Glen Bell, the man who introduced Mexican cuisine to mainstream America with Taco Bell restaurants, died in his Rancho Santa Fe home Sunday. He was 86.

Bell was among a handful of entrepreneurs who changed the landscape and eating habits of post-World War II America with chains of low-cost restaurants that offered assembly-line fast food. Unlike the hamburgers served by McDonald's or Carl's Jr., however, Bell offered an adventurous alternative of tacos and burritos.

So exotic was the food at the time that in locations such as Florida, menus came with phonetic pronunciations to help customers with their orders.

Today, tacos are among Americans' favorite foods, and more than 58,000 Taco Bell restaurants serve more than 2 billion customers annually.

"He never bragged and was never jealous," said Bell's daughter, Kathleen Flynn of Rancho Santa Fe. "He had a wonderful attitude. He used to say to me, 'If you're attitude's good, your food tastes better.'"

The man largely responsible for popularizing Mexican food with Americans was born in Lynwood, grew up poor and hopped freight trains to find itinerant work, Bell biographer Debra Lee Baldwin said Monday from her Hidden Meadows Home.

Baldwin wrote a biography of Bell called "Taco Titan," in 1999.

Returning home after serving as a U.S. Marine in the Pacific Theater during World War II, Bell took the cooking skills he learned in the military and opened the drive-in Bell's Burgers in Colton in 1950.

"The area he was in was a Hispanic neighborhood, and he enjoyed eating tacos," Baldwin said. "Glen had the idea of getting an assembly line going and cranking out these tacos."

First came Taco-Tia, then El Taco, and finally, in 1962, Taco Bell, a name suggested by a friend.

From his first store in Downey, Bell opened eight more restaurants in Long Beach, Paramount and Los Angeles, then sold his first Taco Bell franchise in 1964.

In 1978, Bell sold his 868 Taco Bell restaurants to PepsiCo and moved to Rancho Santa Fe.

"He embodies the American entrepreneur in the post-war era," Baldwin said. "His was a rags-to-riches story."

Bell was shy and didn't reveal who he was when visiting local fast-food restaurants, Baldwin said.

"There's a Taco Bell in Escondido he liked to go to," she said. "He'd never say, 'Hi, I founded Taco Bell.'"

In 1993, Bell created the 115-acre Bell Gardens Farms on Cole Grade Road in Valley Center, a free educational facility where the public was invited to learn about farming and children got to ride in an open-air miniature train.

"It was one of the most marvelous tourist attractions any community could want," said Bob Lerner of the Valley Center History Museum.

Lerner said Bell was always at the farm, although he had been slowed by Parkinson's disease and used a wheelchair. The farm closed in 2003, but Lerner said Bell remained supportive of Valley Center and the museum. For a fundraiser just two months ago, Bell let the museum use a house he owned in Valley Center that had been the home of Hollywood stars Dick Powell and June Allyson.

"He was down to earth," Lerner said about Bell. "Just a very nice, warm human being."

Bell especially liked talking to Valley Center students studying agriculture in 4-H programs.

"It was so cool to go to the Del Mar Fair with him," Baldwin said. "He'd love to run up the bidding so these teenage kids would get this whopping sum for their calves."

"He was a risk-taker," Flynn said about her father. "I think throughout his life, if somebody said you can't do something, that was just an obstacle. He'd get around it. He had a way of making people turn around and look at things his way."

He is survived by his wife of 54 years, Martha; sisters Delores, Dorothy and Maureen; daughter Kathleen Flynn; sons Gary and Rex; and grandchildren Brandon, Jordan, Valerie and Christopher.

In memory of Bell, his family has asked people to thank a member of the U.S. Armed Forces for their service or to perform an act of kindness, no matter how small or large.

Call staff writer Gary Warth at 760-740-5410.