{{Short description|American businesswoman (1920–2006)}} {{Infobox person | name = Esther Snyder | image = <!-- just the filename, without the File: or Image: prefix or enclosing brackets --> | alt = | caption = | birth_name = Esther Lavelle Johnson | birth_date = {{Birth date|1920|1|7}} | birth_place = Sorento, Illinois, US | death_date = {{Death date and age|2006|8|4|1920|1|7}} | death_place = Irvine, California, US | other_names = | known_for = Co-founding In-N-Out Burger | spouse = {{marriage|Harry Snyder|1948|1976|reason=died}} | children = Guy Snyder <br> Rich Snyder <br> Wilbur Stites }} '''Esther Lavelle Snyder''' (née '''Johnson''') (January 7, 1920 – August 4, 2006) was an American businesswoman. She co-founded In-N-Out Burger, with her husband Harry Snyder, in 1948. Snyder was the fast-food chain's president from January 2000 until her death.

==Early life== Snyder was born and raised in Sorento, Illinois, as the fifth of eight children (seven daughters, one son) to parents Orla and Mabel Johnson. She attended Greenville College and graduated from Seattle Pacific University with a bachelor's degree in zoology.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.in-n-out.com/esther/|title=In Loving Memory of Esther Snyder|website=In-N-Out Burger|access-date=November 26, 2010|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080227002626/http://www.in-n-out.com/esther/|archive-date=February 27, 2008}}</ref>

==Career== During In-N-Out's early years, Snyder managed all of the company bookkeeping herself, creating thousands of pages of handwritten notes and accounts.

From January 2000 until her August 2006 death, Snyder served as the company's president.

==Personal life== She met Harry Snyder in 1947, while working at a restaurant in Seattle; the two were married the following year and moved to Baldwin Park, California.<ref>[https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DEFD7163EF930A2575BC0A9609C8B63 "Esther Snyder, 86; Began In-N-Out Burger"]. ''The New York Times''. August 13, 2006. Retrieved November 26, 2010.</ref> By the late 1950s, the couple had moved to a larger house in the nearby city of San Dimas, California.

Esther and Harry Snyder had three children: biological sons Guy (1951-1999) and Rich Snyder (1952-1993), and an adopted son named Wilbur Stites (1951-1979), a local orphan whom the Snyders began fostering in the early 1960s. Esther outlived her husband, who died in 1976 from lung cancer and all three of their sons: Guy succumbed to a drug overdose, Rich died in a plane crash and Wilbur was killed in an automobile crash.

Following her husband's death, Snyder spent the last two decades of her life living in Glendora, California, where she owned a home that author Stacy Perman described as "a ranch house shaded by oak trees and fronted by a white fence."

==Death== Snyder died on August 4, 2006, in Irvine, California, aged 86, from undisclosed causes. Her only grandchild, Lynsi Snyder, is now the heiress to the In-N-Out Burger company.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.dailynews.com/portlet/article/html/fragments/print_article.jsp?article=4139249|date=2006-08-06|title=In-N-Out matriarch Snyder dies at age 86|website=Los Angeles Daily News |url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060807025959/http://www.dailynews.com/portlet/article/html/fragments/print_article.jsp?article=4139249|archive-date=2006-08-07}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=August 13, 2006 |title=Esther Snyder, In-N-Out Burger Founder, Dies at 86 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/13/business/13snyder.html |access-date=2008-04-01 |work=The New York Times}}</ref>

==Esther Snyder Community Center== Since In-N-Out Burger was started in the city of Baldwin Park, the city named its community center after Esther Snyder.<ref>{{cite web|url = http://www.baldwinpark.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=category&sectionid=28&id=112&Itemid=282 | title = City of Baldwin Park - Esther Snyder Community Center|access-date=2009-08-18 }}</ref>

==References== {{Reflist}}

== Further reading == {{refbegin}} *{{cite book |first=Stacy | last=Perman | title=In-N-Out Burger: A Behind-the-Counter Look at the Fast-Food Chain That Breaks All the Rules | publisher=Harper Collins Publishers | location=New York | year=2009 | isbn=978-0-06-134671-2 }} {{refend}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Snyder, Esther}} Category:1920 births Category:2006 deaths Category:American food company founders Category:American Methodists Category:Businesspeople from Los Angeles Category:Fast-food chain founders Category:Greenville University people Category:People from Baldwin Park, California Category:People from Glendora, California Category:People from Bond County, Illinois Category:Seattle Pacific University alumni Category:American women company founders Category:American company founders Category:Snyder family Category:American Christians