Latest / Ridiculous History / Awful Candy, Part One: Tootsie Rolls Saved the War -- and Divided the World

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Awful Candy, Part One: Tootsie Rolls Saved the War -- and Divided the World · Ridiculous History

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  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: for tuning in. Who's that knocking on your door? Trick
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: or treating?
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: Why?
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  Speaker 1: It's us with our super producer, mister Max Williams.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: Who's that girl? La? La La? It's Max Williams. Who's
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: that Max? Two hands Williams haven't? That's right? You were
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: a hand down.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: I got cleared by the orthopedic surgeon yesterday to begin
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: weightlifting again.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: All right, that's no old brack, your swollen state, that's
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: no brown.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: I'm Ben Bowlin. Sad news for you. Max, you're also
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: our research associate on this episode. That's not the sad news.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: The sad news is I went through a phase where
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: I wrote nicknames for all our co workers and Matt
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Twohans Frederick.
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, but I mean since he's my work big brother,
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: so I think we'd share, like you know, nicknames.
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: That's not nicknames. It's a little confusing. We might have
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: to workshop this one, Max.
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  Speaker 1: Well, let's workshop Candy, because cast your memories back. Fellow
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians. We are a very pro Halloween bunch, and
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: we had a lot of opinions about Halloween candy in
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  Speaker 1: a previous episode, and I don't know whether we'll play
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  Speaker 1: a clip or not, but in classic ridiculous history fashion,
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  Speaker 1: far after that conversation during Halloween, we are returning to
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  Speaker 1: you with some opinions about candy. Now, to be fair,
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  Speaker 1: we are a history show, so we will explore history
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  Speaker 1: of candy. But we just want you to know going
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  Speaker 1: into this.
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  Speaker 2: We get a lot of hot takes nostalgia candy. The
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  Speaker 2: nostalgia candy scene is rife with garbage candy, although there's
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: there's a few gems you know, hidden within the rough, right,
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  Speaker 2: isn't that how it goes? Can I tell you guys that?
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  Speaker 3: So we started writing this brief back last year, and
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: around that time I bought my dad an entire this
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  Speaker 3: is the only wee you can buy neck A wafers
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  Speaker 3: now like wafers, the chocolate, the selection and a shirt.
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  Speaker 2: It was like one hundred dollars. He loved it. He's
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  Speaker 2: beyond like happy about it.
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  Speaker 3: But it's like, man, I would have the father, who
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  Speaker 3: was a passionate defender of neck A wafers and.
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  Speaker 2: Grape necko wafers to me to strike me as like
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  Speaker 2: wartime candy. Yeah, like they're Halloween hard tags.
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  Speaker 3: And I just want to point out that we are
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  Speaker 3: going to talk about a candy today that was both
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  Speaker 3: a depression era and a wartime rationing candy.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, literally in their history. So it's true. Yeah, and
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  Speaker 1: that's why they stick around. It also reminds me for
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  Speaker 1: our friends further south, it reminds me of the Ansac cookies,
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  Speaker 1: the Australian biscuits a n Zac those tooth on those Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: those are a result of wartime stuff.
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  Speaker 2: You know.
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  Speaker 1: It's the thing. It's the thing about candy. There is
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  Speaker 1: such a panopoly of possibility. Generally, even people who don't
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  Speaker 1: consider themselves as folks with a sweet tooth, they'll have
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  Speaker 1: one candy. And to your point, Nol, it's often nostalgia related, right,
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  Speaker 1: It's like I ate whoppers the first time I saw
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  Speaker 1: a movie that I loved. So I don't eat candy,
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  Speaker 1: but I do have an exception for whoppers. I suggest
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  Speaker 1: we begin with Tutsie rules, as are as our pal
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  Speaker 1: Max introduces it. Here's the question, have you ever looked
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  Speaker 1: at your cat's turts and thought what if that was chewy?
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  Speaker 2: Or oh wow? Yeah? No, but I do have to
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  Speaker 2: take issue with something that Max wrote in his jury
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  Speaker 2: here that we sort of repassed. You think kit Kat, reseason,
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  Speaker 2: Almond Joy or bad candy?
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  Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, no.
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  Speaker 3: I'm saying, if you or you buy the variety of Pivo,
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  Speaker 3: you get the kit Casts, you get the Receeds, which
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  Speaker 3: are a plus candies, and you get an Almond Joy,
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  Speaker 3: which is just trash candy.
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  Speaker 2: No, that's what I'm saying. That's my favorite candy.
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  Speaker 1: Are you serious?
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  Speaker 2: I love Almond Joy?
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  Speaker 3: Did you read the next sentence that said you were
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  Speaker 3: one of the seven people who are getting bad about this?
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  Speaker 2: Anyway, I'm mad, and I also like Receas is considerable
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  Speaker 2: as a beloved candy. I don't know.
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  Speaker 1: Well, that's what you say, but shout out, shout out
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  Speaker 1: to Shang Weng who has an excellent piece about almonds
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  Speaker 1: versus mounds. What's your allmon joy versus bounds. What's your
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  Speaker 1: mounds opinion?
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  Speaker 2: Well, allmon Joys have nuts and mounds don't, right, So
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  Speaker 2: sometimes you feel like and usually I feel like a nut.
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  Speaker 2: When I don't, I eat some other candy that's not mounds.
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  Speaker 2: Mounds is darker chocolate too. I don't know, man, people
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  Speaker 2: have really strong opinions about shredded coconut, And I don't
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: know if you know this. You know, there's some surgeries
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  Speaker 2: that people get. I believe it's I forget the name
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: of it, but it's when you get your stomach reduced
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: in size some people that have trouble with weight gain
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: and it's a procedure that can be done to literally
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  Speaker 2: decrease the size of your stomach, and there's some kind
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  Speaker 2: of suture or staples or whatever that stay in there forever.
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  Speaker 2: That shredded coconut can literally shred So people that have
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  Speaker 2: these procedures they are no longer allowed to eat shredded
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  Speaker 2: coconut of any variety for the rest of their lives,
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  Speaker 2: which it sounds like you guys would be fine.
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  Speaker 1: With gastric staplings. That's the one. Yeah, there's now clearly,
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  Speaker 1: as we're going into it, there is one candy which
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  Speaker 1: is obviously the worst candy bar, and that is the
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  Speaker 1: zero bar. We're not going to talk about the zero
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  Speaker 1: bar because that would be like platforming terrorism. We just
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  Speaker 1: need you to know that we are aware of that
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  Speaker 1: war crime on the mouth man.
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  Speaker 2: Such strong opinions about I haven't had one in years.
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  Speaker 2: I think, what is it? It's basically nugat wrapped in
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  Speaker 2: white chocolate. Are there some almonds in there? There's some
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  Speaker 2: kind of crunchy nut.
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  Speaker 3: Peanut and almond nugat covered with white fudge.
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  Speaker 1: Which is weird because just like an improvised explosive device,
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  Speaker 1: those ingredients on their own are harmless, you know.
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  Speaker 2: When weaponized in the form of a weaponized well. And
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  Speaker 2: then the question then arises too, I mean, if certain
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  Speaker 2: some of these candies are so hated, why are they
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  Speaker 2: still manufactured? You can still see the Zero bar is
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  Speaker 2: right there on the candy aisle. It's your local convenient
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  Speaker 2: in store gas station, right next to the Hits. It's
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  Speaker 2: been around for one hundred and four years.
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  Speaker 1: Well, thankfully with dust on them, that's how you'll see
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  Speaker 1: them on the shelf. And that's I think a good
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  Speaker 1: thing for America. But we're not talking about the Zero.
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  Speaker 1: We don't want a platform that terrible stuff. There's a
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  Speaker 1: lot of good candy out there. Opinions differ on the
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  Speaker 1: candy known as the Tutsie Roll.
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  Speaker 2: Hate them You're not a tousy boy? Oh no, no,
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  Speaker 2: My girlfriend really likes them a lot. But I just
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  Speaker 2: I don't like the texture of them. I don't like
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  Speaker 2: the way they get stuck in your teeth. Yeah, they
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  Speaker 2: do resemble cat turns, there's no question about that. I
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  Speaker 2: just find them patently unpleasant.
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  Speaker 1: So let's go to kat Eshner from writing for Waters Smithsonian,
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  Speaker 1: who gives us a bit of the history.
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  Speaker 2: Here.
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  Speaker 1: On the twenty third of February eighteen ninety six, Leo
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  Speaker 1: Hirshfield opened a shop in New York City. He's originally
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  Speaker 1: an Austrian national. And I got a pause here because
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  Speaker 1: I know this story from a thing called Stuff of
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  Speaker 1: Genius that we did many years ago of video series
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  Speaker 1: on YouTube. Yeah, all right, So here's the idea. He
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  Speaker 1: is working our buddy Leo in this shop and he
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  Speaker 1: invents the Tutsi role for one reason or another, and
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  Speaker 1: then it becomes very popular. It's like it's got a
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  Speaker 1: wax like texture. Some people like it, some people don't.
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  Speaker 1: It's not quite gum. It's definitely not you know, like
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  Speaker 1: a Hershey kiss or something. But at this point New
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  Speaker 1: York goes crazy for it. They want the little Tutsi
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  Speaker 1: roll snacks. And I think the first flavor was only chocolate,
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  Speaker 1: Is that correct?
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  Speaker 2: I believe. Yeah, that's certainly the classic tutsi role, and
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  Speaker 2: they have there are fruit fruits adjacent flavored tootsi rolls.
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  Speaker 2: There's the one that resemble like kind of what Et
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  Speaker 2: looked like at the end of the movie when he
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  Speaker 2: sort of shriveled up and turned white and kind of
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  Speaker 2: looked like a cat turn that have been left out
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  Speaker 2: for quite a few days and dried out. There's definitely
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  Speaker 2: those as well. What other varietals of tutsi rolls are
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  Speaker 2: out there?
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  Speaker 1: Vanilla? Okay, Yeah, there are a couple of I want
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  Speaker 1: to say, for a short time, they had the potential
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  Speaker 1: to become like kit cats in Japan. Every time I
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  Speaker 1: have to go, yeah, I pick up a ton of
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  Speaker 1: kit cats because they're in KitKat flavors in Japan are
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  Speaker 1: are are amazing because they are very much not one
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  Speaker 1: to one palette comparisons. You can get kit cats that
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  Speaker 1: are ocean wave flavored or like.
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  Speaker 2: What does that daste like?
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  Speaker 1: They're very Miyazaki, you know, like there's I'm sure there's
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  Speaker 1: a kit Cat out there named a Dream I Had
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  Speaker 1: or something like that. But with boy Hirshfield, after he
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  Speaker 1: invents the Tutsi roll, he merges with an outfit called
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  Speaker 1: Stern and Solberg to get scale of economy, to make
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  Speaker 1: more Tutsi rolls, and to bring them to more places.
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  Speaker 1: There's a side note here involving Star Wars.
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  Speaker 2: Right, there's an advertisement for something called The Empire Strips Back,
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  Speaker 2: which I believe is a Star Wars themed burlesque show
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  Speaker 2: that just recently I passed through Atlanta. I believe a
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  Speaker 2: friend of the show, Nick Benson, Nick Admiral Turbo Benson
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  Speaker 2: wentz and said it was quite quite a hullabaloo featuring
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: stormtroopers something called Twilex Twilex. I'm not familiar with the
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: Star Wars creature, Boba Fetts. You think they would have
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  Speaker 2: given them more risque names. The image associated with the
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  Speaker 2: ad featured a very sexy job of the hut being
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  Speaker 2: quite risque.
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  Speaker 1: Risque.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, what has this to do with the episode,
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  Speaker 2: you might ask this.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, nothing, It has nothing to do with it other
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  Speaker 1: than us sharing the specific types of targeted ads are
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  Speaker 1: paled max is getting.
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  Speaker 2: I thought the Star Wars universe has bad candy made
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  Speaker 2: from that blue milk. Perhaps, well, the Tutsi role everybody
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  Speaker 2: in the West recognizes it. When it started it solved
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  Speaker 2: to problems. It didn't melt, and it was individually wrapped.
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  Speaker 2: And this was a huge, huge deal because if you
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  Speaker 2: are a Wonka esque or Charlie and the chocolate factory
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  Speaker 2: esque candy man shout out to the candyman, can would
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  Speaker 2: you would try to sell a lot of candy, and
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: a lot of your candy was very temperature sensitive. So
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: a hot summer, when most people are going to be
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  Speaker 2: out perhaps impulsively buying candy a hot summer can be
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  Speaker 2: dangerous for things like marshmallows, which are also trash. Chocolate
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  Speaker 2: also has a problem just chemically. In very hot weather,
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  Speaker 2: it can turn into a sticky mass, the texture can change.
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  Speaker 2: So Samira Kawash, who also authored a history of candy,
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  Speaker 2: puts it this way. The genius of Tutsi roll was
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  Speaker 2: to create a summer candy that was a flavor never
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  Speaker 2: before seen in summer candies, the flavor of chocolate, because
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  Speaker 2: you just couldn't get it at that time. Yeah, I
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  Speaker 2: guess that's sort of chocolate, the way like diet coke
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: tastes like coke. I mean, it doesn't taste like diety.
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  Speaker 2: It's definitely sweet, but it's I don't know, I wouldn't
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  Speaker 2: describe it as being particularly accurate in its chocolate flavor.
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  Speaker 1: A third advantage is that it was really affordable, right,
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  Speaker 1: This is kind of like penny candy.
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  Speaker 2: That's right. And then enter let's combine two things that
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  Speaker 2: people apparently love at the time, which is this this
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  Speaker 2: sutsy role and a lollipop. Boom bang bam, you got
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: yourself a Tutsi pop? How many licks does it take
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: to get to the center? The world may never know?
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: Ask mister Awl. You guys remember that classic ad. They
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  Speaker 2: played it well into the nineties. This is the same one,
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  Speaker 2: which I really respect, you know, because again they're playing
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  Speaker 2: on the nostalgia and they know their brand.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, how many licks does it take to get to
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  Speaker 1: the center of a Tutsi pop? A question that I
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: think there was actually a one or two scientific endeavors
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: to find the answer, which we're not going to quote today,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: but let us know how many licks it takes you.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: This is where the war comes in that Max teased
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: Sue Astuteley. So the Tutsi pop comes along in the
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: nineteen thirties. It is a It's one of the candies
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  Speaker 1: that succeeds during the Great Depression, and when the US
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: goes to World War Two, the Tutsi role goes along
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  Speaker 1: as well. I want to shout out our earlier episode
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  Speaker 1: on chocolate science in war, which was pretty much banger.
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  Speaker 1: So the Tutsi role is associated with wartime rationing and
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  Speaker 1: the depression in some form and after the war. Now
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: as veterans are returning to the US, it becomes even
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  Speaker 1: more popular because now it is hitting that nostalgia switch.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: Have you guys seen the Japanese anime film Grave of
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: the Fireflies. Yes, it's a very harrowing tale, as you
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: guys know, anyone out there the audience who hasn't seen it,
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: very harrowing World War two tail told from the perspective
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: of a young boy and his sister who are kind
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: of traversing the nuclear decimated wasteland of Japan. And there
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: is a candy tie in. It's basically a ration type candy.
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: They're called Sakuma drops, and it's a really tragic thing
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: where they end up starving and all they have are
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: these little kind of hard candy drops. And you can
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: still buy these if you go to a grocery like
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: a Japanese or Asian market and they're branded with Grave
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: of the Firefly's imagery, which I think is the weirdest
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: branding tie in because it is a plot point in
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: the movie that will break your heart and it comes
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: in this like ten you know, And I actually have
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: one that I just keep on my mantle as like
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: a little curio or whatever. But I just thought that
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: was such an odd choice to tie in such a
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: depressing film to your brand.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Nostalgia is I guess that drug? Yeah, yeah, that's true.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: And right now again, according to that awesome article, Tutsi
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: Rules were WW two energy bars from Kat Eshner. According
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: to that article, which is pretty recent from twenty seventeen,
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: right now, thirteen point eight percent of Americans hate Tutsi roles,
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: or I should say they did in twenty seventeen. So
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: is the candy still popular?
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: I would say yes, Ben weren't there at the time.
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: Maybe I'm misremembering, but like some of those ration kind
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: of mre situations, didn't they sometimes include a little Tutsi role.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because they stayed fresh.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: They stayed fresh, and they're calorically dense, like we were
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: talking on our other show, stuff that I want you
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: to know about. Or maybe it wasn't on the show,
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: but it was a conversation we were having with a
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: co host, Matt that in a apocalyptic or you know
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: what's the word kind of bunker type situation, peanut butter
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: is really great to have because of its caloric density.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: So the same deal with this stuff. And it also
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: keeps packs a lot of punch colorically into a little
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: tiny wax paper package.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and if you go on the tutsi roll website today,
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: according to mashed dot com, you will find that there
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: are sixty four million tiny little tutsi rolls reduced every
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: single day. They also walk through some pretty interesting statistics, right,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: so let's.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: Break down the math. The company produced sixty four million
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: candies a day, which averages to forty four four hundred
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: and forty every minute, seven hundred and forty every second.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: Kind of mind boggling. I'd love to see how it's
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: made about the tutsi roll process because, like, you know,
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: just how how did they get each one wrapped so perfectly?
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: They must have a machine that twists the ends like that.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: I'd love to see that assembly line in action. Massive scale.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: Can only imagine.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, seven hundred and forty separate individually wrapped tutsi rolls
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: every second. I guess it takes the longer to wrap them.
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: It must ben, do you think, And I guess you
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: know what, I bet. I bet they're created as giant
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: logs that are then cut chopped, you know, like by
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: some massive machine, like all at the same time. But
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: do you think that it's tutsi rolls that are kind
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: of responsible for the individually packaged candy craze? Because there
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: are some individually packaged candies that are so small, like egregious,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: you know, like gummies. You can find now that each
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: little tiny gummy has its own little plastic packaging.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: You know, I would kind of like to do an
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: episode about packaging. It's just such a it's a fascinating thing.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: It may be its own podcast, sure, but tutsi roles,
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: at least in the West, were pretty early into the
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: individually packaged concept, you know. And now there's what a
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: estimated twenty three billion tutsi rolls made a year individually packaged.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: Is pretty wild, and you know, interesting news for the
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: slightly less than fourteen percent of Americans who don't care
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: for tutsi roles. Other people like them very positive about it.
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: I'm one of those people, you know, if I don't know, man,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: candy is so weird, like we have.
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: Can I make something?
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: I actually like tutsi rolls. I'll put them in here first.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: One on the write up.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: I like it's nostalgia though, because you know, if you
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: grow up in like a public school environment, toutsi rolls
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: often end up being something you get on like Valentine's Day,
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: teachers give them his treats and so on.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: I really like Bito Honey, which has a very similar
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: texture to tutsi rolls, but a lovely honey nut kind
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: of flavor. So to me, it's not the texture that
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: Touzzy rolls that throws me off. It's just the kind
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: of faux chocolate flavor of it, but love a Bido honey.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: Also there's another what was it called like something Jane
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: Mary Jane's. That's another like nostalgia candy that's very similar
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: to Bito Honey.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: There was one I still remember. Oh. It was like,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: oh gosh, it's going to come back to me at
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: the weirdest moment. It's not a butterfinger, but it was
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: like it came on a stick and it was like
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: a little chocolatey caramel e.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: Turd I was talking about. It was something daddy, sugar daddy,
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: sugar daddy, because then there's sugar babies and that was related.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: But the sugar daddy comes on a stick.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: What's your opinion on candy corn, you guys.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: Oh god, I hope we're aligned on this. I just
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: think it's the devil's candy.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: You're probably familiar with candy corn folks. It's the thing
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: that looks like little loose.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: Teeth get of sugar, exactly, a little loose vampire fangs,
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: kind of with a orange and red and white. Maybe
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: not red, but there's three colors. Maybe it goes orange, white, orange,
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: but definitely got a repeating pattern and of course a
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: fun way to make variations. Because there are some festive
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: looking candy corns. I put them in the same category
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: as those weird little pumpkin things. They just taste like
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: sugary wax to me and just get stuck in your teeth.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: Once again. I think they're cute for decoration, though, you know,
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: to fill out perhaps a bit of a Halloween cornucopia spread,
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: or to the point made here in the research document,
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: Thanksgiving cornucopia spread of candy, although we don't really associate
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: Thanksgiving with candy as much as we do with like
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: gluttony and pies.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: And it's actually it's tough to it's tough to find
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: the providence where the ultimate origin story of candy corn.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: But from what we know it came around sometime in
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: the eighteen seventies eighteen eighties. The technology to make this
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: kind of stuff, I would argue, was already sort of
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: descending from things like marzipan, right where you use an
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: almond paste to create different shapes. Companies at this time
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: were all about taking conventional, easily accessible agricultural products and
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: using them as a flavor. I wouldn't even say a
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: flavor base, a flavor inspiration for different things. They would
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: they would shape like chestnut candy is still pretty popular
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: in different.
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: Nuts to the worst nut candy. Oh, yeah, you know what,
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: maybe I have seen we were talking earlier about the
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: various varieties of Japanese kit cat. I want to say
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: I've seen a chestnut flavored kit cat, you know, at
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: Super h Mart before.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: But I could probably you've probably seen it. Yeah, chestnut
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: flavor for different things is pretty popular in East Asia?
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: Got it? And I gotta say, just putting it out there,
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: I'm a big Marzapan fan, but for me, that's its
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: own kind of nostalgia because, as you all know, I
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: was once a small German boy and Marzapan is huge
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: in Germany. There was a candy that my parents would
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: give me for Christmas in my stocking every year called
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: Mozart Cougod and their chocolated in case balls of Marsupan
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: with kind of like a liquor y kind of chocolate filling.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: I guess they cook it off, but I remember them
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: tasting quite boozy. But it was sort of a tradition
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: that I would get Mozart Coogan in my stocking every year.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: And Becky Little, writing for history dot Com with the
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: article who Invented Candycorn dives into this strange, somewhat obscure
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: origin story. She posits that a guy named George Renneger
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: worked at a place called the Vnderlay Candy Company, and
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: he is generally going to be cited as the creator
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: of candycorn because while he was working at this company,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: Thunderley became the first outfit to sell this stuff. And
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: just to be clear, everybody, candy corn is mainly sugar
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: and corn syrup. You know what I mean.
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: You know, it's interesting. I was just looking at Yes,
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: I was just looking to go back a little further,
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: wondering like, what was the first documented suite and it
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: actually zembles a lot of the kinds of candies we're
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: talking about today. It was, of course the ancient Egyptians
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: as well as folks in the Middle East and in China,
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: where they combined fruits and nuts, often caramelizing them inside honey.
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: And you know, they also created early versions of licorice
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: and kind of ginger candies. But we do see things
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: that are very that kind of almost preserved, you know,
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: chunky stuff within a kind of you know, medium of
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: sort of honeyed kind of gooiness. So not not like
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: candy corn, a little more like the bido honey and
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: the tussy rolls that we're talking about, or even things
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: like fruitcake. But I digress. I just wanted to quickly
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: just take us into the past.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: However, it was the Golitz Candy Company now going by
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: the name Jelly Belly Candy Company. Ah, they made candy
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: corn successful. They hit the economy of scale in eighteen
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: ninety eight. They snagged the recipe and they started selling
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: these little you know, sugar and corn syrup burst of
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: a burst of sweet as a candy that they originally
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: called chicken feed. But it makes sense. It makes sense
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: at the time because many more people were part of
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: the agricultural industry. So it's kind of like how you
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: will sell pretend kitchen goods to children. You know, you're
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: oshkosh b gosh toast raven and so on.
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: Easy bake oven and all that. Right, right, So fast
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: forward a little bit to the early nineteen hundreds when
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: candy corner really took off because much like the humble Titzzerole,
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: it was very very cheap to buy and to produce
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: and was another member of the family we know as
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Penny candy. And I don't know if y'all remember, I'm
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: sure you do, the idea of a penny lick when
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: we refer when we did a history of ice cream
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: or frozen treats, that you would like it would be
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: a kind of a community spoon you'd play, you pay
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: a penny and you'd get a lick of the spoon,
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: or it was like a shared popsicle or something. And
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: I believe it actually spread disease pretty significantly back in
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: the heyday of the penny lick.
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it was a glass. People had, like a couple
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: of glasses. So after you were done licking all the
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: ice cream out of it, Yes, they dunked it in water.
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: Put you know more, I can give it to somebody.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: Else, similar to how lemonade or dairy would be served
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: from a cup that was reused. There were definitely vectors
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: for infection. There was a thing that happened that was
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: very good for candy corn, and it was the evolution
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: of Halloween the way it's currently celebrated in the United States.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: As as candy becomes increasingly associated with Halloween in the
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: nineteen fifties, candy corn, I would argue, also, tutsi rolls
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: increasingly become a convenient giveaway candy for Halloween. But it
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: may be a chicken feed versus the egg.
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: A Yes, I like a robin egg that's sort of
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: like just a multicolored whopper. Really, I go, that doesn't
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: have chocolate on the outset. It's more of a thin
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: candy shell. But yeah, According to Samara Kuwash in her
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: book on the History of Candy, there's a quote here
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: There was a dramatic spike in October advertising of candy
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: corn starting in the late nineteen fifties, which began to
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: really cement the candy as being associated with Halloween. I
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: don't know. I guess it makes sense because of fall
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: kind of stuff and like corn mazes and you know,
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: scarecrows and all of that. So I guess it was
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: a convenient tie in, even if it wasn't necessarily envisioned
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: that way in the first place. Right for sure.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's something a tumnul about it. That's always been
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: an association with candy corn, and go like staying with
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: little here for a moment, Little notes. The National Confectioners
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: Association estimates more than thirty five million pounds of this
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: candy candy corn are sold every year. The sales do
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: seem to be pretty seasonal. It's most popular in October,
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: but you can also get candy corn any old time
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: of the year, even on February twenty ninth, even on
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: what was that month that got put in and taken
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: out Mercediusdonia, Mercedonius. Even on Mercedonius, if they bring Mercedonius back,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: you can get candy corn.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: That's right then it's still sold in bulk, you know,
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: giant bulky bags. Max found a fun little article from
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: Pinterest on the proper way to eat candy corn. It
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: starts with open bag, pour candy into trash, eat Arese's
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: peanut butter cup, and I couldn't agree more. And you know,
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: and to your point better about how this stuff is
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: still around. There is even a special day designated for
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: those who love candy corn. It is October thirtieth National
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: Candy Corn Day. Seem Live is a national day for
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: just about everything.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but not almond joys. Hold the phote or
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: hold the Halloween bag. This turned into a two parter
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: because it turns out, as we said at the top,
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: Noel Max, we have a lot of opinions about candy.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: It does seem to get people's danders up. Yeah, people
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: have hot takes on candy and we are right there
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: with you. So join us for part two coming up
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: this very week.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: Big big thanks to super producer research associate mister Max Williams.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: Big thanks to Alex Williams, the composer of this track.
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: And then who else? How do we want to reference
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland today?
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: Oh geeze what did you say earlier? Max, He's like
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: the Grimace of the of the Ridiculous Universe. He's a
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: human taste Bud.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: The circus peanut of our hearts.
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: Perhaps I don't hate a circus peanut.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: No, no, you know, I mean because it's like a
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: marshmallow basis.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: It's the little marshmallow. You know what I really like, guys,
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: my favorite candy of all various gummies, specifically the ones
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: that have like that are shaped like animals and have
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: little marshmallowy tummies, like the gummy sharks or gummy frogs.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: I love. I love a good gummy and love it
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: so much. Fellow Ridiculous Historians that you have tuned in
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: with us, please join us later this week when we
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: dive into part two of Strange Halloween Candy. I don't
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: even want to call it awful, you know, I don't
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: want to go.
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: Oh, strange is good. Yeah, and uh, we'll see a
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: nice time Fox. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or where ever you listen to
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: your favorite shows.