Recently, I’ve been a little distracted by several important things I’ve had on my mind, and as a result have had trouble sitting down and writing blogs that tell personal stories. However; I have still had the itch to write, and for the second blog in a row am going to use it as a way to tell a story I learned recently and found interesting. Just like my last blog entitled, “A Grand Old Day,” where I told the abridged history of July 4^th, I want to use this blog to tell another story that relates to that day.

The Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest is synonymous with the 4^th of July; however the story behind how the contest came to be, and how long it has really been, well, an actual contest, are very debatable and murky. The prevailing legend behind the contest, that I’ve read about in several different articles during the past week, is that in 1916 when Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Stand first opened 4 immigrants decided to hold a hot dog eating contest there in order to settle an argument about which one of them was the most patriotic. The date of this score settling eating contest happened to be July 4^th, and thus a tradition was born with a man named Jim Mullen reported to be the first ever winner.

The legend of the hot dog eating contest grew over the years even though, suspiciously, there was never any actual evidence to prove that it had taken place before 1972. In 2010 a promoter named Mortimer Matz admitted to having invented and embellished the whole legend of the contest, along with another man named Max Rosey, in the early 1970’s as part of a publicity stunt. However, in spite of this fabrication most publications still credit July 4^th, 1916 as the official date of the contests origin. Since 1972 every contest has been held on July 4^th, except for 1978 when it was held on Memorial Day, with the results being recorded and champions awarded the coveted “international ‘bejeweled’ mustard-yellow belt.”

In the 1990’s and into the new millennium this grand American tradition was actually dominated by Japanese competitors, culminating in 2006 when Takeru Kobayashi won his 6^th consecutive competition after he consumed 50 hot dogs in 12 minutes. Since then the events rising popularity has led to it being broadcast live on ESPN, and the birth of Major League Eating – a competitive eating circuit where competitors travel across the country competing in a variety of different eating contests such as buffalo wings, tamales, ribs and oysters (there must be a lot of love in the air after that contest).

Since the reign of Kobayashi ended American Joey Chestnut has dominated the competitive eating scene, winning 8 consecutive hot dog eating contests before his dominance suddenly ended last weekend when he lost by a mere 2 dogs to new champion Matt Stonie. Today, the event is so popular, and such a spectacle, that a party atmosphere takes over Coney Island and the crowd of thousands (as many as 50,000 people have been in attendance for the contest in recent years) becomes more and more raucous as the number of hot dogs consumed adds up.

And boy do they add up! In 2013 Joey Chestnut managed to eat a record 69 hot dogs, buns and all, in 10 minutes, which broke his record-setting mark from the previous year when he’d eaten 68, which was just a few more than the first record holder, Jim Mullen, who managed to eat 13 hot dogs in 12 minutes back in 1916. However, whether you like watching people race to consume gluttonous amounts of the same food or not the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest is a fun American 4^th of July tradition that I think it’s safe to assume even the Founding Fathers would have gotten behind.