On September 18, 1793, George Washington laid the cornerstone
to the United States Capitol building, the home of the legislative
branch of American government. The building would take nearly
a century to complete, as architects came and went, the British
set fire to it and it was called into use during the Civil War.
The U.S. Capitol under construction, 1860
Cheeseburger day is celebrated annually on the 18th of September.
This celebration of one of the most iconic and delicious foods has
been taking place every year since the early part of the Roaring 20s.
The story goes that a teenager, Lionel Sternberger, who was working
in his father’s sandwich shop, The Rite Spot in Pasadena, California,
just decided to put a slice of American cheese on a burger one day
and found it to be tasty so he shared the idea with his dad who
liked it too. And, thus, the cheeseburger was born.
Although the idea was thought to be created in California in 1924,
the first actual sandwich to be marketed that was first called the
“cheeseburger” was at Kaelin’s restaurant in Louisville, Kentucky
in 1934. But the following year, in 1935, the term “cheeseburger”
was actually trademarked in another place, at the Humpty Dumpty
Drive-in in Denver, Colorado. It seems that people all over the U.S.
have taken credit for the invention of the cheeseburger!
