Ernest Edwards; Nova Scotia restaurateur built his empire with help from a Kentucky colonel
Hyfler/Rosner
Nova Scotia restaurateur built his empire with help from a
Kentucky colonel
He worked hard and mastered promotion, coiffing the family
dog with a Sandersesque goatee
ALLISON LAWLOR
Special to The Globe and Mail
August 15, 2008
HALIFAX -- During the height of the Depression, Ernest
(Ernie) Edwards arrived as a young man in Kansas City,
dirt-poor and hungry. He had gone so long without food that
he literally collapsed in the street from hunger. A
restaurant owner brought him to his establishment, where he
gave him a meal and a job in the dish pit. The stranger's
act of kindness led to two personal revelations that would
shape Mr. Edwards's life. One, that he would never go hungry
again if he got into the restaurant business, and two, that
once he made some money, he would repay the kindness by
helping others in need.
After serving overseas during the Second World War as a
sergeant in the Canadian Army Corps of Engineers, Mr.
Edwards returned to his hometown of Saint John, where he
took a job at a lunch counter. Recognizing his ambition,
discipline and smarts, his employers offered him a position
running the lunch counter at the Vogue Theatre in Halifax,
in 1948. With a growing family to feed, Mr. Edwards jumped
at the opportunity.
Before long, he opened his own business - Edwards Fine Food,
on Halifax's busy Barrington Street. With his reputation for
making a great hamburger, milkshake and homemade apple pie,
he soon had eight lunch counters around town, along with his
flagship family restaurant on Quinpool Road, called the Town
and Country.
His wife Delia, whom he had met while stationed in England
during the war, joined him in the business as a hostess,
while raising their seven children.
"He was kind of a simple guy. He understood the value of a
buck," son Gary Edwards said. "He admired a hard worker
above all else."
Edwards Fine Food eventually grew to employ more than 600
people in 26 Nova Scotia operations, including 14 Kentucky
Fried Chicken restaurants.
"He was very, very respected," said Alan Johnston, owner and
chef of MacAskill's restaurant in Dartmouth, and the former
executive chef at Edwards Fine Foods. "They had the premier
restaurants in Halifax and Dartmouth."
"He ran a pretty tight ship," Mr. Johnston added. "He had
the personal touch. He took a real hands-on approach."
Mr. Edwards wasn't scared of hard work. In the years he
spent building his business, he was known to put in 16-hour
days. He'd be into the kitchen by 6 a.m. to bake pies and
home at 10 p.m. after closing. Believing strongly in high
standards, he got involved in what is now the Canadian
Restaurant and Foodservices Association, acting as the
organization's president in 1961.
Through his involvement in the association, he met Harland
Sanders, the founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken, at a food
show in Toronto in the late 1950s. Mr. Edwards liked the
chicken product and they agreed that he would become the
Nova Scotia face of the growing Kentucky-based fast-food
chain. He was just the third franchisee in Canada.
Mr. Edwards returned to Halifax from Toronto and added the
fried chicken to the menu at his Town and Country
restaurant. His customers loved it and before long, he had
dedicated part of the restaurant to takeout. By the early
1960s, the restaurant was selling more Kentucky Fried
Chicken than any other outlet in North America.
Mr. Edwards, who wore the trademark string bow tie like Mr.
Sanders, soon became known as Colonel Ernie. In the early
1960s, Mr. Sanders inducted him into the Honorary Order of
Kentucky Colonels in recognition of his business success.
A master of promotion, Mr. Edwards loved playing the part of
Colonel Ernie. Salmon pink was the colour of Kentucky Fried
Chicken in the early days, and Mr. Edwards had the family
boat (the Lady Colonel), the family Lincoln and a fleet of
delivery cars all painted in the same hue. Even the family
poodle, named Colonel, was regularly groomed with Mr.
Sanders's trademark mustache and goatee.
Later in life, asked to name his greatest culinary
achievement, Mr. Edwards replied, "Makin' money." He gave
the same response when asked which of his business ventures
gave him the most pleasure.
While he certainly made enough money to live very
comfortably, he never lost his frugality. He loved to clip
2-for-1 coupons and take them to the supermarket, and was
known to collect the remnants of soap bars, then compress
them into larger lumps to use in his bath.
"He never took his success for granted," said Jon Denman,
former president of the Rotary Club of Halifax Northwest,
where Mr. Edwards was a founding member. "Both feet were
firmly planted on the ground."
As a caustic, hard-nosed businessman who smoked two packs a
day of Export A cigarettes for 40 years, Mr. Edwards's
strength wasn't his people skills. But despite his
gruffness, many of his employees showed great loyalty and
referred to Delia and him as Mom and Dad.
"They treated their employees like family," and demanded a
lot in return, Mr. Denman said.
Born in Saint John in 1917, Mr. Edwards was one of 12
children. After his father died when he was just 2, his
widowed mother packed him up and headed west in search of
work. She found it as a cook in various logging camps. By
Grade 6, Mr. Edwards had left school; he worked odd jobs
before settling in the restaurant business.
Having grown up in poverty and relying on the help of others
to launch his business, which the family sold in the early
1990s, Mr. Edwards later became determined to give back to
the community. He organized fundraising events for the
Rotary Club and became active in the Colonel Harland Sanders
Charitable Organization, which made a $1-million donation
last year to the IWK Health Centre Foundation in Halifax.
In the early 1980s, the family created the Edwards Family
Charitable Foundation and Mr. Edwards focused on giving to
charities involved in health care, education and children.
By 1989, he was giving away $40,000 a year, said Bill Frank,
who worked for Edwards Fine Food for 30 years, eventually
becoming its president.
The foundation now has more than $3-million and by the end
of 2008 will have donated close to $2-million, Mr. Frank
said - and even after Mr. Edwards had long since retired, he
was still keenly interested in the foundation's activities.
"I don't want you pissing away the principal," he told a
June meeting of the foundation's investment committee. "You
have to be careful."
ERNEST EDWARDS
Ernest Edwards was born Aug. 12, 1917, in Saint John, and
died June 25, 2008, of heart failure in a Halifax hospital.
He was 90. He is survived by children Murray, Rozanne,
Judith, Sylvia, David and Gary; 27 grandchildren; 51
great-grandchildren; and close friend Lillian Rodgers. He
was predeceased by all 11 of his siblings, son Paul and wife
Bridget Roseleen, known as Delia, who died in 2002.