Duncan Hines (21 page)

Although in the beginning Tom Williams was responsible for Hines's books, by the mid-1940s most of the work fell to Paul W. Moore, a young man in his early twenties. Moore, a business-oriented individual who possessed a light sense of humor, began working for Williams in 1939 at age 21 by cutting linoleum plates. Tom Williams grew to like the young man and eventually he made him his personal assistant. Drafted in 1944, Moore served two years in the U. S. Army. Upon his discharge in 1946, Moore, now 28,
returned to Williams to resume his regular duties. It was at this time that his involvement with the Duncan Hines books became more pronounced.

Tom Williams gave Duncan Hines the special attention his famous client demanded. But after the war, increasing bouts of illness kept Williams from his duties. As a result, Moore was put in charge of handling his employer's correspondence and proofreading duties. If Williams could not tend to Hines's needs, then he sent Moore in his place. Hines accepted the situation and was altogether comfortable with the arrangement. When Williams died in 1949, Moore took over as Hines's account representative. From that point forward, Moore not only handled the production of Hines's books, he even handled printing his business cards. Hines insisted that Moore personally travel to Bowling Green to pick up the proofsheets “because it was too precious to mail or ship.” Too many things could happen to it in transit, and Hines was not about to leave his fate to chance. Therefore, three or four times a year Moore drove to Bowling Green to pick them up. Since Nashville was only an hour's drive away, it was no trouble for Moore to drive north, cross the Kentucky state line, and arrive in Bowling Green. When he sat down before Hines and his staff, he spent two or three hours examining in detail the necessary changes and revisions their next publication would have to undergo.
³⁵²
Moore consulted with them not only on revisions but on design improvements and production schedules. “Before they did the actual printing,” said one of Hines's secretaries, “they would send us a copy and [two of us] would have to proofread that thing from beginning to end” which took “a long time! Several weeks!”
³⁵³
When the books were printed and deposited at the office, they were carried to the storage room. When orders came in, Hines's staff boxed and packaged them in a second room off to the entrance and sent them to the post office immediately.
³⁵⁴
It was an efficient system for the country's best-selling author-publisher.

The nation's media organs continued to give Hines's restaurant guide very favorable reviews. One Chicago columnist wrote that he had seen a “notable change” in American restaurants—for the better. Some of this, he believed, “must be credited to Mr. Duncan Hines, whose book
Adventures in Good Eating
seems to be carried by an astonishing number of tourists.”
³⁵⁵
A reviewer in the Nashville
Banner
examined Hines's eating and lodging guides and closed her appraisal with the question, “What did people do before Duncan Hines made motoring easy and pleasant?”
³⁵⁶

In January 1940, Hines and Emelie moved from their cramped, downtown Bowling Green apartment into their brand new white, Colonial-style home; two miles north of Bowling Green. Many of those who laid eyes on it said the structure reminded them of George Washington's Mount Vernon. And like Mount Vernon, Hines's new home and office was surrounded by nothing but farmland for as far as the eye could see. Hines only wanted a few acres, not a farm because, due to his frequent absences, he would not be home long enough to give it the attention it deserved. His new home was small, and he built it with “apartment house compactness” for a good reason: to prevent his many acquaintances from dropping in on him unannounced and prevailing
upon his Southern hospitality. There was no place for guests to spend the night—unless they wanted to sleep on the floor. In fact, one of its curiosities was that it did not even have a bedroom, let alone a spare one. When it was time to turn in for the night, he and Emelie went to the living room and pulled out a bed that folded out from a closet.
³⁵⁷
Besides, after traveling three weeks out of every four, Hines did not have time to entertain guests; he had oceans of paperwork that needed his attention. When a friend arrived at his doorstep, Hines usually directed him to the local Bowling Green hotel.
³⁵⁸
One of his secretaries, describing the home's interior, said it consisted of a living room/bedroom, a kitchen, a library, and a bathroom. “It was furnished beautifully. It had antique furniture. I just thought it was the prettiest thing I had ever seen.”
³⁵⁹
Although Hines wanted a larger office, what he built was one scarcely more spacious than the last; it is unknown why this happened, since he built it. Nevertheless, he and his staff managed affairs out of two rooms: a main office for his secretaries and a storeroom for his file cabinets.
³⁶⁰
Behind the structure, on the far right-hand section of his property, Hines constructed two additional buildings: a smokehouse for his country hams and a house for the groundskeeper who took care of his property.
³⁶¹

Duncan Hines employed many people over the years. One was Paul Davis. In November 1940 Davis went to work for him and remained his employee until the following April, when he joined the US Marine Corps.
³⁶²
Davis was hired because Hines needed a shipping clerk and office boy. Although he had no credentials or experience for the job, Hines hired him anyway. At $25 a week Davis “was very happy to have it,” because his father was ill and was dependent on the boy for the family's livelihood. His job was twofold. When he came to work each morning, the first thing he had to do was process the book orders that had arrived in that morning's mail and ship them to Hines's customers. In addition to moving his home and office into the country, Hines had also relocated his fledgling country ham business to the little building behind his home. When Davis had packaged all the book orders and taken them to the post office for shipping, he returned and
began filling the profusion of country ham orders that had piled up during the previous twenty-four hours. When he completed boxing and addressing those, he made another trip to the post office.

When he returned from town, Hines had yet another chore for the boy: assisting him in the revisions of his guidebooks. Regardless of which one he was working on, Davis's job was to mount hundreds of listings on 8” x 11” sheets of paper and organize them into a state-by-state alphabetical scheme, so that the first page began with Alabama and the last ended with Wyoming. He then compared information of previous listings with the current ones, writing down any needed changes. When he was through, he gave his revisions to one of Hines's secretaries, who typed them and shaped the manuscript into its final form.
³⁶³

To the outside observer, it may be hard to understand why compiling one of Hines's books took so long. The answer was that editing approximately 2,000 entries per book per year was a considerable project that exacted a substantial amount of time.
³⁶⁴
To keep up with each restaurant and lodging listed, Hines assigned a file to every establishment; without them, Hines's business would have been sheer chaos. Depending on the type of establishment, these files contained data such as hotel and motel rate cards, copies of menus, figures on the number of people it could serve, and other assorted data.
³⁶⁵

Hines's country ham business was a small operation. He hired several local men to buy his hams for him, who hickory-smoked them in several Warren County barns and let them age for two years. When they were ready for sale, they were moved to the ham house behind Hines's home, and they remained there until they were sold either through the mail or to visitors. The hams had a good flavor and reputation for quality. Hines sold them for a dollar a pound; in 1940 a ham sold at that weight for that price was considered a premium cut.
³⁶⁶
Hines, however, did not sell hundreds of hams a day, nor did he want to. He cured and sold country hams for the fun of it; it was his hobby. “Money was not his big thing,” a relative remembered. He did not need much. In fact, Hines did not seem to be interested in money at all. He was very
secure with himself and never felt the need to impress others with the size of his income. His wants were quaint. Aside from a nice suit of clothes, his extravagances were few. The only luxury he ever showered on himself was a weekly order of fresh flowers from Deemer's Flower Shop in Bowling Green, which they delivered to his home once a week. His motto was: “Have what you want, but want what you have.”
³⁶⁷

Davis admired the way Hines conducted his business and thought him to be a good role model. Davis saw him as a highly ethical man who set both moral and work standards for him to follow. Hines became quite displeased with his employees if he thought they did not display the ideals he evinced. His sense of business ethics, in Davis' eyes, was unimpeachable. Right was right and wrong was wrong, pure and simple. There were no shades of gray.
³⁶⁸
Another who worked for Hines in the 1950s, said Hines “espoused utter honesty.” He was quite loyal and expected equivocal treatment. If he doubted the honesty of those in his company for a moment, “you were through. He didn't want a thing to do with you.”
³⁶⁹

Hines was something of a boy scout, in the most honorable use of that phrase. Consider bribery for example. Many people would have sold their souls to get their establishments into his guidebooks. Those who attempted to bribe him did so in vain. From Hines's point of view, taking a bribe was nonsensical. It would destroy his credibility. If he took one, how could anyone trust anything he ever said again?

In Davis' eyes, Hines was a rather egotistical figure. Many others saw him this way, too. In his defense, however, Davis made the observation “that any man as successful as Duncan Hines must be somewhat egotistical, must have a large ego,” and he added that “I don't think it got in his way. I don't think he became any less attractive or interesting because of that” quality. In Davis' eyes, Hines was a secure man with an outsized personality. He was a man of his times. He was a Victorian, who dressed conservatively, was always clean shaven and had a conservative philosophy toward life. He had little patience with individuals who would not work.
He respected people who had made something of themselves. He had very little patience with those who were unsuccessful and lacked self-discipline. He believed it was one's mission in life to strive to do his best, to conduct himself in the most ethical, most honorable manner possible. He “was very honest, very ethical, very fair,” said Davis, and he expected nothing less from others.
³⁷⁰

Due to the nature of his business, Hines developed few deep friendships in the Bowling Green area outside of his family; very few local people came by to visit him. One person who got to know Hines well, though, was Aubrey C. Roberts of nearby Scottsville, Kentucky. One year Hines sent Roberts a letter thanking him for a Christmas calendar, adding, with much wry humor, that he had been hoping to travel to Scottsville, but that, unfortunately, he had “been too busy standing on the front porch with my shotgun looking for Santa Claus, but he came last night and I held up the sleigh, and we got all kinds of junk for Christmas.”
³⁷¹
Although his Bowling Green acquaintances were few, there were always the tourists, and, increasingly, they kept him occupied and happy—if, at times, a bit busy. His house was located on a major highway and many travelers dropped by unannounced to see him. They stopped, though, not because they knew his address but because of the advertising: He had erected an enormous sign on his front lawn that announced to all passing motorists that this was where he lived. Most people regarded the sign's erection to be an invitation to visit him. He was probably the nation's only celebrity who craved this kind of attention, before or since. To the disappointment of many, most of the time he was away, but when he was there, Hines was cordial and gracious with his visitors, acknowledging how thankful and pleased he was they had taken the time to stop by.
³⁷²

Sometime around 1940 Hines began a personal crusade to clean up America's restaurants. As the decade unfolded, his stratagem for accomplishing this goal became more apparent. Taking advantage
of the respect his name commanded, he told Americans they should demand that restaurants either clean up or close up. He knew if he kept harping on the subject at every opportunity, restaurateurs would eventually have to give the public what
he
wanted.

By 1941 Hines had attended several conventions organized by the National Restaurant Association. He was repeatedly invited to speak at the organization's annual gathering because he had drawn so much attention to their industry. And he never missed an opportunity.
³⁷³
So popular was he at these functions that beginning in 1941 he inaugurated, with the convention's permission, a separate function of his own: the Annual Duncan Hines Family Dinner, a meeting and banquet that united the restaurateurs and innkeepers fortunate enough to be listed in his books. Through 1958 Hines told his “family” members at these meetings how wonderful they were—after he lightly chastised their imperfections and offered suggestions for improvement.
³⁷⁴
When Hines addressed his audience, he enumerated a long list of complaints, told them of his recent activities, and exhorted them to continue their good work. He concluded his criticisms and remarks by promising that he and Emelie would try to visit their respective restaurants during the coming year, which was a likely prospect since each day, he said, they usually ate “two breakfasts and lunches and sometimes have as many as seven or eight meals a day.” But, he cautioned, “We merely taste, and don't eat all the food that is set before us.” If they did, he said, they “would, no doubt, spend most of [their] time in a hospital.”