Seventy years ago this week, a hamburger joint named McDonald’s opened in northwest suburban Des Plaines. No one except for its Oak Park-raised owner Ray Kroc may have believed the tiny to-go place that offered hamburgers for 15 cents ($1.80 in today’s dollars), fries for 10 cents ($1.20) and milkshakes for 20 cents ($2.40) would one day become the second-largest fast-food chain in number of stores in the world. (McDonald’s was overtaken by a Chinese bubble tea and ice cream brand in March, according to Newsweek.)

Certainly the Tribune didn’t. The paper didn’t write about the operation until 1962. By then, McDonald’s had 341 restaurants in 40 states and had served its 700 millionth burger. Today, there are 36,000 restaurants in more than 100 countries.

Though the restaurant’s concept began with brothers Maurice and Richard McDonald in southern California, many of the company’s innovations have happened right here in Chicago. Here’s a look back at what we found about them in the Tribune archives with commentary provided by Kroc himself from his 1977 autobiography written with former Tribune feature editor Robert Anderson, “Grinding it out: The making of McDonald’s.”

April 15, 1955: Franchise opens in Des Plaines

An undated photo of Ray Kroc’s first McDonald’s restaurant in suburban Des Plaines. (McDonald’s)

At 52 years old, Kroc had eked out a living for himself, his first wife, Ethel, and their daughter, Marilyn, as a pianist, a failed real estate speculator in Florida and then a dedicated paper cup salesman for the Lily-Tulip Co. and distributor for the Multimixer milkshake machine.

Kroc’s life changed after he saw eight of his Multimixers in action inside a red-and-white tiled octagon-shaped drive-in operated by the McDonald brothers in San Bernardino, California. “Speedee” was the eatery’s original mascot.

“Hamburgers, fries, and beverages were prepared on an assembly line basis, and, to the amazement of everyone, Mac and Dick included, the thing worked!” Kroc wrote in “Grinding it out.” “Of course, the simplicity of the procedure allowed the McDonalds to concentrate on quality in every step, and that was the trick. When I saw it working that day in 1954, I felt like some latter-day Newton who’d just had an Idaho potato caromed off his skull.”

The McDonald brothers — who had no desire to leave California — agreed to let Kroc franchise copies of their bustling business.

Why did Kroc choose to build his first location in Des Plaines? Convenience. The lot at 400 N. Lee St., southwest of the intersection of River and Rand roads, was “a seven-minute drive from my home and a short walk from the Northwestern Railroad Station, from where I could commute to the city.”

Immediately, there were issues in replicating the McDonald’s brothers’ playbook. Their 900-square-foot, red-and-white tiled building had been designed for a desert climate and not for rain, freezing temperatures and snow. Their process of creating french fries from scratch, when followed here, produced a mushy, bland concoction. Food storage required a basement for the building, which had to be negotiated with the brothers because it deviated from their designs. Still, Kroc worked out the kinks.

Ray Kroc, the founder of the McDonald’s chain, is seen with his book “Grinding it out: The making of McDonald’s” in May 1977. (James Mayo/Chicago Tribune)

On its first day, the store’s sales were $366.12 and $705.13 on its second (a Saturday). Customers walked up to a window to place their order, but had to eat their food in their cars because there was no indoor seating.

“When the American family of today thinks of something to do, they think about going somewhere in the car,” Kroc told the Tribune in 1962. “And when they think about something to eat, it’s more likely to be hamburger than anything else. We just built a place where car meets hamburger. And we built rainbows on it so it wouldn’t go unnoticed.”