Lollipops!

Another cold day in Montana and once again people venture to the mall. Today at Glacier Candy the big hit was Lollipops. There are many stories about how the lollipop was invented. Some believe that a form of it has been around since the
1800's Charles Dickens and other authors referred to a sweet lozenge without a stick in some stories. During the Civil War, it is believed that little pieces of hard candy were put on the ends of pencils for children to nibble. In 1908, George Smith claimed to be the first to invent the modern lollipop. Smith applied an idea of putting hard candies on a stick to make them easier to eat. He decided to name the treat after his favorite racing horse, Lolly Pop, and later trademarked the name. Lollipops were successful until the Depression. Smith stopped production on lollipops and the name fell into public domain. A Racine, Wis., manufacturing company claims credit for inventing the first lollipop machine. Racine Confectioners Machinery Co. answered an East Coast candy maker’s call to have a machine make hard candy on a stick in 1908. The company created a machine that automated the lollipop making process and could make 40 lollipops per minute. However, others claim Samuel Born was the first to automate the lollipop-making process. Lollipop manufacturing grew independently in California and in 1916 Samuel Born invented the Born Sucker machine. This machine automatically inserted the stick, which added to the popularity of the confection. San Francisco awarded Born the keys to the city for his invention. Over time, lollipops have had different looks. They have been traditional hard candy on a stick and hard candy on a ring, some include bubble gum or chocolate as a surprise center and some even spin or glow. Whether traditional or novel, the lollipop is still enjoyed by many people.

Fun Facts:
~The world’s largest lollipop was certified on June 25, 2002. It weighed 4,031 lbs (with stick), measured 18.9 inches thick and was more than 15 feet tall with stick (about as tall a a giraffe). It was Cherry Falvored.
~The word lollipop is used in many different songs including Lollipop Guild featured in the movie The Wizard of Oz, the Chordettes Lollipop and The Good Ship Lollipop from a 1934 Shirley Temple movie called Bright Eyes
~National Lollipop day is celebrated on July 20th
~The original lollipop machines made 40 lollipops in one minute. At that rate it would take 592 days to make enough lollipops to cover the 2,153 miles between Sugar Hill, Ga. and Sugar City, Idaho. Today’s machines produce 5,900 lollipops per minute and would take only four days to make the 34,103,520 lollipops needed to stretch the distance between the two cities.

Until tomorrow,
Amanda & Kristina