of Beard and the subject of my talk, Fred Harvey. Here’s an interesting one:

Chef Marion Cunningham, a protege of Beard’s, includes in her 1987 Breakfast Book cookbook a recipe for “J.B.’s French Toast,” which she says Beard told her was inspired by the French toast served on the Fred Harvey dining cars on the Santa Fe Railroad. (Beard, who grew up in Portland, was a seasoned train traveler and a fan of the many joys of fine rail dining). It employs crumbled-up cornflakes that “give every bite a crisp crunch that is mighty good.”

I believe that the cornflakes were Beard’s innovation, perhaps a new way to create a texture and flavor he remembered, because I find no evidence that the original Fred Harvey French toast served in the Santa Fe dining cars or the Harvey restaurants used them. Neither did any of the other major railroads (according to James Porterfield’s Dining By Rail).

So here are “J.B.’s French Toast” from Cunningham’s book, and the original Santa Fe French toast, from the recipe appendix to my new biography of Harvey, Appetite for America.

J.B’S FRENCH TOAST
3 eggs
2 cups cornflakes
½ cup milk
4 tablespoons ( ½ stick) butter
½ teaspoon nutmeg
6 slices dense white bread
¼ teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons sugar

Stir the eggs, milk, nutmeg, and salt together in a bowl until well blended. Strain the mixture through a sieve into a shallow bowl in which you can dip the bread easily (a soup bowl works well). Crumble the cornflakes slightly (to make each flake about half its original size) and spread them on a piece of waxed paper. Dip (don’t soak) both sides of each slice of bread into the milk batter. Then press each slice of bread on both sides into the cornflakes to coat the bread well. Melt two tablespoons of butter in a 12-inch skillet over medium heat and fry three slices of the bread until gloden on each side. When done, sprinkle about one tablespoon sugar on top of each slice and keep warm in 250-degree oven while you fry the other three slices in the remaining two tablespoons butter. Serve hot. Makes four servings.

FRENCH TOAST À LA SANTA FE
Place one-half cup cooking oil in skillet, heat to hot. Meanwhile, cut two slices white bread three-quarters of an inch thick diagonally to form four triangles, and set aside. In a small bowl, combine two eggs, one-half cup light cream, and salt. Beat well. Soak bread thoroughly in egg/cream mixture. Fry soaked bread in one-half cup hot cooking oil to a golden brown on both sides, about two minutes per side. Lift from skillet to clean paper towel and allow to absorb excess cooking oil. Transfer to baking sheet and place in oven. Bake four to six minutes, until bread slices have puffed up. Serve sprinkled with powdered sugar and cinnamon and apple sauce, currant jelly, maple syrup, honey or preserves.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Today, February 9, is the 110th anniversary of the death of Fred Harvey in Leavenworth, Kansas.

Eat a great meal in his memory! I’ll be lecturing at the James Beard House about him today–a fitting tribute.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Thanks to the folks at 800CEOREAD–one of the best business book sites in the world, and the first to embrace Appetite for America as a book as businesspeople should read–there are 20 copies of the book being given away online at their inBubbleWrap service.

Just click here to enter to win and be sure to share the link with others. And check in regularly at 800ceoread, where Jack Covert is always the first share news of important business books (they pick the Top 100 Business Books).

This article is copyright © 2024 

I’m pleased to announce that the Harvey Family Collection that I relied on for primary research for Appetite for America has been donated to the fabulous New Mexico History Museum in Santa Fe, and the finding aid has just been put up online by Tomas Jaehn of the Chavez Library.

Thanks to Daggett and Stewart Harvey and Helen Harvey Mills for sharing their collections with me, and now with other researchers, and thanks to Tomas the museum for such a helpful finding aid.

May Fred’s stuff be with you.

first page of the oldest fred harvey datebook, 1867

This article is copyright © 2024 

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History Library just posted a list of its most recent additions to the collections and Appetite for America was one of the new titles.

There must be some Fred buzz in DC, because I was also just invited to give a talk at the National Archives there in September.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Appetite for America has won the Athenaeum of Philadelphia Literary Award for Non-Fiction.

This is the major literary prize in Philadelphia, going back to 1950, and has been won by many writers I grew up admiring (and many I interviewed during my early days as a Philadelphia magazine writer). It’s quite an honor to join that list.

The other winner this year is Robin Black for If I Loved You I Would Tell You This (fiction). The awards are given out at a reception on May 4 at the Athenaeum.

This seems like as good a time as any to share this rare family shot of Ford Harvey looking literary.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Here’s something very cool just posted on the FB page of our pals at the National Archives in Kansas City (where we did the single largest event on the Appetite for America book tour). Their collection includes the medical records for men in Missouri examined as possible Union soldiers for the Civil War.

In Record Group 110, Entry 4381, Line 146 of the Records of the Provost Marshal General’s Bureau, 7th District of Missouri, Medical Register of Examinations of Enrolled Men, we find none other than our hero Fred Harvey being examined because he had varicose veins–at the age of 29. (Close readers of chapter notes to Appetite for America will recall that according to records in the National Archives in DC, Fred was rejected in St. Joseph in 1864 as a soldier due to “physical disability.”)

Anyway, the National Archive in Kansas City selected this medical record of Fred’s as one of it’s Top Ten documents for 2010, and here’s a link to their Facebook page to see all ten of them.

Here’s their shot of Fred’s record, which was on display when I gave my talk there:

This article is copyright © 2024 

Very interesting photo posted on facebook by Fred Harvey’s great-great-grandson Steve (I think I have the number of greats right), of Byron Harvey, Jr. in an ad for filterless cigarettes not long before he died of cancer in the 1960s.

This article is copyright © 2024 

Just came across this Santa Fe trainiac’s blog, which had unusually good visuals and good links to Harvey-ana.

A commenter asked if the bloggist—who writes from Mojave, CA (an original Santa Fe stop, home to a Harvey hotel and restaurant from 1887-1933, in case you wondered)—had read Appetite for America yet. For Fred’s sake, let’s hope so.

This article is copyright © 2024 

I’ve been invited to host one of the tables at the Author’s Table Dinner fundraiser that kicks off this year’s Tucson Festival of Books.

So, if you’d like an opportunity to hang out together and talk books (and Fred), you can now sign up for the cocktail reception and dinner, Friday March 11, online.

Click here to make your reservation now.

This article is copyright © 2024