It was an ordinary day. Thought I would write about a few favorite treats that everyone enjoys. For me, the small, cardboard boxed J&J Pie, which I first discovered on the island of Turks & Caicos, would have to be my favorite. After buying a few of the pies at a grocery store on the island of Turks & Caicos, I read the information on the box and found they were made in Erie, Pennsylvania. When I returned home I emailed them asking where I can buy them in Lancaster, PA and found that the Scheetz Gas Station Chain sells them in Lancaster. When I needed gas I made sure to go to Sheetz to fill up with both gas and pies. Today I stopped at a local Turkey Hill Dairy to gas up and get milk and found the pie treat on their shelves. It's a shorter trip so now I can get gas, pies and milk all at one time. Life is Good! Now, not everyone likes the pies, so I began researching and found that popcorn is the world's most versatile and favorite snack. Guess they never had a J&J pie! Popcorn can be dressed up with cheese, caramel, butter, salt or any number of special toppings. But, my pie can be dressed up with whipped cream or even ice cream. Not sure who was responsible for the pies I enjoy, but as far as popcorn is concerned, Orville Clarence Redenbacher was the American businessman most often associated with the brand of popcorn that bears his name.
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| Mr. Orville Clarence Redenbacher |
The New York Times called him "the agricultural visionary who all but single-handedly revolutionized the American popcorn industry." He was born in Brazil, Indiana on July 16, 1907 and grew up on his family's farm where he sometimes sold popcorn from the back of his car.
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| A younger photo of Mr. Redenbacher |
He graduated from high school in 1924 in the top 5% of his class and then attended Purdue University where he was part of the agriculture-oriented Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity, played tuba in the school band and joined the track team. He graduated with a degree in agronomy in 1928. He began his career selling fertilizer, but spent his spare time working with popcorn. Twenty-three years later he and his business partner bought the George F. Chester and Son seed corn plant in Boone Grove, Indiana. They named their new business "Chester Hybrids" and tried thousands of hybrid strains of popcorn before settling on a hybrid they named "RedBow." A very smart advertising agency told them to use "Orville Redenbacher" as the brand name for their new popping corn in 1970. Six years later they sold the company to Hunt-Wesson Foods. Over the next couple of years the business changed owners and names until in 1990 the popcorn business was sold to agribusiness giant ConAgra. Years before, in 1973, Redenbacher appeared on TV's "To Tell the Truth" game show and by the mid-1970's Redenbacher and Bowman had over 1/3 of the popcorn market. Orville became the company's official spokesman wearing his trademark outfit of horn-rimmed glasses and a bow tie. He began to appear in TV commercials which led to customers asking him if he was a real person and not an actor. He began appearing on talk shows telling his story and telling everyone that he is a real person. He married his first wife in 1928. She died in 1971 and he remarried later that year. She died in 1991. On September 19, 1995, Redenbecher was found dead in the Jacuzzi of his condo in Coronado, California. He had suffered a heart attack and had drowned. Beginning in 2006, several of Orville's older commercials began to air on TV across America. In 2008 the advertisements featured the brand's "natural" popcorn snacks with a clip of Orville at the end of the commercial.
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| Orville with a few of his products. |
In 2007 a TV commercial aired with a digital recreation of Redenbacher. His grandson said he would have loved it and was a good way to honor his legacy. Orville Redenbacher is the popcorn name we all recognize today and the man himself is still a well-known spokesman more than 20 years after his death. One thing he always believed was that popcorn made the old-fashioned way on a stovetop tends to be far superior to popcorn made in a microwave. Funny, but the J&J pies I love taste better warmed up in a microwave. It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.
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