Brown Derby was a chain of restaurants in Los Angeles, California. The first and best known was shaped like a derby hat, an iconic image that became synonymous with the Golden Age of Hollywood. It was opened by Wilson Mizner in 1926. The chain was started by Robert H. Cobb and Herbert K. Somborn (a former husband of film star Gloria Swanson) in the 1920s. The original Brown Derby restaurants had closed or had been converted to other uses by the 1980s, though a Disney-backed Brown Derby national franchising program revived the brand in the 21st century. It is often incorrectly thought that the Brown Derby was a single restaurant, and the Wilshire Boulevard and Hollywood branches are frequently confused. There is a non-related chain of steakhouse restaurants founded in 1941 in Akron, Ohio, and franchised in 1962. This chain was founded by Ted and Gus Girves, and the full name of these restaurants is "Girves Brown Derby". , five of the Girves chain are still in business. Wilshire Boulevard Brown Derby First Wilshire Derby (at 3427) The first restaurant was opened in February 1926 at 3427 Wilshire Boulevard in a building built in the distinctive shape of a derby hat. Whimsical architecture was in vogue at the time, and the restaurant was designed to catch the eye of passing motorists. The Brown Derby name originated from a Malverne, New York-based restaurant of the same name that had been a hang-out for vaudevillians in the 1920s. It was founded by Wilson Mizner as a small cafe, across the street from the Hollywood hot spot the Cocoanut Grove at the Ambassador Hotel. Wilson was the front man; Herbert K. Somborn owned the property and Jack L. Warner put up the money. Wilson Mizner sat in booth 50 almost every day. Unfortunately the original restaurant was small and suffered from acoustic problems in which sound from one end of the building bounced off the semicircular ceiling and traveled to the other side of the room. Subsequent uses Most of the rest of the block bounded by Wilshire Boulevard, Sixth Street, Mariposa Avenue and Alexandria Avenue was occupied by the Chapman Park Hotel and Bungalows which wanted to acquire the rest of the block that it did not own, including the lot that the original Derby had occupied. After the restaurant moved out in May 1936, the building was demolished and the hotel