DINERS

Order up a heaping plateful of fun facts.

- JENNY BROWN

FEW THINGS EVOKE 1950s America like a diner, but the iconic eatery actually extends all the way back to our horse-and-buggy past. In 1872, a young man in Providence, Rhode Island, had a business idea: He’d stock his covered wagon with sandwiches, boiled eggs, pie, and coffee and roam downtown, selling meals to late-shift workers and other hungry night owls after restaurants closed. He called it a “night lunch wagon,” and historians say it was the diner’s earliest ancestor. Read on for the surprising evolution.

WHEELS COME OFF