Frankly speaking: The tale of America's Hot Dog King

TAKE ONE helping of moxie, add some street smarts born of desperation and a hefty dash of unstoppable Polish work ethic - slap it all between a freshly toasted, American-made bun, and you have Nathan's Famous Hot Dogs, a Coney Island icon since 1916.

The story of this business, and the man who founded it is the subject of "Famous Nathan," a documentary about Coney Island's frankfurter king screening Nov. 16 at the National Museum of American Jewish History.

It's one of two documentaries about food that sandwich the Philadelphia Jewish Film Fest, each exploring food icons of New York City. "The Sturgeon Queens," about Russ & Daughters, the famed smoked-fish emporium, will be shown at 11:30 a.m. this Sunday at the Gershman Y, on Broad Street. The festival starts Saturday.

For Lloyd Handwerker, the story of how the Nathan's dog became a pop-culture phenom is a personal one. His grandfather Nathan and his grandmother Ida founded Nathan's Famous Hot Dogs with little more than an old family recipe and a clever marketing strategy, selling them for a nickel, 5 cents less than the competition.

It took a journey of close to 5,000 miles for the Nathan's Famous hot dog to wind up in Coney Island, feeding the beach-going masses a humble frank that epitomized the American immigrant dream. That small hot-dog stand would become a family cottage industry, with throngs of fans lining up for the all-beef dog known for its snap and spice.

The family no longer owns the business, but Nathan's is an international force, with stores across the country and overseas. Ten Philly supermarkets carry its products, and there's a Nathan's restaurant in West Philly.

Ida devised the sausage recipe using a blend of spices that her grandmother had used back in Poland. Ida and Nathan invested their life savings, $300, to open the business on the Coney Island amusement pier.

How that humble start spawned huge success is a story Lloyd has been working on for 30 years.

"Being a grandchild, I grew up listening to stories around their dining room table," he said. "I was curious and interested - why did Nathan's Famous have such a special place in people's hearts? I'd meet people and they'd always say, 'Are you related to Nathan?' He was like a god in Coney Island."

No doubt, Nathan Handwerker's story deserved a silver-screen treatment. Epitomizing just about every stereotype you could imagine about the trials of an Eastern European immigrant, his road to success was bumpy. In the film - a wonderful collection of archival footage that captures Nathan's Famous at its apex - Lloyd uses his grandfather's own voice to tell the tale, thanks to interviews his cousin, David, recorded. Nathan died in 1974.

Hearing the patriarch's heavily accented English describing living and working 12 hours a day in a bakery when he was 11 years old to help his family gives keen insight into Handwerker's mettle.

"My grandfather wasn't unique in his struggles as an immigrant," said Lloyd. "Of course he worked incredibly hard, but he had an intuition about business, his feet were on the ground. He knew what customers wanted. A lot of his motivation and his work ethic came out of poverty."

After coming to America alone to join an older brother - Nathan was one of 13 kids - he heard about a job at a restaurant in Manhattan and walked hours to be the first in line to apply at 4 a.m.

Despite speaking no English, he got the job as a dishwasher and, before long, graduated to busboy. He later worked two jobs, seven days a week, including one at Feltman's German Gardens, a famous beer restaurant in Brooklyn. Two regular customers, Eddie Cantor and Jimmy Durante, encouraged him to go out on his own.

At its apex, Nathan's Famous was selling 6 million hot dogs a year, 40,000 on a busy weekend day. Open 24/7, the restaurant relied on its loyal crew of gruff countermen, working long hours under difficult conditions, to keep the dogs flying out the door.

"They were a tough group," said Lloyd. "In the beginning, in the '20s and '30s, they worked in open air, no heat or AC, standing 12 hours a day. The customers were tough, too - a lot of gangsters back then.

"And my grandfather was a perfectionist. He treated everybody like family - which meant no special treatment. Because nobody could work as hard as he did."

Nathan was incredibly strict with food standards, insisting on only the best beef dogs, made to his formula. He would boil each batch in his office and taste it - if it wasn't perfect, it went back.

The menu was simple at first: hot dogs, house-ground burgers, brisket sandwiches, orangeade, lemonade, malted milk and egg creams. Seafood and delicatessen were added in the late '40s.

Lloyd remembered the long, epic grill that sizzled nonstop with smoked franks.

"There were guys that worked that grill for 40 years," he said. "They were top notch at what they were doing. The customer could ask for the hot dog well-done, the bun was always toasted. When it was super busy, there were six people in the back toasting buns 12 hours a day."

Unlike the current dog craze, where everything from kimchee to shrimp etouffee adorns a wiener, Nathan's Famous kept things simple, Lloyd said. "They served high-quality mustard, and that was it. It was bare - a hot dog, a bun and mustard. It wasn't till much later they had sauerkraut. Never relish."

By the 1950s, the business was grossing $3 million a year, with a payroll of $1 million. "My grandfather worked people hard, but he was incredibly generous," Lloyd said. "His managers were making $25,000 a year, which was huge at that time. He gave everybody bonuses at Christmas."

Nathan kept the price of a hot dog at a nickel for 30 years, until his supplier forced him to increase it.

"He'd literally spend hours counting nickels, at the end of the day," recalled his grandson. "He'd take this heavy paper bag of nickels to the bank."

Pushed by his sons to open multiple locations, a franchise program was initiated in 1968.

"There were some real disasters with expansion," Lloyd acknowledged. "By the early '80s, the business was in a downward trajectory."

The family sold all interests to private investors in 1987.

"It was good that my grandfather didn't see that," said Lloyd, who was 18 when his grandfather died.

Although it's now corporate-owned, there's still a Nathan's Famous in the original location. It's still open every day, serving a basic Nathan dog for $2.95 - up to $3.65 if you add such toppings as bacon, cheese, chili and peppers.

Lloyd never worked in the Coney Island business. His father opened his own place in Manhattan when Lloyd was 7. "There was a hot dog on the menu," he said. "It created some conflict in the family. But I loved my grandparents, and they were always warm and loving to us."

One of the reasons he made this film was to pay homage to his grandparents' legacy. And to come to terms with how his family fit into the Nathan's Famous story.

The film premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival this year and earned high marks from family in the audience. "I am extremely happy I could show it to my parents, while they are still alive," Lloyd said.

Does he think his grandfather would be a fan? "I think he would like it, yes. He was always a modest man. My grandfather wasn't a braggart. But the story is an amazing one."