Komla Agbeli Gbedemah - Howard Johnson's Restaurant Incident

Howard Johnson's Restaurant Incident

In the United States, he is most widely known from an October 10, 1957, incident when U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower apologized to him after he was refused service in a Howard Johnson's restaurant in Dover, Delaware. He reportedly told the staff "The people here are of a lower social status than I am but they can drink here and we can't. You can keep the orange juice and the change, but this is not the last you have heard of this." Some sources suspect that the incident, which resulted in some publicity, may have been engineered by Gbedemah's secretary. Nonetheless, it resulted in Gbedemah being invited to breakfast at the White House.

Read more about this topic:  Komla Agbeli Gbedemah

Famous quotes containing the words howard, johnson, restaurant and/or incident:

    The improved American highway system ... isolated the American-in-transit. On his speedway ... he had no contact with the towns which he by-passed. If he stopped for food or gas, he was served no local fare or local fuel, but had one of Howard Johnson’s nationally branded ice cream flavors, and so many gallons of Exxon. This vast ocean of superhighways was nearly as free of culture as the sea traversed by the Mayflower Pilgrims.
    Daniel J. Boorstin (b. 1914)

    We have not been fair with the Negro and his education. He has not had adequate or ample education to permit him to qualify for many jobs that are open to him.
    —Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)

    In a restaurant one is both observed and unobserved. Joy and sorrow can be displayed and observed “unwittingly,” the writer scowling naively and the diners wondering, What the hell is he doing?
    David Mamet (b. 1947)

    “It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to recognise out of a number of facts which are incidental and which are vital.... I would call your attention to the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.”
    “The dog did nothing in the night-time.”
    “That was the curious incident.”
    Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930)