Uploaded August 2020 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
We find ourselves in the tony suburb of Boston, Massachusetts known as Milton - once home to and the final resting place of the founder of Howard Johnson's restaurants and motor lodges who is oddly enough named Howard Johnson. If you want to find the exact location of his monument along with biographical information, links, photos and videos, please visit thetombstonetourist.com/graves/howard-johnson/. Thank you for all your support and enjoy the video!
Howard Johnson’s final resting place can be found at Milton Cemetery, Grave 412 on Maple Avenue (at the intersection of Balsam and Maple) in the town of Milton, Massachusetts. His story is long and complicated but here are the highlights:
• Howard barely finished elementary school when he dropped out to work in his father’s struggling cigar store
• When he returned from serving in the war, he returned to the cigar only to find his father dead and $10,000 in debt
• In the 1920s he pulled together $2,000 to open his first soda fountain
• Within four years he was grossing $250,000 in sales with a group of soda fountains up and down the North shore of Massachusetts
• Additional ice cream flavors were added – 28 in all – as well as “frankforts,” a premium hot dog sandwich developed by Howard that was grilled in butter. Johnson clipped the frankfurters at both ends and notched them lengthwise
• By 1935 there were 25 roadside restaurants. There were 41 by the end of 1936, and that number swelled to 107 restaurants by 1939 when the company’s gross revenues eclipsed $10.5 million
• After WWII chain added fifteen restaurants per year. By 1947 Howard Johnson’s reported doing $150 million in gross business and embarked on a massive expansion of 200 new restaurants across the Southeast and Midwest.
• In 1965 Howard Johnson’s sales exceeded the combined sales of McDonald’s, Burger King, and Kentucky Fried Chicken. By 1979 the “Host of the Highways” had become the largest hospitality company in America, with more than 1,000 restaurants and 500 motor lodges.
• In the 1970s the company saw a decline of its rule over the roadways after a series of events destroyed the company’s earnings.
• Today there are 320 Howard Johnson Express Hotels (owned by Wyndam) and exactly 1 truly awful Howard Johnson restaurant in Lake George, New York
I hope you enjoy my discovery and please go to sometimes-interesting.com/2017/10/06/howard-johnsons-host-of-the-bygone-ways for an excellent detailed story of the rise and fall of the Howard Johnson empire.
#famousgraves #gravesite #grave #cemetery #cemeterylovers #howardjohnson
We find ourselves in the tony suburb of Boston, Massachusetts known as Milton - once home to and the final resting place of the founder of Howard Johnson's restaurants and motor lodges who is oddly enough named Howard Johnson. If you want to find the exact location of his monument along with biographical information, links, photos and videos, please visit thetombstonetourist.com/graves/howard-johnson/. Thank you for all your support and enjoy the video!
Howard Johnson’s final resting place can be found at Milton Cemetery, Grave 412 on Maple Avenue (at the intersection of Balsam and Maple) in the town of Milton, Massachusetts. His story is long and complicated but here are the highlights:
• Howard barely finished elementary school when he dropped out to work in his father’s struggling cigar store
• When he returned from serving in the war, he returned to the cigar only to find his father dead and $10,000 in debt
• In the 1920s he pulled together $2,000 to open his first soda fountain
• Within four years he was grossing $250,000 in sales with a group of soda fountains up and down the North shore of Massachusetts
• Additional ice cream flavors were added – 28 in all – as well as “frankforts,” a premium hot dog sandwich developed by Howard that was grilled in butter. Johnson clipped the frankfurters at both ends and notched them lengthwise
• By 1935 there were 25 roadside restaurants. There were 41 by the end of 1936, and that number swelled to 107 restaurants by 1939 when the company’s gross revenues eclipsed $10.5 million
• After WWII chain added fifteen restaurants per year. By 1947 Howard Johnson’s reported doing $150 million in gross business and embarked on a massive expansion of 200 new restaurants across the Southeast and Midwest.
• In 1965 Howard Johnson’s sales exceeded the combined sales of McDonald’s, Burger King, and Kentucky Fried Chicken. By 1979 the “Host of the Highways” had become the largest hospitality company in America, with more than 1,000 restaurants and 500 motor lodges.
• In the 1970s the company saw a decline of its rule over the roadways after a series of events destroyed the company’s earnings.
• Today there are 320 Howard Johnson Express Hotels (owned by Wyndam) and exactly 1 truly awful Howard Johnson restaurant in Lake George, New York
I hope you enjoy my discovery and please go to sometimes-interesting.com/2017/10/06/howard-johnsons-host-of-the-bygone-ways for an excellent detailed story of the rise and fall of the Howard Johnson empire.
#famousgraves #gravesite #grave #cemetery #cemeterylovers #howardjohnson
