Wednesday, May 6, 2015

WONDER BREAD TURNS 94!


by Ramona K. Cecil
                                                                                                                                                   
I’m of the Howdy Doody generation. If you’re too young to remember Howdy Doody, it was a TV puppet show for children in the 1950s. One of the main sponsors of the show was Wonder Bread with it’s iconic package sporting colorful red, yellow, and blue balloons. I remember those ads very well. What I didn’t know as a kid watching them was that the bread being touted by Howdy Doody and his pal Buffalo Bob Smith, actually got its start in my home state of Indiana.

This month, Wonder Bread turn 94 years old! It was introduced by the Taggart Baking Company of Indianapolis, Indiana, on May 21st, 1921. Leading up to the bread’s launch, the baking company enticed the public with a promotional ad campaign arguably as intriguing as any Apple Computer has put forth in recent years with the tantalizing promise, “Wonder is coming May 21st!”   

Are you “wondering” how the bread got the name “Wonder,” I wonder, with tongue placed firmly in cheek? The brand name was the brain child of Elmer Cline, the baking company’s vice president charged with naming the new product. Cline had witnessed the International Balloon Race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and was filled with “wonder” at the sight of the many colorful balloons rising skyward. The red, yellow, and blue balloon logo on the bread’s packaging pays homage to the event that inspired the product’s name.
 

Balloon Race at Indianapolis Speedway 1909


When the bread hit the stores, Cline and his marketing department continued their genius ad promotion. They sent out company trucks filled with colorful helium-filled balloons and handed the balloons out to kids with a note advertising Wonder Bread to take to their mothers. It worked. Soon, Wonder Bread outsold all other bread brands in Indianapolis. Over the years the company continued to target their youngest customers through promotions like games and magic tricks on the bread’s package as well as sponsoring radio and TV programs for kids like Howdy Doody and personalities like sports heroes and cartoon characters.





 

In 1925, Continental Baking Company bought Taggart and Wonder Bread went national.

In 1928, a bread-slicing machine invented by an Iowan named Otto Frederick Rohwedder completely revolutionized commercial bread baking. Wonder Bread was one of the first to adopt the technology and began selling pre-sliced bread nationwide in 1930. At first the public was skeptical, wary that pre-slicing would cause the bread to be stale. Ultimately, however, fears about less than fresh-tasting bread proved unfounded and the public went wild for the uniformly pre-sliced product. Wonder Bread rode the wave of  public enthusiasm over the new technology and helped to coin the phrase “The best thing since sliced bread.”

Wonder Bread had a bakery pavilion at the 1939 New York World's Fair, advertising Wonder as the only bread baked at the world's fair.

 With the outbreak of WWII metals required to produce bread slicing machines were needed for the war effort, so, for much of the 1940s, Wonder Bread returned to selling their product unsliced. Despite what might have been viewed as a step backwards, Wonder Bread was quietly making new leaps forward. It was during this time that Wonder Bread was on the forefront of a government supported initiative to eliminate diseases like beriberi and pellagra by enriching commercially sold white bread with vitamins and minerals. Known as the “quiet miracle,” this innovation helped to improve the health of millions of people nationwide and was touted in Wonder Bread’s slogan, “Helps build strong bodies 12 ways.”  It was also during this period that Wonder Bread revolutionized commercial bread-baking with a new process that eliminated holes in the bread.

 

Continuing to innovate, Wonder introduced nutritional information and open-dating to their packaging in the 1970s and, in the mid 1980s, brought a reduced-calorie Wonder Bread to a more health-conscious public.


In 1995 Interstate Brands bought the Continental Baking Company and the Wonder Bread brand. Six years later, in 2001, the company honored Wonder Bread’s 80th birthday with a hot air balloon tour of the country, reminding folks about how the famous bread got its name.




















Today, Wonder Bread is part of Flowers Foods.
Flowers Foods markets baked foods under such brands as Nature's Own and Whitewheat.


Back in the 1950s as I sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the TV set, singing along with the Howdy Doody theme song between bites of a peanut butter sandwich, would I have cared if I knew that the bread I was eating got its start in Indiana? I doubt it. But today, I say “Happy birthday, Wonder Bread! One of Indiana’s own.

Do you have a special childhood memory of Wonder Bread? I’d love to hear it!




Ramona K. Cecil is a poet and award-winning author of historical fiction for the Christian market. A proud Hoosier, she often sets her stories in her home state of Indiana.


Check out her website at www.ramonakcecil.com


15 comments:

  1. Oh, I love this post, Ramona. I'm pretty sure I had peanut-butter and homemade, strawberry jelly sandwiches everyday from kindergarten through eighth grade. As a "grown-up", I don't think I've had a white bread sandwich in twenty years. I may have to take a walk down memory lane and get some Wonder bread. Thank you for a great post.

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  2. Hi, Michele! I'm glad you enjoyed the post. I'm sure it has been at least twenty years and probably more since I've eaten white bread. I can still remember the aroma of it when I opened my school lunch box. :-) Thanks for stopping by and joining me in this little stroll down memory lane.

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  3. We used to have a Wonder Bread factory near our old house. I can remember driving by and breathing in the wonderful aroma of freshly baked bread. It's such a delicious smell.

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    1. Hi, Vickie! What a great memory! I'll bet you had the best smelling neighborhood in your town! :-) Thanks for stopping by!

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  4. I enjoyed your research on Wonder Bread and I remember it well. Being an MK I did not eat any till I came to US on furlough. It was incredible that we enjoyed it so much when we were used to home baked bread in Nigeria.
    Thanks for your post. Yea for Indiana! sm wileygreen1(at)yahoo(dot)com

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    1. Hi, Sharon! Funny how something locals take for granted can seem exotic to a newcomer to this country. I'm glad you enjoyed the post and the memory.

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  5. I remember my brother smashing his bread and rolling it into the size of a large marble. He ate it then, but it doesn't sound appetizing.

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    1. LOL Love that, Terri! No, that doesn't sound appetizing to me either. Amazing what an adventurous boy can do with a slice of white bread. :-) Thanks for stopping by and sharing your memory.

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  6. What a fun memory, Ramona. My sister and I used to take the slice of white bread and squish it into a little ball of dough and eat it, just like Terri mentioned. We loved it. Thanks for sharing.

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    1. Hi, Nancy! Thanks for stopping by. I must have missed out on the bread-ball eating trend as a kid. Glad my post revived a fond childhood memory. :-)

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  7. Ramona, my husband and I were just discussing old slogans yesterday and Wonder Bread came up. We didn't know that it was balloons on the bag. We thought they were just circles. Of course, where I grew up, Sunbeam Bread was the one to buy. Did you ever hear of it? Used to enjoy the smell as we drove past too. But no white bread for me anymore.

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    1. Hi, Marilyn! Yes, I have heard of Sunbeam bread. I'm thinking it was sold more in the South? Not sure. I first heard the colored "dots" on the Wonder Bread package called "balloons" on the 1960s Annie Oakley TV show. The gal playing Annie would advertise the bread in the commercial break, always finishing with "Look for the package with the red, yellow, and blue balloons."

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  8. Hi Ramona! I can remember going to tour a Wonder Bread factory when I was a Girl Scout. Of course, it smelled wonderful and at the end of the tour they presented each one of us with a very small mini loaf of bread. Yum!!!!!

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  9. Hi, Melanie! What a great, and yummy memory! I'll bet your scout troupe loved that tour! Thanks for sharing it. :-)

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  10. Thanks for this post, Ramona. I love hearing the stories behind successful (and not-so successful) marketing.

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