Harland David "Colonel" Sanders (September 9, 1890 December 16, 1980) was an American fast food businessman who

o founded the Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant chain, now re-branded as KFC. His image remains iconic in KFC promotions, and a foundation he established in his later years aids charities and funds scholarships with more than a million dollars in grants a year.

Early life and career

Sanders was born to a Presbyterian family in Henryville, Indiana. His father, Wilbur David Sanders, died when Harland was six years old, and, since his mother worked, he was required to cook for his family. He dropped out of school in seventh grade. When his mother remarried, he ran away from home because his stepfather beat him. Sanders falsified his date of birth and enlisted in the United States Army at the age of sixteen, completing his entire service commitment in Cuba. During his early years, Sanders held many jobs, including: steamboat pilot, insurance salesman, railroad fireman and farmer. He had a son, Harland, Jr., who died at an early age, and two daughters, Margaret Sanders and Mildred Sanders Ruggles.

Harland Sanders at age 20 At the age of 40, Sanders cooked chicken dishes and other meals for people who stopped at his service station in Corbin, Kentucky. Since he did not have

a restaurant, he served customers in his adjacent living quarters. His local popularity grew, and Sanders moved to a motel and 142 seat restaurant, later Harland Sanders Caf and Museum. Over the next nine years he developed his "secret recipe" for frying chicken in a pressure fryer that cooked the chicken much faster than pan frying. Sanders was given the honorary title "Kentucky Colonel" in 1935 by Governor Ruby Laffoon. He was "re-commissioned" in 1950 by Governor Lawrence Wetherby. Around 1950, Sanders began developing his distinctive appearance, growing his trademark mustache and goatee and donning a white suit and string tie. He never wore anything else in public during the last 20 years of his life, using a heavy wool suit in the winter and a light cotton suit in the summer. At age 65, Sanders' store having failed due to the new Interstate 75 reducing his restaurant's customer traffic, he took $105 from his first Social Security check and began visiting potential franchisees.

The restaurant in Corbin, Kentucky where Colonel Sanders developed Kentucky Fried Chicken The franchise approach was successful, and less than ten years later (in 1964) Sanders sold the Kentucky Fried Chicken corporation for $2 million to a partnership of Kentucky businessmen headed by John Y. Brown, Jr. The deal did not include the Canadian operations. In 1965 Sanders moved to Mississauga, Ontario to oversee his Canadian franchises and continued to collect franchise and appearance fees there and appearance fees in the U.S. (He was locally active. For example, his 80th birthday was held at the Inn on the Park in North York, Ontario, hosted by Jerry Lewis as a Canadian Muscular Dystrophy Association fundraiser.) In 1973, he sued Heublein Inc. then parent company of Kentucky Fried Chicken over alleged misuse of his image in promoting products he had not helped develop. In 1975, Heublein Inc. unsuccessfully sued Sanders for libel after he publicly referred to their gravy as "sludge" that tasted like "wallpaper paste". Death and legacy

Sanders remains the official face of Kentucky Fried Chicken, and appears on its logo Sanders later used his stockholdings to create the Colonel Harland Sanders Trust and Colonel Harland Sanders Charitable Organization, which used the proceeds to aid charities and fund scholarships. His trusts continue to donate money to groups like the Trillium Health Care Centre; a wing of their building specializes in women's and children's care and has been named after him. The Sidney, British Columbia based foundation granted over $1,000,000 in 2007, according to its 2007 tax return. Sanders died in Louisville, Kentucky, of pneumonia on December 16, 1980. He had been diagnosed with acute leukemia the previous June. His body lay in state in the rotunda of the Kentucky State Capitol; after a funeral service at the Southern Baptist Seminary Chapel attended by more than 1,000 people. He was buried in his characteristic white suit and black western string tie in Cave Hill Cemetery in Louisville.

Gravesite of Harland Sanders Since his death, Sanders has been portrayed by voice actors in Kentucky Fried Chicken commercials in radio and an animated version of him has been used for television commercials. A 1982 episode of Little House on the Prairie ("Wave of the Future") paid tribute to KFC by featuring a character implied to be Col. Sanders (portrayed by John Roberts) offering Mrs. Oleson a fried chicken franchise. For legal reasons, this character was listed in the credits as "Bearded Man".

Sanders was inducted into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 2000. The Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball league has developed an urban legend of the "Curse of the Colonel". A statue of Colonel Sanders was thrown into the river and lost during a 1985 fan celebration, and (according to the legend) the "curse" has caused Japan's Hanshin Tigers to perform poorly since the incident. A manuscript of a book on cooking, which Sanders apparently wrote in the mid-1960s, has been found in KFC archives. It includes Sanders' recipes as well as stories. KFC plans to try some of the recipes, and to offer the book online.[15]