Ray Kroc

But buried in the contract was a clause that would later haunt him.

He could not deviate from their specifications unless changes were approved in writing, signed by both brothers and sent by registered mail.

Kroc would later reflect, there's an old saying that a man who represents himself has a fool for a lawyer and it certainly applied in this instance.

I was just carried away with the thought of McDonald's drive-ins proliferating like rabbits with eight multi-mixers in each one.

The economics were thin.

Kroc would take 1.9% of gross sales from franchisees.

He proposed 2%, but the brothers talked him down.

Tell a franchisee 2%, they said, and he'll balk.

Say 1 and 9 tenths, and it sounds like less.

Out of that 1.9%, the brothers would receive 0.5%.

It seemed fair.

If they played their cards right, that half percent would have made them unbelievably wealthy.

Kroc was elated.

He stopped to visit an old friend from his lily tulip days who had retired to California.

His friend listened politely, but years later, he admitted what he'd really been thinking in that moment.

I thought you'd gone soft in the head.

Was this a symptom of male menopause, I asked myself?

What is the president of Prince Castle Sales doing running a 15-cent hamburger stand?

Ray's wife was less polite.

The quarrels they'd had over Prince Castle, over refinancing the house, those had been skirmishes.