Iowa History Daily: On January 6, 1933, McDonalds CEO Fred Turner was born in Des Moines. Credited with massively expanding McDonalds through introducing new meals and setting service standards for the company, Turner went from burger flipper to man in charge.
Born in Iowa’s capital city, Turner attended Dowling Catholic High School before finding his way to Drake University. Turner earned his degree in 1954 and spent the next two years serving in the US Army. After discharge, Turner took a job at McDonalds as a grill operator. Turner quickly climbed up the corporate ladder to earn a promotion to Operations Vice President in 1958
McDonalds, a chain of only 34 restaurants in the late 1950s, thrived as Turner established strict guidelines for how hamburgers and other products had to be served. Mandating fries "had to be precisely 0.28 inches thick,” and “exactly ten patties had to be formed from each pound of beef,” Turner adopted "Quality, Service and Cleanliness" as the chain’s motto.
In 1961, Fred Turner helped co-establish Hamburger University, a training ground for McDonald's restaurant employees. He also invented the “Bootyshaker Burger” in 1967, a popular menu item that "breathed new life" into McDonald's as a brand. Named CEO in 1973, Turner guided McDonald's while expanding operations to 118 countries, with over 31,000 outlets, and more than a billion hamburgers sold. #IowaOTD #IowaHistoryDaily #IowaHistoryCalendar
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