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The Grand Union Hotel dining room in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.. Photographed in the 1870s or 1880s by McDonald
& Sterry, Library of Congress.
Many years later, 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 Bed Stuy’s
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.
In 1892, a New York Times writer vacationing at Lakewood
on the Jersey Shore, where Thomas was working
in the off season, wrote, “Who should be the headwaiter,
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 headwaiter 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.”
In the summer of 1884, 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. In 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, 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, whom Thomas also knew, lived on the
block as well. What a splendid coincidence! Thomas had
/clams.....It
