Being a vegetarian in the 1950s even in Los Angeles was quite unusual so I usually didn't speak about this to my class mates in Grade School. However, when it was my graduation from Grade school I was given a hamburger to eat like all the other children and I was embarrassed because I couldn't eat this. I asked my 6th grade Teacher Katherine Juday what to do. She said just eat the potato Salad and potato chips and any cake or candy and leave your hamburger. You don't have to eat it Fred. My parents called me Freddie because my father's name was Fred too.
So, for the most part I never told people unless I really trusted them like best friends that I was a vegetarian (a lacto Ovo Vegetarian) which is common in India by the way.
It wasn't until the 1960s where vegetarian restaurants sprang up all over the place in Los Angeles. Before then I only remember the SRF Vegetarian Restaurant I think it might have been on Wilshire Blvd. in Los Angeles which always had a real nice clientele of customers because their food was really good!
They had another restaurant in the 1950s in Encinitas, California which is a beach town between oceanside and San Diego. So, when there were special Classes in San Diego people of our churches would eat on the way home to Los Angeles and Orange Counties then at the SRF Restaurant because that was Yogananda's Retreat center over looking the cliffs and ocean there. The Surfer's still call the beach below SRF "Swamis"to this day by the way.
By God's Grace
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