WASHINGTON (TND) — Mars, Inc. has introduced a new purple
character to its lineup of M&M’s, but not a new purple color of
the popular chocolate candy.

Aptly named "Purple," the new female character is coming
aboard to help the company "represent acceptance and
inclusivity," according to a news release.

It’s M&M’s first new character in a decade. The company said
Purple’s confidence, "keen self-awareness," and authenticity
give the character a "quirky nature."

Franklin Clarence Mars (1883 – 1934)

Franklin C. Mars started the Mars Candy
Factory in 1911 with Ethel V. Mars, his
second wife, in Tacoma, Washington.

By 1920, Mars had returned to his home
state, Minnesota, where the earliest
incarnation of the present day Mars
company was founded that year as
Mar-O-Bar Co., in Minneapolis and later
incorporated there as Mars, Incorporated.

Milton Snavely Hershey
(September 13, 1857 – October 13, 1945)

Milton Snavely Hershey, a German-speaking Mennonite
farmer who turned his passion for confections into a
symbol of American affluence and goodwill, was born
in Derry Township, Penn. 

"Milton Hershey was the rarest of men — both a dreamer
and a builder," notes his biography at the Candy Hall of
Fame, into which the chocolatier was inducted in 1972.

He founded both the Hershey Chocolate Co. and the
Milton Hershey School.

The school, which he opened in 1910 to educate orphans,
thrives today as a prominent free educational institution
serving underprivileged students.

The Hershey Company, known as Hershey’s, is one of
the world’s biggest confectionery manufacturers.

Tootsie Roll is a chocolate-flavored taffy-like candy that has been manufactured in the United States since 1907. The candy has
qualities similar to both caramels and taffy without being exactly
either confection. The manufacturer, Tootsie Roll Industries, is
based in Chicago, Illinois. It was the first penny candy to be
individually wrapped in America. (From Wikipedia)

Founder

To honor the iconic candy brand’s 90th anniversary, the brains behind
Snickers decided, hey, what better way to celebrate that than with a
4,700-pound candy bar? Someone in the room then likely said, “There
is no better way!” and thus the “largest Snickers bar ever created” was
born.

The bar reportedly took more than 600 people to construct and used
caramel, peanuts, nougat and 3,500 pounds of chocolate to create the
“equivalent to more than 41,000 single-size Snickers bars.”

Construction of the large bar (above) that will be a tease to
the Snickers commercial that will be played during the
Super Bowl on Feb. 2.  

.

(FoxNews) – Before it was known as “candy corn” — and more than a
hundred years before it was crowned the “worst” Halloween candy in
a 2019 poll — the triangular, tri-colored treat went by a much different,
less-alliterative name.

The original recipe for what’s now known as “candy corn” is said to
have been invented sometime in the 1880s, according to popular belief,
by an employee of the Wunderle Candy Company. (The Wunderle Candy
Company puts the exact date at 1888, and says an employee named
George Renninger came up with the idea.)

Wunderle wasn’t the only company to hop on the candy corn craze. The
Goelitz Candy Company — which later became Jelly Belly — began
producing the treats by the turn of the 20th century, marketing them 
under the name “Chicken Feed,” according to a 2015 report published
in National Geographic.

The 1898 packaging design for Goelitz Candy Corn.  (Jelly Bean)