CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · General Reference

Straw Hat Pizza

Pizza chain

Cross-disciplinary reference desk with index cards, atlas, dictionary and catalogue
General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 22, 2026
Entity authorityQ7622368
Source-derived summary

Straw Hat Pizza is a chain of pizza restaurants founded in 1959 in San Leandro, California.

History

Charlie Olson and Bill Henderlong founded Straw Hat Pizza in 1959, after working together for a regional chain called Me-N-Ed's. They named the store after hats worn by employees at their former employer. At one point there were 230 locations across California and Nevada.

Locations

As of August 2026, the company's website lists 23 locations spread across California.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Straw Hat Pizza” is pizza chain. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Straw, Pizza and chain, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1959, 2026—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1959-01-01. For this dossier, Straw, Pizza and chain is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “pizza chain” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7622368. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1959 and 2026.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Straw Hat Pizza”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Straw Hat Pizza primary sources, Straw Hat Pizza archive and Straw research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Straw Hat Pizza”?
  2. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Straw Hat Pizza” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.