Tags: Lancaster PA
Hershey Chocolate Company: 1894-1900
Inspired by chocolate-making machinery he saw at the 1893 World’s Exposition in Chicago, Milton Hershey returned to Lancaster and began experimenting with making chocolate. In 1894, he established the Hershey Chocolate Company and was soon producing over 100 varieties of “sweet chocolate” novelties, bite-size chocolates produced in a variety of shapes and sizes. The term […]
HersheyArchives@30, Part 4: Selling the Lancaster Caramel Company
What’s the story behind this American Caramel Company stock certificate? Milton Hershey’s caramel business was called the Lancaster Caramel Company. So why did Milton Hershey own stock in a rival company? The Lancaster Caramel Company dominated the United States confectionery market. Lancaster Caramel products were distributed nationally and internationally. Even though Lancaster Caramel Company dominated the […]
HersheyArchives@30, Part 3: “I am going to make chocolate.”
Milton Hershey made his fortune with caramels but he made history with chocolate. In 1893, while attending the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Hershey told Frank Snavely, “Caramels are a fad but chocolate is permanent. I am going to make chocolate.” Milton Hershey was a reader of newspapers and an astute businessman. The increasing demand for […]
Home, Sweet Home
Milton Hershey’s rise from poverty to wealth, after he returned to Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1886, was almost meteoric. Just five years after he had returned to Lancaster, basically penniless, to establish the Lancaster Caramel Company, he was emerging as one of the city’s most successful businessmen. In 1891 Milton Hershey was invited to join the Hamilton Club, a […]
Hershey Chocolate Company: On the Road
In February 1900, some months before the sale of the Lancaster Caramel Company, Milton Hershey brought the first automobile to Lancaster, and used it to advertise his product. The arrival of the machine was announced in the Lancaster New Era, February 13, 1900: The Hershey Chocolate Company will have the distinction of having introduced the automobile into Lancaster, […]
Learning a Trade
Many of us are not familiar with the story of Milton Hershey’s youth; before his financial success. This Milton Hershey was the teenager who first discovered his gift for candy-making at Royer’s Ice Cream Parlor and Garden, Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Milton Hershey’s first job was not as a confectioner but as a printer’s devil in 1871 for a […]
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