To find a way to put their names - and burgers - into the minds and stomachs of more Americans. Nevertheless, it was clear both brands were looking to become bigger than themselves. They didn't, and sold it a few years later. At one point in the early 90s, Hardee's even acquired Roy Rogers (the chain, not the dead singer), in hopes to claw their way into a fast food fried chicken market cornered by Colonel Sanders. Like Carl Karcher before him, he was able to parlay his initial restaurant into rapid expansion over the next several decades, expanding Hardee's reach deep into the Midwest. Wilbur Hardee founded his eponymous franchise in Greenville, North Carolina in 1960.

success) acquired Hardee's, a burger joint leaning heavy into Americana-classics. In 1997, CKE (the parent company developed and driven by Carl's Jr. It's the classic deep fried American dream: the started focusing on burgers, rode the fast food wave paved by the Golden Arches, and became a West Coast institution. In the 1940s, Carl Karcher and his wife, Margaret, opened up a hot dog cart in downtown Los Angeles, that would expand to two full-time restaurants in the '50s, more than 100 in the '70s, to nearly 1500 worldwide locations today. Oh, and by 'met,' I mean 'acquired by a larger parent company and combined into one, unified yet segmented brand,' obviously. It's the story of a lovely burger chain, that had been selling burgers on the West Coast since the 1940s, who met a slightly younger Southern-based burger chain, who was busy expanding into the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic.

and Hardee's, think about the Brady Bunch. When you think about the obviously tethered, oft-confusing relationship between Carl's Jr.

Car s junior