Fast-Food Worker’s Friendliness Keeps the Fan Mail Coming

Hilda Engel is probably the least likely person in the world to have a fan club.

The 54-year-old German immigrant is not rich or famous. In fact, her only notoriety came six months ago when she won $1,000 worth of furniture in a radio call-in contest.

But that is not why people from as far away as Germany and London have in the past year sent her 31 postcards and letters singing her praises. According to the letters, Engel’s popularity is based simply on her polite, motherly demeanor and her sincere, lighthearted attitude.

Engel, a diminutive grandmother who speaks with a heavy German accent, works at the McDonald’s restaurant in Castaic, a town of about 9,000 people 40 miles north of Los Angeles. There she sweeps, mops, cleans the windows and bathrooms, and serves coffee for $6.50 an hour.

But for many of the travelers who have met her while stopping by the restaurant for a fast meal, Engel’s hospitality is priceless.

“Thank you for making our stop so pleasant in your restaurant a couple weeks ago,” Edwin Baptista of Salinas wrote in a recent postcard to Engel. “We hope you are fine and happy. Look forward to seeing you next time we are in the area.”

Most of the travelers who have sent letters to Engel write to tell her how their vacations turned out.

“Hi! We are the folks who met you at McDonald’s a week ago on our way to the Rail Fair of Sacramento,” said a letter sent to her in May from a family in San Diego. “Had a great time there, but we are home now. We enjoyed meeting and talking with you.”

Karen Boles, Engel’s manager, said she is surprised that the McDonald’s cleaning lady, who runs to refill customers’ coffee cups, is receiving fan mail. But she said it is understandable.

“If we get a busload of people, Hilda runs and opens the door for them all and tells every single one of them: ‘Good morning, good morning.’ And then when they are leaving, she says: ‘Don’t forget your purse. Did everyone remember their belongings?’ ” Boles said.

Boles said the letters to Engel arrive nearly every week and are kept in a scrapbook in the employees lounge. No other employees have received fan letters.

Engel, a mother of six who walks 15 minutes to the restaurant and back home, says it is part of her nature to be cheerful and warm.

“I go clean and clean and they say, ‘Hey, excuse me, how come you are so happy person, you smile and so polite?’ ” she said in slightly broken English. “I say, ‘Well, I don’t know. I’m from Germany. I was born in Germany and we people are always happy.’ ”

But it is a mystery to her why people who spend only a few minutes talking to her over a Big Mac and fries would take the time to write to her.

“I don’t believe it; they mail me all these cards,” she said. “My boss says, ‘Look at all these cards,’ and I say, ‘Oh my God, they really like me.’ ”

Engel’s family left Germany 33 years ago to visit relatives in Canada and decided to stay. Twelve years later, they moved to California, where Engel settled down to raise her family.

Before her present job, Engel worked as a baby-sitter and housecleaner. But she said she quit that work because it was too much like raising her own children, most of whom are grown. She said she took the job at McDonald’s more than two years ago because she wanted to show her husband that she wasn’t a lazy person.

She said her philosophy is simple: “See, you have to be kind to people. When they sit down, you say, ‘Good morning, how are you?’ Some people don’t do that. Not all the young ones.”

Such niceties are unusual enough that people take notice and consider her their friend.

A couple from Pomona wrote in July: “Hi Hilda: We are the couple celebrating our 50th anniversary in June. We stopped to see you when we took a trip north. Thanks for being friendly. See you in the fall.”

A woman from Dinuba, Calif., became so fond of Engel that in August she sent her a photo of her newborn son. “It’s wonderful people like you who make traveling a pleasure--keep it up,” the accompanying letter said. The salutation on the letter read: “Dear, new friend.”