The brothers open a drive-in
Richard and Maurice McDonald open a barbecue drive-in restaurant in San Bernardino, California, with carhops and a long menu.
1940 to now
A timeline of decisions.
The moments that changed what the company is: a kitchen redesign, a buyout, a listing, and a departure.
The Speedee Service System
The brothers close the restaurant and reopen it with a nine-item menu, no carhops, no plates and a kitchen laid out as an assembly line. This is the actual invention.
Ray Kroc arrives
Milkshake-mixer salesman Ray Kroc visits San Bernardino to find out why one stand needs eight mixers, and leaves as the brothers' national franchising agent.
Des Plaines and incorporation
Kroc opens his first franchised restaurant in Des Plaines, Illinois, and incorporates McDonald's System, Inc.
Kroc buys out the brothers
Kroc purchases the McDonald brothers' interest for $2.7 million. Hamburger University opens the same year to standardise how restaurants are run.
Public listing
McDonald's goes public. The share offering turns a franchising operation into a company with capital to expand at speed.
First restaurants outside the United States
The chain opens in Canada and Puerto Rico, beginning the international expansion that now defines it.
The first Ronald McDonald House
A house for families of children in hospital opens in Philadelphia, starting the charity that carries the company's name.
The drive-thru
A restaurant in Sierra Vista, Arizona opens a drive-thru window to serve soldiers from a nearby base who were not allowed out of their vehicles in uniform.
The Happy Meal
A boxed children's meal with a toy launches nationally in the United States and becomes one of the most effective marketing formats in the industry.
Pushkin Square
The first Soviet McDonald's opens in Moscow to queues of thousands, and becomes a shorthand image for the end of the Cold War.
I'm Lovin' It
The chain adopts its first genuinely global campaign line, run in the same form across markets.
All-day breakfast
After years of customer demand, breakfast items move onto the all-day menu in the United States, forcing kitchen and equipment changes.
Exit from Russia
McDonald's leaves Russia after 32 years and sells its restaurants to a local operator, closing the chapter Pushkin Square opened.