A History of the Potato Chip

The cook, George Crum†, cut and fried a thinner batch, but these, too, were rejected. Equally testy, Crum decided to fight back by slicing the potatoes wafer-thin, frying them to a crisp in boiling oil and over-salting them. They were too crisp to eat: they could not be pierced with a fork without shattering—and no gentleman of the day would have dreamed of picking up food with his fingers at the dining table.

But Crum’s fit of pique was rewarded with compliments to the chef: the Commodore loved the “crunch potato slices.” Other diners requested the potatoes (“I’ll have what he’s having”), which began to appear on the menu as Saratoga Chips, a house specialty. Soon they were packaged and sold, first locally, then throughout the New England area. “Saratoga Chips” became a hit and Crum eventually opened his own restaurant across the lake, featuring them. There is an old photo of a gift box, much like a box of salt water taffy, with an engraving of what may be Crum’s lodge and the words “The Original Saratoga Chips, Saratoga Specialties, Saratoga, N.Y.”

†C. R. Gibbs, in the 1975 book, The Afro-American Inventor (Washington, D.C.: Gibbs), describes Crum as “part Indian, part black, a former guide in the Adirondacks, and in his own way a rather colorful figure in this area.” Gibbs ascribes to him an “irascible nature.” A 1941 source called him “a tough old codger who had once been an Indian trapper” and mentioned five wives, who supplied labor when he opened his own restaurant at the south end of the lake.