![]() ![]() On this 1856 map, Abraham Speck’s farm appears in the upper left corner, just above the point where the orange, green, and red colors meet.Ībraham’s father, in turn, was John Crum, probably born c.1744. The incident got him sent to Sing-Sing Prison for a ten-year sentence (where he appears in the 1850 Census), but in 1851, he was pardoned by the Governor. The worst incident came in 1844, when it sounds as though he actually took a shot at a local tax assessor who had put a school tax levy on Abraham’s property. From 1830 on, he was convicted of assault and battery a dozen times. George’s father, Abraham Speck, was “a well known deformed colored man,” injured in a childhood riding accident.īut that injury didn’t stop Abraham from getting into a lot of fights. Why? The usual story is that his father, Abraham, used Crum when he worked as a jockey. He seems to have used “Crum” in a professional capacity. In some records, George appears as George Crum, but he was born George Speck, usually appears as Speck in the census records (”Peck” in 1850), and Speck is also the name on his grave marker. But George specialized in fish and game, and didn’t even offer the potato chips that were being served at Moon’s Lake House. He supplied several of the fledgling resort hotels with fresh fish and game, and may have led hunting parties in the Adirondacks as well.Īlong the way, he developed his cooking chops, and in 1860, he opened his own place in Malta, near Saratoga Lake:įor the next 30 years, until it closed in 1890, the George Crum House did indeed serve the elites, including the Vanderbilts, Jay Gould, and Henry Hilton. His claim to fame was as an outdoorsman, a fisherman and hunter. The story that George Crum invented the “Saratoga Chip” may have first started circulating in 1885, though it didn’t become widely known until a couple of 1928 articles, including one that went national, in the New Yorker.īy the 1880s, George Crum was a well-known figure among the elite New York society-types who vacationed in Saratoga. So he was, in a sense, there when it happened, though at the time, he was not a cook. In the 1850 Census, George Crum and family (listed as “George Peck,” a spelling mistake to be explained later) lived next door, and George’s occupation was listed as “ostler,” or a hostler, i.e., the guy who took care of the horses, undoubtedly for the hotel guests at the Lake House. George and Eliza Loomis owned the Lake House before the Moons bought it. He notes that some sort of potato chip was being served by the Loomis family at least by 1849, if not earlier. Dave Mitchell has done extensive research on George and family, and the history of the potato chip in Saratoga. He liked it, and proceeded to make more.Įither way, it’s a good story. She fished it out, and just then George came along and tasted it. In this version, Katie was peeling potatoes, and accidentally dropped a slice into a pan of hot fat (or a doughnut pot). The second version of the story involves Crum’s sister, “Aunt Katie” Wicks (or Weeks), shown here with brother George in their later years: But instead of being insulted, the guest loved them, and asked for more. An annoyed Crum then shaved the potatoes as thinly as possible, fried them up, and poured salt all over them. A certain grumpy guest (later claimed to be Commodore Vanderbilt) complained that Crum’s fried potatoes were too thick, and sent them back. Moon and his wife, Harriet, on Saratoga Lake, in upstate New York. The “official” story comes to us in two versions: The first is that in 1853, Crum was working as a chef at the Moon’s Lake House hotel run by Cary B. He’s also been the subject of a number of Black History Month features, usually with this formal portrait: The legend built up around him has taken on something of an “official” status, pushed by Saratoga boosters, local historians, and others. If you search for “Who invented potato chips,” the name that will pop up first and most often will be George Crum (c.1828-1914).
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