The Immigrant History Behind Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest

DanTD, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Today, 37-year-old San Jose, CA denizen Joey Chestnut won Nathan’s Famous International Hot Dog Eating Contest by consuming a record-breaking 76 hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes.

CNN’s coverage of the win led me to Nathan’s website, which includes this fascinating immigration angle on the annual eating contest:

Legend has it that on July 4, 1916, four immigrants gathered at the very first Nathan’s Famous hot dog stand in Coney Island and made eating contest history. As the story goes, they were competing to see who was the most patriotic. How did they determine the winner? With a hot dog-eating contest, of course!

News to me. But few things strike me as more American than over-eating processed foods. So, as far as patriotic challenges go, this sounds like a  pretty believable backstory.

-KitJ