On
February 23, 1896 Austrian immigrant
Leo Hirshfield introduced the candy
that would probably result in more emergency trips to the dentist than any
other, the Tootsie Roll, at his New York City sweets shop. He named
the confection in honor of his daughter Clara,
aka “Tootsie” and not, as urban legend would have it, because of some bizarre
foot fetish.
Prior
to its introduction most Americans
seldom had any kind of chocolate candy because milk chocolate and dark
chocolate were inherently unstable, prone to crystallizing over time if they
did not melt. Bon-bons were the treats
of the rich and spoiled. Most folks got
their chocolate fix as the Aztecs
did, by drinking cocoa and their sweet tooth satisfied by hard penny candies.
By
mixing the cocoa powder with a caramel like syrup base, boiling it down and
rolling it into a bar, Hirshfield created a cheap, lasting and portable
treat.
It
wasn’t until Milton Hershey devised
a process to stabilize milk chocolate a few years later that he had to compete
with widely available chocolate candy.
In
1931 the company introduced the Tootsie
Pop, cheap treat just the ticket for Depression
era cash strapped customers. The
durability of the original Tootsie Roll caused it to be included in the rations
of World War II GIs.
Today,
faced with competition from endless chocolate bars, the full size Tootsie Roll
has faded from many candy counters. But
the personal size and mini versions
in bags are ubiquitous as inexpensive Halloween
candy and for kid’s birthday party treat bags.
And they will still pull a filling out of a molar in a heartbeat.
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