Harland Sanders Café and Museum

The building right here in Corbin is where Kentucky Fried Chicken was born. Harland Sanders opened a gas station on U.S.

Route Twenty-Five in nineteen thirty and added a café in nineteen thirty-seven to feed travelers passing through during the Depression. Through the nineteen forties he refined his pressure-cooker technique and his secret blend of eleven herbs and spices in this very kitchen. By nineteen fifty-two he had franchised the recipe to a restaurant in Salt Lake City, Utah, the first Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise in the world.

He sold the Corbin café in nineteen fifty-six and spent the rest of his working life driving from franchise to franchise in a white suit, ensuring his standards were met. The National Register of Historic Places added the café in nineteen ninety. Today it is still a working KFC, and visitors can tour the restored original dining room where the Colonel first perfected his recipe.