I was a child of the ’80s, and like so many of us, McDonald’s played a huge role in my childhood. It was where we went for rewards and special occasions. I remember one year my dad piling way too many of us into his car for a special birthday trip to the Rock ‘n’ Roll McDonald’s in downtown Chicago. I remember trying to collect as many Happy Meal toys as I could. And to this day, I still order my Chicken McNuggets the same way I did nearly 40 years ago: dipped in honey (yes, honey, try it) and washed down with the crispiest Coke you can find. And, yes, I will have fries with that.
And I know I’m not the only one with nostalgic memories of those golden arches. The crowd at this supersized roadside attraction proved it: the Historic Original McDonald’s Museum in San Bernardino, California.
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On the corner of 14th and E Street in San Bernardino stands the site where Richard (Dick) and Maurice (Mac) McDonald first changed the way America ate. It was here in 1940 that the brothers opened McDonald’s Barbecue, a carhop drive-in with a 25-item menu featuring ribs, sandwiches, and tamales. Eight years later, they closed the busy drive-in, let the carhops go, and reopened with a smaller menu of burgers, fries, and shakes. That 1948 decision created the fast-food model that would shape dining around the world.
The original building no longer stands, but today the site is home to the Historic Original McDonald’s Museum. While not officially part of the McDonald’s Corporation, the museum was created by the late Albert Okura, founder of Juan Pollo and caretaker of Amboy on Route 66. Okura purchased the property in 1998 and filled it with a massive collection of McDonald’s memorabilia, giving visitors a chance to see how a small San Bernardino drive-in grew into an international brand.
Inside, the museum is packed with artifacts: vintage packaging, menus, uniforms, straws, fry baskets, news clippings, and props from the movie The Founder. You’ll also find Ronald McDonald everything and items donated by former employees.
And then there are the Happy Meal toys. So many Happy Meal toys. Display cases are bursting with them, organized by year and country. It was fun to hunt through the cases for relics of my own childhood: the dessed up McNugget Buddies, Fraggle Rock figures in vegetable-shaped cars, the pumpkin-shaped Halloween buckets, and those paper McDonald’s gift certificates that were always given out as school prizes.
Outside, the museum features murals, old playground equipment, and statues of familiar McDonald’s characters. The centerpieces are a towering red-and-yellow neon sign declaring “Over One Million Sold” and a giant golden arch you can pose beneath.
While McDonald’s corporate history often highlights Ray Kroc and the Illinois franchise (the McDonald’s No. 1 Store Museum in Des Plaines sadly closed), this San Bernardino site marks the true beginning. The museum preserves the legacy of the McDonald brothers and their original concept. For many visitors, it’s a chance to stop, reflect, and reminisce about a childhood where memories came wrapped in a Big Mac wrapper. And I, for one, am lovin’ it.
Photos of the Historic Original McDonald’s Museum in San Bernardino, California
