Black Excellence in the19th Century: the Hiram S. Thomas Story

Chances are, you've never heard this remarkable success story. A version of this appeared in Brownstoner magazine and on line in 2019.

(Hiram Thomas, undated photo via The Schomberg Center for Black Culture, NYPL)

Before COVID-19, we couldn’t imagine a world without restaurants. Whether plain or fancy, no matter the culture or meal, we have all gotten used to the idea of being able to enter an establishment where we could sit, choose our food from a menu, be served, and eat a meal prepared for us.

The modern American restaurant as we know it is not all that old. While taverns and inns that served food have been with us for centuries, the full service restaurant is a 19th century invention. Based on many worldly antecedents, it was born of the post-Civil War urban experience and the rise of cities.

In 1762, NYC’s oldest tavern opened. Fraunce’s Tavern, like many such watering holes, served patrons whatever was in the pot that day. Vendors selling all manner of street foods have always been a part of the city, too. In the early 1800s, the direct ancestors of the city’s restaurants were its popular coffee shops and oyster bars.

But after the Civil War, the growing wealthy classes in our cities wanted more. Businessmen found that conducting meetings over a meal could be conducive to better business. The rich on their Grand Tours were enjoying the restaurant experience in Paris and other European cities. Here, they were becoming more social, with theaters, concerts and other activities that took them away from home in the evening.

Delmonico’s, in lower Manhattan, was the first and finest of New York’s restaurants. By the end of the century, it was THE place to eat and be seen as NY’s elite filled the cavernous restaurant every night. They had everything we associate with upscale dining – white clothed tables groaning with fine fare served on silver platters, an extensive wine list, a large menu of favorites and exotic new dishes to choose from, all served by impeccably mannered waiters who treated their guests like royalty.

It didn’t take long for this kind of dining and service to be replicated not only in places like Gage & Tollner and Peter Luger in Brooklyn, but in cities across the country. It was also expected in the resort hotels of the Gilded Age: the huge upscale palaces of Coney Island, the Jersey Shore and in resort towns like Saratoga Springs, in upstate New York.

(Illustration from the NY Sun, 1894)

Hiram S. Thomas’s Story

Into our story comes Hiram S. Thomas. Niagara Falls, Ontario was still called Drummondville when he was born in 1837. His family’s history there is unknown. He was college educated, but opportunities for black men with a college education were few in mid-19th century North America. He spent his early working years as a waiter and steward on passenger boats plying the Great Lakes and the Mississippi.

By the 1870s, during the presidency of Ulysses S. Grant, Thomas held the position of steward at the prestigious Capitol Club, in Washington DC. The club was the favorite dining place of politicians and businessmen. A steward was not just a waiter. While he could be called upon to deliver food or drink, he was more responsible for running the dining room and making sure the guests had everything they needed and had a pleasurable dining experience.

Many fine dining establishments of the day were staffed exclusively by black waiters, a trend that continued into the 20th century in some places, including Brooklyn’s Gage & Tollner. For reasons no doubt derived from slavery, it was seen as very classy to have a contingent of elegantly dressed black men trained to deliver impeccable service, performing their duties to perfection. Hiram Thomas was described as a tall, elegant and refined man himself, and his job as steward allowed him to interact with presidents and kings.

Everyone writing about Thomas describes him as well-spoken, witty and engaging. He was a favorite of President Grant, and later, of Presidents Cleveland and McKinley. He chatted with other prominent politicians and saw to the culinary needs of heads of industry and commerce, all patrons at the club. He was able to make a good living, much more than most black men of his time. He married, and he and his wife Julia would eventually have eight children: five daughters and three sons.

He left the Capitol Club and moved with his family to Saratoga Springs, the famed resort town north of Albany famous for its mineral springs, horse racing, gambling and luxury hotels. By the 1870s, Saratoga was the country’s top upscale resort destination. Visitors could board the Empire Express train at Grand Central Station in NYC and travel due north to Saratoga. Wealthy people from New York, Boston and Canada built large mansions in town, many of which still stand.

(Dining room of the Grand Union Hotel, Saratoga, NY. Photo via Library of Congress)

Anyone who was anyone came north, out of the city, for “the Season.” Many stayed at the Grand Union Hotel, which by 1876 could accommodate 2,000 guests and was billed as the largest hotel in the world.  At that time, it was owned by A.T. Stewart, the ultra-wealthy owner of Manhattan’s largest department store of the same name. Writers from NYC called the hotel the “Waldorf of Saratoga.”

Hiram Thomas was hired as the hotel’s head waiter. An 1878 article in the St. Louis Globe, (syndicated from the NY Herald) describes the scene at dinner on a typical night at the Grand Union. His staff, many of them veterans of colored Union Army regiments, stood at attention at the doorways.

                “At 2 pm 200 colored waiters stand spotless in an orderly array. The far-famed Hiram S. Thomas, a man of gigantic but graceful frame, is their generalissimo. His captains-general, attired like himself in full evening suits of black, are stationed at equal distances apart down the center aisle. The lieutenants stand along the sides. Every table is attended, according to its size, with two to four waiters, and every waiter is watched by the assistance of the generalissimo…Watch the generalissimo! With what intuition he comprehends the disposition and wish of each hungry guest. Always polite and accommodating, never hurried, yet performing his task with a celerity that saves everyone from waiting, this potentate of the dining room is an artist.”

Thomas did well here, and his fame and reputation grew. His bank account and ambitions grew too. In 1888, he took over the running of an upscale resort hotel on Saratoga Lake called Moon’s. He renamed it the Lake House. In the beginning he only owned the restaurant, he later bought the entire establishment. He brought his now-famous class and elegance to the Lake House. The hotel was mentioned often in New York’s society pages, where they referred to Thomas as the well-known and respected colored man who owned it.

(This illustration erroneously credits Hiram Thomas as the inventor of the potato chip. The information was given to the author by Mrs. Eubie Blake, who was Thomas’ granddaughter. Sorry, but it was really George Crum.)

The Lake House was most famous for its food. In the summer of  1888, one of its chefs was Emeline Jones, declared by her wealthy clientele to be the “best cook in America.” Mrs. Jones was so admired, she had been wooed by both Presidents Cleveland and Arthur to come to the White House, but she declined. She went to Washington to cook one meal for President Arthur and then came back to Saratoga to work for fellow African American Hiram Thomas.

Another African American chef at the Lake House also made culinary history. His name was George Crum. Local lore has it that he prepared some sliced potatoes for a guest. The guest sent them back, saying they weren’t sliced thinly enough. He sliced the potatoes thinner, but they were again rejected. Frustrated, he sliced the potatoes paper thin, deep fried them, put plenty of salt on them, and sent them out one more time. The guest was elated. Soon everyone at the Lake House wanted the new “Saratoga Chips.” The potato chip was born.

Many years later, Hiram Thomas’ granddaughter, Marion Tyler Gant, told the African American press that her grandfather had invented the potato chip. It was the topic of much publicity and pride, especially since Ms. Gant was married to famed composer Eubie Blake. Their house at 284A Stuyvesant Avenue was passed down to her from Thomas. But today, most culinary historians give George Crum the credit. That’s fine, because Hiram Thomas had quite the reputation on his own merits.

The “Season” at Saratoga ends in early October and doesn’t reopen until May. Hiram had children in college and wanted to work during the off-season, so he took a job as head waiter at the Lakewood Hotel, on the Jersey Shore. The hotel was another large, posh establishment that was a favorite of the East Coast’s elite. Grover Cleveland, Mark Twain and John D. Rockefeller all vacationed there, or had homes in Lakewood. As happened wherever he worked, Hiram Thomas’ reputation preceded him, and as he knew all of these people anyway, he was accorded great respect and admiration.

(1890s postcard of the Lakewood Hotel in Lakewood, NJ)

In 1892, a NY Times writer, vacationing at Lakewood wrote, “Who should be the headwater, but the dignified and portly Hiram Thomas, from the Grand Union Hotel in Saratoga, who has 'head-waitered' upon me many times in that establishment; and Mr. Thomas stood by me while I ate the Lakewood's Little Neck clams.....It is no small honor, you must understand, to have the dignified head waiter in a big hotel devote his time to you and even stop to talk with you. But I wore my laurels as modestly as I could.” 

(131 Fort Greene Place - the middle house. Photo: Susan DeVries for Brownstoner)

The “Generalissimo” meets the General in Brooklyn

In the summer of 1894, Thomas was working the room at his Lake House. He stopped to chat with General Edward Molineaux, whom he knew from his Capitol Club days in Washington. The general had been a member of General Grant’s staff during the war and during the Grant presidency was a frequent guest at the club. During the course of conversation, Molineaux dropped that he now lived in Brooklyn. Thomas was elated. Perhaps the general could tell him about a property that Thomas had just purchased for himself and his family? Most of his children were of college age or older, he was thinking about retiring at some point, and this new house would be a homey respite from his busy summer schedule. Brooklyn was also the halfway point between Saratoga and New Jersey.

Molineaux explained that he might not know the neighborhood that Thomas’ new home was in, no doubt expecting that it would be in some lesser neighborhood than his, after all….but he lived at 117 Fort Greene Place, a quiet street not far from Washington Park and downtown Brooklyn. His brother-in-law, who Thomas also knew, lived on the block as well.  “No,” Thomas exclaimed, “What a coincidence! The property I recently purchased was on the same block, at number 131 Fort Greene Place. We shall be neighbors! How splendid is that?” Splendid, indeed!

The General rushed to tell his sister in Brooklyn the news. She and her husband, retailer J.S. Burnham would be living next door to the Thomas family! Burnham shared that news with his landlady, Dr. Emma Onderdock, one of Brooklyn’s first female physicians. She, like Molineaux and Burnham, was horrified at the thought of a Negro family moving onto the block, even one so distinguished as that of Hiram Thomas. Soon word of the sale spread to every house on Fort Greene Place.

Dr. Onderdock organized a committee to stop the sale. The group met in her house for a series of strategy sessions. Her first move was to attempt to sue the seller, Dr. Harry Smith. He had already moved on to a new home in Prospect Heights and had put the sale of the brownstone in the hands of his realtor, Thomas J. Henderson. Smith was on record saying he really didn’t care who bought his house, as long as the parties had the money to buy it. Realtor Henderson is quoted by the Brooklyn Eagle as saying that he would not mind living next door to a Negro, in fact, would prefer one as a neighbor to some white people he could name.

Naturally, the press had a field day with the story.  The headline in the Eagle on October 1, 1894 read, “Flurry in Ft. Greene Place, because a Negro has bought a Three Story House: Aristocratic Neighbors in a Panic”. The NY Times headline read, “They Want No Colored Neighbor.” As the story progressed, it was picked up in syndication by newspapers across the country. The story of who Hiram Thomas was, the location of the house, the neighbors, all became fodder for many papers, some of which ran the Eagle and Times stories intact, while others took the opportunity to editorialize on the subject.

(General Edward Leslie Molineaux via Wikipedia)

The country’s papers down South took great glee in reporting the story. Here was Northern hypocrisy at its finest! “The occasion is auspicious for observing that it is mighty queer that northern people who are always willing to fasten Negro domination upon the south are not willing to even live next door to a Negro,” sneered the Morning News of Savannah, Georgia.

Not everyone in Brooklyn was up in arms. Some people were downright embarrassed and angry. Many of the residents on the block said they had no problem with Thomas and his family moving in. Rev. S. B. Halliday, assistant pastor of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn Heights wrote a scathing letter to the NY Times. In part, he said, “I have supposed that the residents of Fort Greene Place were so eminently respectable that they could not have feared that their respectability could ever be called in question by the coming of half a dozen respectable families of color settling around them, much less by a single family. What a pretty story it is to get abroad over the country that a black man cannot move into a respectable neighborhood without stirring up a rebellion....I think our city is disgraced by the presence of such a spirit in its midst.”

Meanwhile, the Molineaux extended family and Onderdock continued their efforts to dissuade Thomas from moving in. But that only fueled the negative rumors that Thomas was a greedy speculator out to scare the white folks into buying him out for big bucks.

When this was passed on to Dr. Onderdock, she told the newspapers, “If he [Thomas] is a respectable good man, as they say, he will not wish to live there after this trouble. If he does move in, values will all become depreciated and he will lose as much as anyone else.” She also went on to say that if they couldn't stop Thomas from buying the house, he ought to at least have the decency to not reside at the property.

Hiram and his family ignored the racism. As speculation as to his motives and future actions spread around the neighborhood, he went on with his plans to move his family in. On October 3, 1894, an article in a tabloid called the New York World announced that the residents of Fort Greene Place were jubilant that morning, because they heard that the Thomas family was not moving in.

The day before, the paper reported, neighbors could be seen peering from their windows, waiting in dread for the moving wagon to pull up to 131. Had Thomas moved in, some neighbors declared, they would be moving out. At once. But they had heard from General Molineaux that Thomas would not move in. “The matter has been settled,” Mrs. Molineaux told the reporter. Or had it? Hiram Thomas was of a different opinion.

The next day, the Brooklyn Eagle posted an article with an interview with Hiram, who was still up in Saratoga Springs. He denied buying the house as a speculation. He also revealed that he had considered both Molineaux and Burnham to be personal friends of his. Burnham had even written to Thomas entreating him to take special care of his brother-in-law while he was up in Saratoga. He was shocked at the amount of vitriol over his purchase of the house next door to Mr. Burnham.

He also related that the General tried to buy him out. Thomas told him that he would sell, but he was going to capitalize on his investment, and sell for a higher price than what he purchased the house for. “If my coming into the neighborhood will depreciate property, as some have said it would, I am willing to sell my house. But I don’t think I should be put in all this trouble for nothing.” Molineaux couldn’t afford the house, and the ad hoc Brooklyn committee didn’t have the funds, either.

“I have ordered carpets and furniture, which are now being placed in the house.” Thomas told the reporter.  “My family will occupy it in ten days. We will reside there until I go to Lakewood on the first of December.” True to his timeline, by late October of 1894, Charles O. Thomas, the eldest son, was seen at the house. During the day, grocer’s and butcher’s wagons were seen making deliveries. Charles, two of his sisters and two servants were now in residence.

Charles told reporters that no one had shown any hostility. “Because we live here is no reason why our neighbors should be compelled to associate with us,” he said. The Brooklyn Eagle announced on October 23rd, that Mr. and Mrs. Thomas had joined their children. No neighbors moved out, and nothing happened. Not with the Thomas family anyway. The next time reporters gathered on Fort Greene Place it was because of General Molineaux. His son Roland was accused of being one of the early 20th century’s most notorious murderers. Perhaps they should have worried more about him.

Hiram Thomas owned the Lake House for ten years. He never retired. After giving that up, he took possession of the Rumsen Inn, in Red Bank, NJ. He owned that establishment for eleven years. He didn’t live on Fort Greene Place for very long but did invest in other property in Brooklyn. When he died at his home in Red Bank after a long illness on July 8, 1907, he was 70 years old. One of his sons and two of his daughters had taken over his business, showing much of the same talent for hospitality as their father.

His funeral took place at St. Philip’s Episcopal Church in Manhattan, where he was a vestryman when in NY, and he is buried in the family plot in Cypress Hills Cemetery. Thomas was eulogized in papers across the nation. “One of the best-known hotel men in the country,” one paper announced. “The fine art of entertaining was his in largest measure.” “He enjoyed a wide acquaintance among public men,” another paper stated, “especially those high in political and financial circles. General Grant was a warm supporter of his.”

Today, as the accomplishments of many of America’s unsung chefs, cooks and hoteliers of African descent are finally becoming better known, perhaps Hiram S. Thomas will become a household name once again -  revered as his own self-made success, and  a master of the art of fine and gracious dining.

(Thomas family monument in Cypress Hills Cemetery, Brooklyn. Photo: Susan DeVries for Brownstoner.)