Mr Bartley's Burger Cottage • 1960

In a cramped Harvard Square storefront, Joe Bartley started flipping burgers in 1960, and six decades later the line still snakes out the door. The menu reads like tabloid headlines—towering patties named after politicians, celebrities, and scandal-of-the-moment—served alongside hand-cut onion rings and thick frappes. Guy Fieri showed up for Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, but the real draw is biting into a messy, perfectly charred burger while crammed elbow-to-elbow with students, tourists, and Cambridge old-timers.