by Who invented the hamburger? This seemingly simple food item, perhaps the world’s most popular snack, has a surprisingly mysterious history.
The story starts in Hamburg, in northern Germany.
Situated on the Elbe River, in the Middle Ages Hamburg was a lively trading post. Visiting merchants and travellers from across Europe would bring trade goods, along with new ideas and customs.
Somewhere in the mid 18th century, this process brought a new culinary concept to the bustling city: diced beef steak, formed into flattened disks and fried.
It is thought this preparation may have originated in England or Russia; both countries had dishes that were similar, and had significant trade with Germany in this period. But exactly where, and when, fried meat patties were first cooked, will probably never be known.
Wherever the recipe originated, it quickly caught on in Hamburg. There the meat was mixed with mixed with egg, onion and spices, and served with roast vegetables.
Known as a ‘Hamburg Steak‘, the dish became popular locally, then throughout Germany. Simple to prepare, cheap and tasty, it was well placed to conquer the world.
As the 19th century unfolded, waves of immigrants departed Europe, looking for fresh opportunity elsewhere. Many of these headed for America, then still establishing itself as a world power.
German migrants settled in the United States in large numbers, and many of them prospered. They brought their cultural traditions with them, and the Hamburg Steak would find a vast new audience.
The first recorded reference in America is from the 1870s:
A ‘Hamburg Steak’ is simply a beef-steak, redeemed from its original roughness by being mashed into mincemeat, and then formed into a conglomerated mass, and fried.
‘The New York Times’, 1873
The dish again proved popular. By the 1880s, Hamburg Steaks were well established on the east coast of America, and could be found on the menu of most diners and cafes.
Something was also happening to the name; it had somehow gone from ‘Hamburg’, to ‘Hamburger’:
Those flat, brown, meat cakes on that dish there are Hamburg Steaks; the people call them ‘Hamburgers.’ They are made from raw meat chopped up with onions, and spices, and are very good.
‘The New York Sun’, 1883
This is another mystery of the hamburger: the origin of its name is unknown. Linguists have speculated that there is no clear reason why the named changed, beyond people’s natural inclination to play with words.
The hamburger pattie in America in the 1880s looked and tasted much like it does today. But it remained something that you sat down to eat on a plate, with a knife and fork and vegetable sides.
The late 19th century is when it would transition to sandwich form. Again, who was responsible is unclear.
But there are contenders.
Charlie Nagreen was born into a poor family in Hortonville, Wisconsin in 1870. He left school at an early age, and scrabbled a living with a mobile lunch cart.
Nagreen’s cart had a gas powered hot plate, he cooked and served meatballs. He was undoubtedly familiar with Hamburg Steaks; Wisconsin had a substantial German expat population.
In October 1885, Nagreen used a team of oxen to drag his lunch cart 20 miles to the nearby town of Seymour. He set up there at the county fair, where a large crowd was in attendance.
But he shortly ran into a problem: while there were plenty of potential customers, everyone wanted a snack they could take with them, while they viewed the fair. The meatballs Nagreen served came plated, which did not suit the crowd.
The resourceful Nagreen hit on an ingenious solution. He bought a few loaves of bread from a sandwich stand, flattened his meatballs into patties, and served them between two slices of bread so they could be carried.
This creation was a success, and Nagreen made a tidy sum. He trialled his new sandwich at other events, and it proved so popular he soon made them his primary product, selling them at fairs across Wisconsin.
Nagreen became known as ‘Hamburger Charlie’. And as the food item became more widespread, he promoted the claim that he was its inventor; what is recounted above, is his version of events.
This origin story is widespread online, and appears on his Wikipedia page.
But other sources note, there is no tangible evidence, for any of it. Nagreen was not even able even to prove he attended the Seymour State Fair in 1885, let alone that he invented hamburgers there.
His story may be true, but Hamburger Charlie may also have been an early adopter, rather than an inventor.
Frank and Robert Mench also operated a travelling snack stand, selling sliced pork sandwiches at fairs and public events.
In either 1885, or 1892 (different versions have different dates) the brothers set up shop at the county fair in Akon, Ohio. Having run out of pork due to unexpectedly high demand, they tried to source more meat from a local butcher.
But all the Mench’s could get their hands on was five pounds of ground beef.
They used this to prepare a batch of Hamburg Steaks, also well known in Ohio. To serve them, they employed the remainder of their sandwich making supplies; bread, and salad, with a ground beef pattie in between.
A modern style hamburger was produced. The Mench’s would later stake their claim as its inventor.
The problem with this origin story is the same as Hamburger Charlie’s; there is no evidence beyond the brother’s claims that it ever happened.
The Mench’s ran a mobile sandwich stand, that later became a bricks-and-mortar shop. But there are no newspaper reports of them serving hamburgers in 1885 or 1892, and no mention of them having invented hamburgers until much later.
As a footnote, in the modern era ‘Mench Bros’ is a small goods company, that specialises in frozen hamburger patties.
Another claimant is Fletcher ‘Uncle Fletch’ Davis, who ran a small diner in the Texas city of Athens, just outside Dallas.
Sometime between 1896 and 1900 (accounts vary), Davis came up with a version of the hamburger; a ground beef patty, served between two slices of thick, crusty bread, called Texas Toast.
While Davis did not call his sandwich a ‘hamburger’, it was a popular and well known local lunch item. Several residents have left behind first hand accounts of eating it at his restaurant.
Davis’ sandwich was so popular, he was invited to the World’s Fair in St Louis in 1904. Producing hamburgers in the food hall, the huge audience at the fair helped popularise the food item, across America.
Davis’ story is verifiable, but his role in hamburger history comes too late for him to be its inventor. By 1896, there are widespread reports of hamburgers, across the American media.
This did not stop Davis from claiming to be the inventor, and labelling his Texas establishment: ‘The birthplace of the hamburger’.
In 1893, the Evening Gazette in Reno, Nevada, carried an article that made specific mention of ‘hamburger steak sandwiches’ that were sold in a local cafe.
By the following year, the Los Angeles Times had a description of the same being sold by street vendors in LA. The casual nature of these references indicates that hamburgers – beef patties between two pieces of bread – were already well known in both places.
Which brings us back to the start.
Who invented the hamburger? Just as it is unclear who first cooked Hamburg Steaks, or coined the term ‘hamburger’, we will probably never know.
