Google Doodle Celebrates Anglo-Indian Entrepreneur Sake Dean Mahomed

Today's Google doodle celebrates the Anglo-Indian traveller, Sake Dean Mahomed. Mahomed, an entrepreneur, is known for building cultural connections between India and England. On this day, 225 years ago, Mahomed became the first Indian author to publish a book in English. One of the most notable early non-European immigrants to the Western World, Mahomed also opened an Indian restaurant in England, which would go on to become one the most popular cuisine in Britain.

In 1810, after moving to London, Sake Dean Mahomed opened the Hindostanee Coffee House, Britain's first Indian restaurant. A few years later, Mahomed was forced to close his luxurious restaurant. In 1812, after closing his restaurant, he sought to reinvent himself.

Moving his family to the beachside town of Brighton, he opened a spa named Sake Dean Mahomed's Baths offering luxurious herbal steam baths. A combination of a steam bath and an Indian therapeutic massage, a treatment he named "shampooing" inspired by the Hindi word champissage meaning "a head massage" became his specialty.

Mahomed also found success as the "The Shampooing Surgeon of Brighton," opening a spa in the British seaside town that attracted the rich and royal. In 1822, he was appointed the personal 'shampooing surgeon' of King George IV. This gave a major boost to his business. The Brighton Museum in England features a portrait of Sake Dean Mahomed, which commemorated the man who helped merge the cultures of his two homelands.