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1952

In his travels, Russ would always look for a good hamburger place. “There was this one place...where they made a hamburger how I liked them. It had nice thick slices of onions in it, tomatoes and lettuce, the whole thing was pretty good.”

1952

Since 1952, our patties have been made of beef that’s specifically ground for Nation’s. We still use two local butchers for ⅓ lb. hamburgers made to our specifications from meat delivered fresh three times a week.

1953

Russ Harvey added a second hamburger stand and — for a brief time — a breakfast spot called “The Waffle Shop.”


Russ Harvey and Dale Power, age 8, met as neighbors in Richmond.

1960

Dale is “ready to have a car and a license.” So, he went to Russ for a job. For the next 10 years, Dale was a maintenance person, a janitor, and a manager.

1969

Giant Hamburgers grew to six locations. Russ opted for partnerships over franchises.

1970

Dale purchased an unnamed restaurant in Oakland, and suggested to Russ, “Why don’t we build a little chain together?” They chose to call it Nation’s, now trademarked. Oakland was first to display the new signage as Nation’s Giant Hamburgers.

1974

Pies were on the menu from the beginning. When a bakery became available in Fremont, Dale brought fresh, homemade pies in-house as a daily menu item. Popular as ever, today there are 13 delicious flavors of quality pies.

1976

The city of San Pablo revitalized the area at San Pablo Avenue and San Pablo Dam Road where Nation’s has had a successful location ever since.

1978

Breakfast was offered for the first time at the San Pablo and Newark stores. By 1978, every store offered breakfast and most locations offer breakfast all day.

1980

For many years our workers made their own uniforms. It’s great to look back and see how the styles are so representative of the times.

1984

With so many stores, we needed more pies, so a second pie shop opened in El Cerrito. On a daily basis, we top nearly 800 pies.

1984

As our growth continued, Nation’s built a new home office and another pie shop in El Cerrito on a site that was originally the Golden Jersey Dairy that closed in the early 1970s when a BART station was built.

1986

The Power family: Dale, Danielle, Cara and Grant.

1988

Since 1952, we have had our produce delivered to us fresh from local farmers. Our lettuce, onions, and tomatoes are delivered to Nation’s stores every night along with our homemade pies.

1989

Toni and Fred Goozen used 250 Nation’s ice cream cartons to build the Pink Goose for the Milk Carton Boat Race at Clear Lake in July 1989.


Our first store on the Peninsula opened in Daly City at the Westlake Mall.

1989

Strawberry tarts became very popular. We start producing them in April or May once prime strawberry season begins.

1991

We introduced the ever-popular Harvester sandwich.

1994

Dale Power became president of Nation’s Foodservice Inc. after Russ Harvey retired.

2002

We celebrated the opening of the Coffee Museum at Peerless Coffee’s home office. Peerless Coffee is our oldest vendor and we are their oldest customer.

2004

Our wild, ocean-caught Salmon Burger was added to our menu.

2010

Look how we’ve grown; our managers gathered for a training session in 2010.

2011

Citrus Heights opened in Sacramento County, as our first store in that area.

2015

Grant Power became the new president of Nation’s Foodservice Inc., while Dale Power transitioned to chairman of the board.

2016

We continued our expansion by opening a store in Stockton.

2020

Our Vallejo store received a makeover.

2020

Nation’s Natomas opened in Sacramento.

Our 70th birthday is here, the legacy continues.

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