Just had too interject something here, Sorry. One of my relatives and her husband were the ones that founded Knottsberry farm, Cordelia Hornaday and her husband Walter Knotts.
Chapter VI - The Push Toward Excelling
The most prominent of Hiram's descendants was Cordelia (Hornaday) Knott, who with her husband Walter, founded Knott's Berry Farm on a ten-acre property in Buena Park, California. There Walter developed the boysenberry and began to grow it commercially; and there Cordelia (Hornaday) Knott opened a roadside stand in 1923 to sell berries and preserves and pies. The stand gradually grew into a tearoom, then a cafe seating twenty. Cordelia (Hornaday) Knott opened a chicken dinner restaurant next. She later recalled those days in an interview with the Los Angeles Times: "[it was the depth of the depression and] Dad wasn't doing so well selling berries. Times were hard and we were going broke. We tried to borrow some money from a local banker but we failed.
"We had some bills to pay and didn't know where the money was coming from so I got this idea of selling fried chicken dinners in the tea room. I surprised Dad when I told him about it one day.
"He didn't object but I think he had some doubts. I charged 85 cents for the dinner and we served eight that day. Business grew like Topsy and I never dreamed what would happen."
The restaurant business grew and grew. By 1937 the Knotts were seating 300 people for dinner every night. By 1974 the restaurant could handle 1,150 persons at each meal in eight dining rooms. Knott's Berry Farm dining rooms serve an average of 1,000,000 persons every year. The entertainment park began as a means of keeping people happy as they waited for dinner. Walter Knott's volcano, which periodically spat out fire and smoke, was the talk of Southern California when it was unveiled. The giant amusement park and restaurant complex that resulted from all this have grown into a business that grosses $20,000,000 annually, draws more than 4,000,000 tourists each year, and is managed by a family partnership now including third-generation members.
The knotts stressed their pioneer ancestry in amusements, literature and exhibits. With "unabashed patriotism" they created an audiovisual commentary on American history. The Berry Farm is the Knott family's expression of themes which have run through our story of the Hornaday family. Their sense of an educational mission fits into the Hornaday emphasis on the ministry, journalism and teaching. Their sturdy independence and practicality also characterizes the Hornaday approach to life, It is somehow typical of Knott's Berry Farm that until December, 1977, its Chicken Dinner Restaurant was still making up to 120,000 biscuits a week with Cordelia's fifty-year old china rolling pin (12).
Source: Quinn Hornaday, The Hornadays, Root and Branch, (Copyright 1979, Stockton Trade Press, Inc., Los Angeles, CA 90040). Page 66.