The History of A&W Rootbeer.
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- čas přidán 4. 03. 2023
- A&W Root Beer is an American brand of root beer that was founded in 1919 by Roy W. Allen[1] and primarily available in the United States and Canada. Allen partnered with Frank Wright in 1922, creating the A&W brand and inspiring a chain of A&W Restaurants founded that year. Originally, A&W Root Beer sold for five cents
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A&W is still one of the most popular fast food places in Canada, great food great service. So much better than the others.I never go anywhere else. The sirloin Uncle Burger is outstanding!
Absolutely correct Papa Burger rules !
Canada A
@@bossmanmce5599yes!! Papa Burger and onion rings forme
What are you Canadians doing eating our All American food?
@@The_Not_So_Great_Cornholio A
At 53 now, my memories include my two older sisters working at the local A&W back in the 70s while also eating at the very same location for decades after which has now (very sadly) been razed. Nothing compares to their draft root beer and amazing burgers. Sad now.
A&W went down 1980s after dropping The car hop service and food with it too now today very isolated find car hop service
I also miss the original, new corporate takeovers have ruined what made it so great at first.
What I wouldn't give for a Papa Burger and Fries and good old mug of goodness
Boy, those frosty mugs of ice cold root beer at the drive-ins were fantastic. We would buy a 1 gallon glass jugs for home, but it just wasen't the same.
We'd also buy the one gallon jugs of A&W rootbeer. After sitting in the fridge for several days it would lose its fizz but I'd still drink it!
Former car hop here. We'd put the mugs into the freezer while still warm from the dishwasher so they'd frost perfectly. I can still remember the overwhelming smell of heating concentrated syrup to make the root beer, and how the boss wanted ice cream swirls on the float mugs to match the poster pictures. Great job for a young kid! 😁👍🏻
Thank you. I love inside tips like this.@@patjones2082
I remember back in 1965 it was an event to cruise the A&W in Hawthorne California. Cruising Hawthorne Blvd on the week-ends was a must for most teenagers & younger adults. We would park at the Hawthorne A&W, if you could ever find a space, we’d all buy a five cent root beer & sit there almost all night watching the hot rods cruise through showing off their machines. Fond memories of the A&W.
thanks for sharing your memories
Who could pass up that GIANT GLASS ICE COLD MUG OF A&W. That was classic. Wish those little drive in stands would make a comeback. Iconic American history.👍😎🇺🇸
I'm Having a homemade a&w root beer float while watching
I've been eating clean whole foods No soda pop or junk food for 3.5 years, and this video put me in a trance😵💫I feel like getting mugged big time I remember getting those cheeseburgers in foil bags. Great video but I'm ready for a relapse 🤤 Ice Cream Floats Duuuuuuuuuuuude This video Rocks A&W Cream Soda was my go to. Thank You for the video
I'm craving a large frosty mug of A&W, myself...or a float!
Is this comment about A&W or you?
I desperately miss our local A&W drive-in restaurant -- getting a Coney Dog, a root beer float and chili cheese fries was a bi-weekly thing for my mom and I for a few years in the late 1990s. The A&Ws which are part of another chain fast food restaurant are nothing like the original standalone A&W.
When I was a small child on the early 1960's my dad used to take us to the local A&W stand. It was fun to sit in the car and have cute female carhops skate out to us and hang the foodtrays on our windows. Plus we got root beer in cold glass mugs and usually in a large waxed paper cone to take home. The stand is long gone to make way for the community college parking lot but the A&W still operates across the street as part of a KFC. Their menu is mostly the same except no glass mugs or takeout draft root beer cones. I ate there not long ago. Nothing beats an A&W root beer float on a hot Southern California summer day. They're working on the 6th generation of my family now as my grandparents used to go to A&W in their early California days.
Without the frosted glass mug its not worth it.
In summer 1960 Mom and DAd took us on the mandatory Chicago to the Southwest one month road trip to collect all the window stickers for the National Parks. NO air conditioning in the car. The A & W stands with frost covered mugs of root beer. The A& W stands were our long awaited oasis stops to cool off. Unforgettable.
In the 70s, I remember the A&W at Smith Flat outside Placerville, CA. They served a "Hangtown Burger." Was a double cheeseburger on a sourdough roll. Best burger around in those days.
IN the 1950's my dad was riding his horse one afternoon along a road in Hutchinson, KS and stopped for a Root Beer at the A&W drive in. He leaned over in the saddle, pushed the magic speaker button, and ordered his root beer. After getting near the end, he leaned down to let his horse have the final sip from the mug. His horse stuck his long tongue in and slurped up what was left.... A couple weeks later dad was riding again and came to the A&W stand ... BUT ....the horse stopped and wouldn't go any farther ..... he wanted another slurp.🤣🤣🤣🤣
I've often wondered what the other patrons thought drinking from their frosty mugs and watching my dad's horse having a go too....
I guess they used pretty hot water to clean them🤔
great story, thanks.
In the 1970s A&W was the place to be on a Friday night rolling in the white 1966 Pontiac GTO find a place to park turn down the stereo and push the button, and they would ask the usual? And I would say you got it. And roll the window up a little to the proper height the usual was two Coney Island dogs a Papa burger for me a mama Burger for the wife two large onion rings and two large mugs of Root beer,
@@mudduck754 i can still her the ka-chink ka-chink of those coin changers tapping against their apron as they carried out my order. 🤠🤠
I grow up LOVING A W ROOTBEER !!! WHEN I WAS LITTLE MY FAMILY WOULD GO TO THE AW IN ALHAMBRA CA OFF OF MAIN STREET IN THE 70’S WE ALL HAD DOUBLE CHEESEBURGERS AND LARGE FROSTY ROOT BEER SODAS IN ICED MUGS THE MUGS WHERE A MUST IT KEPT THE ROOT BEER SOOO COLD AWESOME MEMORIES W FAMILY I MISS THOSE TIMES BUT AT LEAST I EXPERIENCED IT ❤❤❤
thanks for sharing your memories
I worked at the A&W in Hanford, California from about 1975 to 1977. It had started out as just a root beer stand, and it was later expanded to sell food. Before I worked there, you could purchase gallon or half-gallon jugs of the root beer to take home.
thank you for sharing your memories
@@patjones2082 Yup! Same packaging at our store. Are there any stores that still serve in the frosted mugs?
When I was in high school in Calgary Alberta Canada there was an A&W on Mcleod Trail. On Friday nights we would all show up in our cars. I went there when I bought my new car a 1966 Chevelle SS to show it off with my high school girlfriend that I married two years later. It was fun sitting there & chatting and seeing who else would be showing up. Girls on roller skates would bring your order to the car on a tray that hooked to your car window. Fun memories !
good times
This video deservers way more attention! Well made and interesting, nice job!
thank you
A&W Restaurants and Root Beer are operated under the A&W banner in Canada separate from the US operations. It also is the second most popular fast food restaurant in Canada with 1,029 restaurants.
thank you for that information
What I remember is....,it is good.,in the 60's was my first taste on really hot evening I had a frosty mug of root beer in Sandusky,Ohio....what a taste for a young boy about 5 years old
There is over a thousand A&W restaurants in Canada and they are thriving.
I’m 70 now and I remember those little root beer stands as they were called in Grand Rapids Michigan. There was at least 4 of them back then and as I recall the only things they served was small, large, and baby sized mugs of root beer, the baby size being free. The only food I remember is hot dogs. This was in the early 60’s when almost nobody had air conditioning in their cars and most didn’t even have air conditioning in their homes. These little A&W stands were an inexpensive stop for families on a hot summer evening to try and cool off a bit over a cold mug of root beer, and now that I think about it I think they were only open in the summer months. They have long ago gone by the wayside however, there are still 2 of those little stands left standing though not A&W. Fond memories!
A&W forever:) I had no idea, not even close to knowing it was that old. I work out west in Canada for a few years. Everytime i would stop at an A&W in the small towns, farmers where gathered there, drinking coffee, snacking on onion rings and burgers. I knew then A&W was legit:) cheers
A&W was the "treat" of my parents in Deer Lodge and Missoula, Mont., back in the early 1960's. I remember the orange lights and all the brown, white and chrome trim, the great food, the food hops, and the attachable tray to the driver's side window that amazed me on ow it worked. It held all the food Dad and Mom ordered via the "magical" speaker beside Dad's window. A&W Root Beer and that food, the "baby burgers, the children's mugs, the deep-fried shrimp plates were a 6-year old's dream after a weary, long shopping, market and cattle auction day for a little boy from a cattle-town out in the "sticks" that now lives in the "food Capital of the USA". Thank you for this reminder of my childhood and how far we all travel in life. Bon-Apatite.
Besides some craft rootbeers, A&W is one of my favorite sodas and restaurants. Great upload
thank you my friend
Back in the 1970's we would ride our horses to A&W and the car hops would wait on us while we sat on the horses. Miss those good old days!
A&W was the nearest "fast food" when I was a kid in the late 80s early 90's. So going out was always running to A&W car hop getting a burger, fries, and a root beer. Then going to the park a couple blocks down. The park and A&W are both gone now. But I'll always cherish those memories.
I recall that we could go to our A andW and buy the root beer by the gallon! That was so good on a hot day!
I worked at A & W Rootbeer after school back in the 70's, didn't pay much but it was a fun job.
I had the good fortune when I was ln my junior and senior years of High school which was the years of 1957 to 1959 to work in A@W in San Bernardino, Cal. It was the most popular drive in restaurant in town for the teenage kid of the 1950's. It was a great time to be a teenager. I have fond memories of those times 😅😊
thanks for sharing those memories
I’ll always remember A&W…. It was the icon of the early 60’s. Believe it or not , My aunt Angie retired from A&W in Livermore California. A street was named after her in the same location. Angie’s Way. My parents would always take my sister and me to get a root beer float. The yummiest drink you could imagine. 1958 through 1963 were my root beer years. Will never forget.😊
thanks for sharing your memories about this place
When I was a kid I lived in Boston, and would walk a block to a pharmacy that had a soda fountain. They had a wooden barrel shaped root beer dispenser that I'm pretty sure poured A&W root beer into frosty mugs taken from a freezer chest. That was such a treat on a hot summer day.
thanks for sharing your memories
It's still DELICIOUS, especially with a good scoop of Vanilla Ice Cream!
In 1967 I was employed by A&W my job was to make root beer keeping the vats flowing.
Back in the 60s, my parents would
drive from Corning NY to Elmira NY for Pizza at Musticos and get jugs of A&W on the way home. Roads back then we not highways of today.
It is a fond childhood memory. I can still taste it in my mind.
Cortland NY has an A&W. That's about a 40 minute drive.
I grew-up in a small town in Central California and we had one of the old car-hop A&W drive-in restaurants that had been there since at least the 1950s. It had the big Papa, Mama & Baby statues on the roof. It was a favorite spot for our family and I loved my Baby Burger & root beer float! We bought A&W root beer in brown gallon glass jugs to take home, and you could then bring the empties back to the restaurant.
thank you for sharing your memories
Almost always when I see an A&W I STOP for a root beer or burger. It was one of the first fast food places I went to as a child. Drinks came in real, heavy glass mugs. The burgers and drinks were called Baby, Momma and Papa by size. It was a real treat for my brother and I when my folks would stop. We would get car hop service with a tray that hung on the lowered driver's side front window. Many " car hops" wore roller skates. I loved it!
thanks for sharing that info
The original 1919 A&W stand is still in operation in Lodi CA. It has of course been rebuilt and remodeled several times over the years.
The current location in Lodi is not the original location but it does have a little A&W museum exhibit inside the dining room that's well worth visiting.
@@tundraboomer3372correct, it was located on Pine Street...
Lived in Plymouth Amador County until 2019 and went to lodi often for a nice cold A&W
California Gold with Huel Howser did a show about Lodi, Ca and A & W Root Beer stands!
@judithscobee8102 he did some amazing shows wish that style of entertainment was still around
Growing up in the 80s I remember A&W root beer stands.
The “roadside” root beer stand was at the town center of Lodi, California…on Pine Street. It was right next to my uncle’s barbershop, where a plaque marks the location today.
Always loves getting a mug or scooter to go of root beer. In our travels when we see a stand definitely make a stop.
There was A&W in Miami on NW 27th Ave. in the 70's which was a stellar landmark where myself and coworkers would eat almost every day while fixing motorcycles at the" Dade Jr. Yamaha Shop". Damn, I miss that place !!!!!!
thanks for sharing
Remember these as a boy in the 60's, drive-up curb service & pretty girls bringing food on the window trays. Loved LOVED those crinkle fries & coney dogs w/their root beer.
❤My first exposure to A & W was in Michigan! Now I live in Tucson where the maker of A & W got his start.
I keep meaning to stop at the one down the peninsula from me, only because I've never had the food in one! When we used to go out for a treat we would get their root beer but my dad never let us keep the mugs!
There's still a seasonal one operating in Lake George NY, it burned down a few years ago but was quickly rebuilt.
Was there last year, saw it and had to stop. We used to have an A&W on Long Island but it’s been gone for years now.
What an exciting list of corporate buy outs, mergers, franchising,. and investment capital . Always fun to hear.
I always thought A&W was started when two old trucks, one driven by Albert, the other driven by Willy collided on the highway. Are you telling me that was just a commercial, not a documentary! I’m shocked!
The free root beer mugs.
Our family ate regularly at a&w.
Our kitchen cupboard was full of root beer mugs.
Now, KFC/A/W if you can find one
❣️
A&W drive in was the only fast food in my small town on the California central coast. It’s still there. The town is no longer small and now all fast food is available.
We called A&W Root Beer floats made with vanilla ice cream "Black Cows." This was in the early 1950's in Des Moines, Iowa. It was always a big treat. A&W is still the best root beer. I make Black Cows for guests in frozen mugs as a special treat.
Sugar bomb
I grew up in the 60's/70's in San Diego and we called them Black Cows as well. Do you know if they were advertised in the restaurants as Black Cows? I say Black Cow every now and then and get blank expressions from friends. Grandma was from Pennsylvania, so I always just thought it was something she picked up there.
@@patrickbrowder6857 Don't know the origin of the name --I was about 8 years old then
@@georgeallee3232 thank you
I miss the true A & W drive ins. Use drive up in my 54 Bel Air all out. Pulled up under the awning and the waitress would come up to the door and I ordered a root beer. She put a tray on the window, with this frosty mug of root beer. It was so good. Today we have one in a Long John Silvers. The root beer served like other drinks. To me it is just the name. As far as in grocery store purchases, I preferred Frosty and Hires root beer.
Thanks for sharing
My first memories of A&W were the little A&W Root Beer stand a few blocks from our house when I was in second grade. It was across the side street from my grade school. Occasionally, my mother would give me 50¢ so I could go across the street and have a hamburger, fries, and a root beer for lunch. It was a special treat, since the school lunch was only 35¢. Once in a great while, my Dad would take us over in the car, and those frosty mugs were so good. Then slowly, all of the drive-in root beer stands disappeared. Sonic is a drive in, but not quite the same. And when A&W was completely inside with KFC, it was nothing special at all. I do remember one locally about 15 years ago trying to recapture that feeling. They put a draft barrel in the seating area and would give you a frosty mug instead of the usual paper cup. But the mugs were plastic, so it still wasn't the same. Now the closest A&W is 100 miles away. And with fast food combo meals running $12 to $14 before tax now, it isn't likely they will be back. I never thought I'd ever pay $10 at Taco Bell unless I was paying for a couple of people, but a month ago in weakness, I went in alone and got out at $13. Really sad.
thanks for sharing those nice memories
I remember going to the A&W drive-in in St Albans WV in the 70s.
My uncle Don would order two dozen hotdogs and two mugs of root beer, six for him,six for me on the drive home. The other twelve for the rest of the family.
I remember that A & W in St. Albans! Great memories!
Six kids in my family. We all worked our first jobs at an a&w in Saskatoon sask. In the 70s. Best job, most fun I ever had. 14 yr old boy working with 16/18 yr old girls I was something.
thanks for sharing that
Was Great back in the early 60’s .
Back in the late 60's, my younger brother got a job their as a car hop. The only problem was that they got charged for broken mugs. He soon realized he was working for nothing. :) I loved their root beer floats. :)
My mom worked at A&W as a car-hop. It’s also where my mom and dad met many years ago.
It is nice to see that A&W not only operated in and around major cities but small cities and towns as well over the years. It's also nice that their root beer brand is still available also.
Always loved their root beer and cream soda.Never been to an A&W restaurant though.Makes me want to visit one.😎
My favorite place to go when I was a kid
My first real job as a teen growing into adulthood was working for A&W International in Santa Monica, CA. That's when corporations were very cool places to work! You could have a long lunch hour with co workers and everyone had a drink or two at lunch usually on friday and nobody raised an eyebrow. We had great Christmas parties too! Corps were like one big family. That was a great job for me. I had several titles there. I started at 17.
Interesting/informative/entertaining. Remember those along the highways. Haven't seen one in 25 years. Excellent photography pictures of the different phases of the chain/employees/menus. Enabling viewer's to better understand what/whom the orator was describing. Making this documentary more authentic and possible. Never did acquire a taste for root beer or cream soda!!! No comment on those beverages/burgers & onion rings tasted good. Better than competitor chain burgers.
thank you my friend
I loved going to the drive in located in Oklahoma. The food came out ona train like capsule. One of my favorite memories
I loved to go there in the 60's.
I loved their root beer and stands, and still keep and use a frosty root beer mug kept in my freezer in homage to A&W. In Nebraska in the 60’s I saw a K&N root beer stand that looked just like it.
A&W root beer was my soda of choice back when I was kid ( 60's ). The only A&W restaurant was 30 miles away so my dad would only take us there about once a month. The papa burger was the best I ever had....but they also served a item called Tater Dog, it was a hot dog on a stick like a corn dog but the outside was mashed potatoes instead of corn meal deep fried. I never saw that item again at any other A&W. It must of been something they invented but it was the best hot dog on a stick I have ever had. They closed it down about 35 years ago, sad.
A&W is still here in San Antonio..has been taken down a notch but the food is still awesome..
A&W in a frosted glass mug is the best thing I ever drank. But the mug has to be thick glass and it has to be chilled just right.
There is nothing like an ice cold mug of A&W Root Beer! My sister was a carhop at A&W in Paradise, California in 1964!
I worked for A&W when I was a teenager from 1967-1970 where I met my husband
thanks for sharing those nice memories
my mom back in the 60's would take us out for a root beer float!
I used to work at a machine shop in the Chicago ghetto on the weekends during the 70s with my father. Hot and dangerous work environment. One of the few highlights was on days we would stop on the way home and get a cold A&W root beer.
thanks for sharing your memories
A&W was my first job. I worked in Alma Michigan
thanks for sharing your memories
Loved A and W in Okinawa in the '60s/70s. I got to drink "beer" just like my daddy.
I remember those frosty mugs with that draft root beer, so good.
The last A&W I remember was in a small California town in the 1970s . My mom and I stopped there once while we were visiting my grandma.
Still love an ice cold A&W 😋
thanks for sharing that
I freaking love A&W
As a soda fan, A&W soda was a preferred choice (and still is) for Root Beer and Cream Soda over IBC and others (unless A&W isn't available). I remember the very first A&W restaurant I went to was in Wyoming next to a laundromat in a small town just outside of the Big Horn Mountains (south side). They had an old-fashioned pin ball machine in there. The next time I saw it was I think in Truckee, California when we left from Lassen National Park and parted ways with my Uncle Herb (we grabbed lunch from the A&W). That was the last time I saw my uncle Herb in person. They used to have an A&W in Corpus Christi that was married to Long John Silver's (part of the Yum Brands). The last time I was in that A&W-Silver's place, my wife had what we thought was a heart attack. Since then, I've not been in another A&W. They closed the Corpus Christi location a couple of years ago. I do not know where the closest A&W restaurant is any more. I liked their double-meat double cheese burger and their grilled chicken sandwich was pretty good (depending on who cooked the food, based on how long they cooked it). Their chili dogs were almost the worst I ever had. A&W Root Beer to set it apart from all the other brands (and I have tried nearly every brand made in the last 40+ years) was that there was a spice or a bite to the root beer where some of the other brands were smoother or had more of a syrupy taste.
Concerning the video, I did not appreciate the commercial at the very beginning. Things would had been a lot better had that been completely out.
thank you for your input
To this day, that's still one of the funniest commercials I've ever seen. I remember it didn't air for very long and I'm not surprised. The first time I saw it, I was visiting my mother and we just laughed and rhetorically asked, "Did they just show that?!" I predicted that it wouldn't run very long and it didn't. It's hilarious.
When in the Air Force, Grand Forks , ND. My wife & I would go to the A&W there . We would order a big box of onion rings & root beer , we still 50 years yrs. later laugh about about it. We did much money, but we had fun. I now own around 40 mugs, very little to large. Some are quite old.
It be awesome if they’d make cane sugar version. & bring back the car hops with the metal tray on your car window, the lil speaker & menu right in every parking spot.
There used to be be an A & W restaurant on the north side of Milwaukee, WI. I was sad to see it shut down and later torn down. Our family would buy the hamburgers and order sometimes 2 or 3 gallons of the root beer to take home. This was in the late 1960's.
A&W is an iconic fast food chain. I grew up with A&W through the years and miss the most was their famous Sub sandwiches!! way before subway and other sub shops! They had the best sub sandwiches ever and discontinued them!
thanks for sharing your memories
Your very welcome,anytime! We have one here in Lodi,Ca..@@echang1976
@10:57 isn't that *John Goodman* on the right?
My brother was three years old when I was a teenager. Dad would let him drink a baby mug. We did not get to go more than once or so a month, but bubba always got his baby mug. We all became fans of a frosty mug of A & W.
In 1960 I was four years old. We lived at my moms parents house, and I distinctly remember having my first chilled bottle of A&W root beer. We would poke holes in the bottle cap with an ice pick and literally suck it out to make it last longer. It was an amazing and delightful, taste experience, and as you see, I remember it to this day.
I remember me and my brother going to the local hop they were on roller skates there in the 60s and early 70s getting that frosty mug full of root beer and playing nickle pinball great child hood memory's
I recall in the 50's and 60's in Western Canada it was to the place to hang out, show off our cars and meet girls. I don't recall goind inside the restaurants..........plenty of car hops to serve us.
The secret to A & W root beer flavor is that in the restruant it has ne bubbles. It is nearly flat, just enough to draw a head. Served ice cold it is by far the best.
You sure don't see many around. The one in my town has been here since the 60's still with the car hops.
Screengrab caught my attention because it was a Canadian picture (the Dominion supermarket in the background at 4:48) that each restaurant displayed along with numerous other pictures back in the day.
Pomona CA Holt Ave and San Antonio Ave had one it's gone and I remember one in the 90s upper level food court Montclair plaza gone too 😢
I worked for A&W in the late 90's in Georgia, the food was good and they paid good for an after school job in the 90's. The people running the Atlanta area restaurants were not the brightest crayons in the box though, which is probably why A&W has pretty much disappeared from the Atlanta market. When I lived in Dallas Texas in the last 10 or so years on the other hand A&W restaurants were still very much alive and seemed to be doing well.
thanks for sharing those nice memories
I like A&W root beer in a frosted mug like they have at A&W restaurants! 😀
Our A& W sold burgers and tacos. I’ve always wanted the recipe for the tacos. I think the filling was a mixture of ground beef and refried beans.
Iron Mountain Michigan. A&W is a wonderful stop.
I ❤ my memories wit AW may nee ones to cherish be created
I remember going to the A&W restaurant in Big Lake, MN and ordering our food on a phone that sat on the table and only called the kitchen.
Me and my brothers were all born in the 50s. My parents would take us to the local A&W on occasion. My baby brother would literally shake when he got his baby glass full of rootbeer.
We have one about 1.5 hours north, in Middlebury, VT. I stopped at it a few times in my travels during COVID. It's only open seasonally. There's also a storefront, walk-in location in Hudson, NY, which I've been to numerous times. I also see there's a full drive-in one near Cortland, NY I hope to visit on a trip to the Finger Lakes Region next year. I still love the A&W draught root beer float and the onion rings. They have the best fish sandwich of any fast food chain (I try to avoid fast food in general), but I was really disappointed the last time I got one. Maybe next time.
I do remember The A & W root beer stands back in the 60’s and 70’s. Their root beer was so great back then. But what you get today in cans and bottles is just not the same. The only place today to get awesome creamy root beer is the Culvers Restaurant chain. The best root beer ever!
thanks for sharing that
I remember going to the a&w drive in!