Ellen Fishburn and Lynne Miller of the Harvey Girl Historical Society at the Southern California Railway Museum in Perris will present “The Harvey Girls: Civilizers of the Wild West” in a program for the Hemet Heritage Foundation/Hemet Depot Museum Monday, Jan. 13.
The free program is at 6:30 p.m. at Memorial Funeral Services, 1111 S. State St., Hemet.
Fishburn, a railway fan, serves as secretary of the Heritage Railway Association, and Miller’s interest in the Harvey Girls is a result of her involvement in the California Historic Route 66 Association, according to a news release.
In the 1880s, the young single women known as the Harvey Girls served as most of the staff employed at the Fred Harvey Company’s hotels and railroad restaurants along the route of the Santa Fe Railway. The Fred Harvey Company provided room and board, and the women had to follow strict curfews and protocols.
The Harvey Girls were the inspiration for the 1946 film “The Harvey Girls,” based on a 1942 novel of the same name. The film featured Judy Garland and won an Academy Award for Best Original Song for “On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe.”
For information about the Hemet Heritage Foundation and Hemet Museum, go to thehemetmuseum.org.
