Planters Peanut Company was founded in 1906 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania by Amedeo Obici, and incorporated two years later as the Planters Nut and Chocolate Company. In 1916, a young schoolboy, Antonio Gentile, submitted drawings of an anthropomorphic peanut to a design contest. When his design was chosen, commercial artist Andrew S. Wallach added the monocle, top hat, and cane to create the iconic image. Gentile’s family originally received five dollars for winning the contest. Obici befriended them and paid Antonio’s, and four of his siblings’, way through college. After Obici paid Antonio’s way through medical school as well, Antonio became a doctor in Newport News, where he died of a heart attack in 1939.There is no dispute that Antonio Gentile, born August 8, 1903 in Philadelphia according to his death certificate, did drawings of a peanut with a face, arms and legs. The Suffolk News-Herald, October 18, 2013, published one such drawing and interviewed Gentile’s nephews. Gentile’s drawings were donated to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. (Gentile graduated from the University of Virginia’s Department of Medicine in 1927.)
There is a disputed claim that Frank P. Krize Sr., a Wilkes-Barre artist and head of the Suffolk plant, made the additions of the monocle, top hat, and cane. Wallach’s daughter, Virginia, maintains that Krize joined the project after Mr. Peanut was created. However, neither Planters’ history nor other sources still in circulation positively identify the artist.
Mr. Peanut was born in 1916. (Before his birth, Planters’ products were represented by a pennant.) Supposedly there was a contest to create a symbol or mascot for Planters Nut and Chocolate Company. There was no documentation of a nationwide contest which was won by Gentile. (Locally the Suffolk Herald ceased publication sometime in early 1916. The Suffolk Tri-Weekly Herald began publishing on February 9, 1916. One of these newspapers may have reported Gentile as the winner of the contest.) The credit for adding the high hat, monocle, cane and spats is unclear. In Peanuts: The Illustrious History of the Goober (2002) Andrew F. Smith said
… Planters hired a Chicago art firm, which commissioned a commercial artist named Andrew Wallach to draw several different caricatures. Obici selected the peanut person with a top hat, monocle, cane, and the look of a raffish gentleman. At least, this was the story that Planers circulated. …
Andrew Sylvester Wallach was born on August 5, 1897 in Chicago. Information about his art training has not been found. In the first half of 1916 Wallach would have been eighteen years old. In the 1916 Chicago city directory Wallach was a lithographer. He and his father, John I., were listed with the address 329 South Albany Avenue.
The 1917 directory listed Wallach, an artist, and his father at 4023 Wilcox Street.
The same address was on an advertisement in the Photo-Engravers Bulletin, December 1918. Wallach was employed at the photo-engraver Barnes-Crosby Company.
He served during World War I. Census records, from 1930 to 1950, show
Wallach as a self-employed commercial artist who lived at Oak Park then
River Forest, both in Illinois. Wallach passed away on May 3, 1969 in Wisconsin. (More about Wallach farther down.)
An article in the Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk Virginia), November 25, 1995, said Mr. Peanut was born in the Suffolk neighborhood of Hall Place.
Planters’ founder, Amedeo Obici, was profiled in the Literary Digest, March 6, 1937, which said
“As the story goes,” explains Baker Parker, a long time resident of Hall Place, “Mr. Amadeo [sic] Obici, the founder of Planters Peanuts, moved to Suffolk, and wanted a logo for the company. Well, Frank Krize came up with the idea to have a neighborhood contest.Frank Paul Krize was born on April 2, 1882 in Aldesburg, Austria. He and his family immigrated to the United States in 1911 according to the 1920 census. The Virginian-Pilot, April 10, 1957, profiled Krize on his 75th birthday.
“There was this little fellow, about 15 years old, by the name of Gentile who sent in a rough sketch to Frank who worked in the art department. Frank took it, polished and sharpened it up into the internationally-recognized Mr. Peanut that you see today.” ...
Suffolk, April 9—An Austrian-born printer who worked alongside Amedeo Obici during his early struggles has observed the 45th anniversary of his employment by Planters Nut & Chocolate Co.Census records and draft cards said Krize was a printer or employed in the printing department. Obviously he had experience handling artwork for the various product packages, promotional posters, booklets, etc. His artistic skills are unknown. Maybe he was involved with the design of the packages, labels, etc. Nonetheless, he was with Obici and Planters almost from the start and witnessed the development of Mr. Peanut. Krize passed away on August 22, 1972.
He is Frank Paul Krize, superintendent of the printing department in Planters’ Suffolk plant. Krize was honored at a banquet Saturday night by fellow employees at Planters Club who tendered congratulations on his anniversary with the company and also his 75th birthday.
Still Active
Krize, still actively in charge of the printing plant, went to work for Obici, Planters’ founder, in Wilkes-Barre not long after his arrival in this country from Austria. A mutual friend recommended him to Obici and he has been with the company ever since, without a break.
At the time Planters’ printing department consisted only of four small hand-fed presses. In 1923 the plant was moved to Suffolk and with it went the superintendent. ...
Planters’ founder, Amedeo Obici, was profiled in the Literary Digest, March 6, 1937, which said
... Obici’s accent on youth during Planters’ early history bore prompt results. The children took their free peanuts home to parents and demand for nickel packages of Pennant peanuts grew. Children not only provided Planters with increasing sales, they even gave Obici the symbol for his business, Mr. Peanut. At Suffolk, Virginia, in 1916, Obici posted a five-dollar prize, asked schoolchildren to suggest a character symbolizing his peanut business. To the winning drawing of a peanut pod embellished with legs and head, Obici added the top hat, cane and spats. Thus the peanut took on swank. Even his peanut oil, Obici has dubbed “Hi-Hat Peanut Oil.” ...
My Weekly Reader, March 29–April 2, 1937, also credited Obici for adding the hat, cane and spats.
Junior Scholastic, March 1, 1956 published the sixteen-page comic book, “The Personal Story of Mr. Peanut: Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Planters Nut & Chocolate Company”. (The artist was Vic Dowd.) On page thirteen, panel two, Obici and Mario Peruzzi study the winning drawing that included a high hat! In panel three a right-handed commercial artist added the finishes touches to Mr. Peanut. The caption read: “At Mr. Peruzzi’s suggestion, the final touches were added by an artist, and there I was...Mr. Peanut, at your service!”... In 1916, Mr. Obici gave a five-dollar prize to the school child in Suffolk who drew the best picture to use in advertising peanuts. The prize was given to a child who sent a drawing of a peanut shell with arms, legs, and a head. To this drawing, Mr. Obici added a tall silk hat, a cane, and spats. Thus the lowly peanut became a well-dressed dandy, and his picture is seen today in advertisements. ...Another publication that mentioned the contest was the National Nut News, October 1928
… This design is the one which resulted from a public school prize contest at Suffolk and the winner happened to be, like Mr. Obici, an Italian. A commercial artist added a high hat and monocle to the original to give Mr. Peanut his present distingué appearance. …
A similar story appeared in Fortune, April 1938.
... But when you think of Planters, you think, of course, of a symbol. The symbol is Mr. Peanut, the long-legged, peanut-bodied character with the stovepipe hat and monocle. He dates dates from 1916 when Mr. Obici, determined to “glorify the peanut,” launched a contest among the school children of Suffolk to find an appropriate trademark. The winning sketch was of Mr. Peanut, lacking however, the monocle and the negligently crooked leg, which was added by a commercial artist. The prize was $5. ...
Panati’s Extraordinary Origins of Everyday Things (1989) had this account:
... To publicize the lowly peanut, as well as to create a distinctive company trademark, in 1916 the two men sponsored a contest. The winning entry was a fourteen-year-old boy’s crayon drawing titled “Little Peanut Person.” It won the boy five dollars, and an in-house artist, adding a monocle, cane, and top hat, turned the cartoon into Mr. Peanut. ...The story of a local contest seems credible. Dressing up Mr. Peanut with a high hat, monocle, cane and spats was not a new idea. Smith referred to the December 1902 issue of Good Housekeeping which published the following drawing.
(The excerpt in Good Housekeeping was from the article, “The Peanut’s Many Aliases”, which appeared in the Richmond Dispatch (Virginia), July 13, 1902.)
There is another artist to consider. Elmer Cecil Stoner was born on October 20, 1897 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. The black artist was best known as a cartoonist. Stoner’s entry at Who’s Who of American Comic Books 1928–1999 said he created Mr. Peanut at age fifteen which was in 1912, four years before the contest. It was Stoner’s wife, Henrietta, who supplied the information to Who’s Who. It’s not clear who calculated Stoner’s age for creating Mr. Peanut. Stoner and his father, George, were listed at 40 Tuttle Street in the 1915 Wilkes-Barre city directory. The following year Stoner’s occupation was student. In 1917 he was a laborer.
In the 1915 and 1916 directories Obici, president of Planters Nut and Chocolate Company, resided at 15 East Market Street. The 1917 directory said his residence was Suffolk, Virginia. (In 1913 Obici purchased land in Suffolk to build a peanut cleaning factory. There he could purchase peanuts directly from the Virginia farmers.) There is the possibility of contests announced at the schools in Suffolk and Wilkes-Barre. The drawings were collected and Gentile’s artwork won. (Modern Packaging, August 1950, and The Peanut Story (1964) claimed a Wilkes-Barre commercial artist added the cane, hat and monocle to the peanut figure.) Stoner’s early art training was at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. In 1920 he was awarded second prize for his animal drawings. In 1922 Stoner moved to New York. Stoner was profiled in the Pittsburgh Courier, July 30, 1966, which made no mention of Mr. Peanut. Stoner passed away on December 15, 1969.
Mr. Peanut made his debut in June 1916 according to its trademark history. There is a timeline at USPTO.report which said the first use date was June 1916. The Classification Information at Justia Trademarks has that date. The same date was on the trademark application with a drawing of Mr. Peanut. It was filed on March 12, 1917. The drawing was registered on May 28, 1918.
Mr. Peanut made his debut in June 1916 according to its trademark history. There is a timeline at USPTO.report which said the first use date was June 1916. The Classification Information at Justia Trademarks has that date. The same date was on the trademark application with a drawing of Mr. Peanut. It was filed on March 12, 1917. The drawing was registered on May 28, 1918.
As stated earlier, Gentile was twelve years old when he submitted his peanut drawings. He turned thirteen in August which was two months after Mr. Peanut’s debut in June 1916. The creation of Mr. Peanut should be looked at from an advertising angle.
Planters’ advertising agency, Cecil Advertising Company, has been overlooked. The agency’s first advertisement, below, appeared in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, July 15, 1915.
Printers’ Ink, March 7, 1918, said
John J. Barreto, formerly with the Curtis Publishing Company [publisher of The Saturday Evening Post], at Philadelphia, has become a partner in the Cecil Advertising Company, Richmond, Va. In the future the agency will be known as Cecil, Barreto & Cecil.
An
advertisement for Cecil, Barreto & Cecil Advertising and its
clients appeared in Printers’ Ink, June 21, 1923.
A brief history of the agency was described in a 1936 issue of Tide.
Cecil, Warwick & Cecil
Back in 1915, Jim Cecil, onetime reporter for Richmond Times Dispatch, started up the Cecil Advertising Co. to service local accounts.
Shortly afterwards things began to hum: 1) Brother John H. joined up; 2) they led Planters’ Peanuts into advertising; 3) Satevepost’s John J. Barreto came in, making the name Cecil, Barreto & Cecil; 4) Nashville’s Maxwell House Coffee became a client, was built from a local product to the first national coffee brand.
Obviously on their toes, Messrs. Cecil & Barreto headed North via Baltimore, hit New York in 1922. And five years later American Lithographic’s Sales Manager Paul Warwick became a partner to replace John Barreto, then deceased some four years. Currently they’re agents for a string of accounts—State of Virginia, Jaeckel Furs, Seagram’s, Trommer’s Beer, Sherwin-Williams Paints, to name a few. ...
(The principals of the agency were James McCosh Cecil who passed away on September 17, 1954; John Joseph Barreto on January 7, 1923; John Howe Cecil on June 3, 1939; and John Paul Warwick on December 6, 1971.)
The
Cecil agency was in Richmond, Virginia, the state capitol. Cecil saw
Planters as a successful and growing regional business in Suffolk which was a small
city. (The 1920 census said Suffolk’s population was 9,123.) As early as 1915 Cecil sought Planters as a client. Cecil probably made numerous suggestions to Obici on how promote its products. One of the ideas may have been to create an easily recognizable symbol or mascot for use in advertisements and packages. The contest may very well have been Obici’s idea. To find an artist, I believe the Cecil agency, not Planters, contacted the Barnes-Crosby Company whose business was preparing artwork for print reproduction. Andrew Wallach was the employee assigned to the Mr. Peanut project. During
the first five months of 1916 Gentile’s drawings were transformed into a
character with a high hat, monocle, cane and spats. In June Mr. Peanut made his debut on a printed item.
Mr. Peanut may have appeared in the booklet, Peanuts.
The title page read, “A Little Journey Through the Virginia Peanut
Plantations, and the Factories of the Planter’s Nut and Chocolate
Company, of Suffolk, Va.” The Virginian-Pilot and the Norfolk Landmark, January 23, 1917, said
The illustrations, some of them exceedingly clever pen and ink drawings, and photographs show the various buildings of the planters, the commercial types of peanuts, and the different kinds, peanut growing, in shocks, being picked by the old style, with negro “hands,” and the new style, with the modern peanut picker, being hauled to the great cleaners, and lastly the journey of the “goobers” through the factory, where it is carefully graded by hand.Later in 1917 Planters’ advertisements appeared in selected states. Editor & Publisher, April 28, 1917, said
“Mr. Peanut,” states the booklet, “entered American society about 1869, when the first lot was cleaned and shipped to New York. In high brow circles its latin name “Arachis Hypogea” wins favor, but its democratic name, peanut, is more popular, and makes it more conspicuous on busy corners, baseball parks, amusement resorts, circuses and picnics and then by sheer merit alone we find it associated with the captains of industry among the wholesalers, and the manufacturing barons of the confectionery and peanut butter business.” “It is stated that the South has given to the world five agricultural treasures: Cotton, corn, potatoes, tobacco and peanuts.”
Interesting descriptions of the old days, when shoe families would work all day in the peanut fields, picking by hand the peanuts from the vines, and getting paid by the measure, are given in this book. The book is the work of a Suffolk man, who is considered one of the best informed “peanut” men in the business today, L. P. Jordan.
The Cecil Advertising Co., Mutual Building, Richmond, Va., is placing orders with a few newspapers in selected sections for the Planters’ Nut & Chocolate Co., “Peanut Brand Salted Peanuts,” Wilkes-Barre, Pa.Mr. Peanut was introduced in the Atlanta Journal (Georgia), April 17; the Barre Daily Times (Vermont), September 6; the Florida Metropolis and Tampa Morning Tribune (Florida), October 9.
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Below: Atlanta Journal, May 11, and Florida Times-Union, November 2.
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Below: Evening Bulletin (Rhode Island), June 8, and Norwich Bulletin (Connecticut), July 31.
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Below: Evening Bulletin (Rhode Island), July 6, and Evening Gazette (Massachusetts), September 26.
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Below: Norwich Bulletin (Connecticut), August 28.
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Below: Barre Daily Times, September 14.
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Below: Evening Gazette, October 16, and Florida Metropolis, November 20.
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Planters advertising campaign was explained in Printers’ Ink, June 21, 1917.
Peanut Packer Starts to Advertise
His Campaign a Challenge to the “Too-many-other-just-like-mine” Excuse
Peanuts at five a bag might seem a difficult article for any one concern to advertise. In the first place, the humble goober is sold so generally, and advertised so vociferously and so extensively by the corner vendor and pushcart merchant, that at first thought the idea of trying to get the public to make any distinction in the peanuts for which it gives its nickels might appear preposterous. But this is just what is being done by a certain company to-day.
The Planters’ Nut & Chocolate Co., of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., has just started an advertising campaign in the New England states for its Pennant salted peanuts. This campaign grew out of an ineffectual attempt by a group of peanut cleaners and shellers to put on foot a movement to advertise peanuts as a food. In this effort the Planters company was a prime mover and, nothing daunted by the outcome, it finally brought its own proposition to a position where it could start a try-out campaign on its own hook to test the possibility of advertising so anonymous and so easily substituted an article as salted peanuts.
The obvious difficulty in the way of a national business on salted peanuts is the package. The product soon spoils if exposed to air, or if insufficiently protected. Until recently efforts to sell salted peanuts in packages resulted in an article retailing for ten cents, with little protection for the product. For general distribution and quick turn-over this price alone seemed impracticable, and on this problem the Planters company concentrated its attention until it devised the following plan, which laid the way for advertising.
The peanuts are now sold to the retail dealer in air-tight tin cans, weighing ten pounds. In the top of the can come packed ninety Pennant peanut bags, made of glassine paper. Each tin contains also a measure, and there are just enough peanuts in the tin to fill the ninety bags, at five cents apiece. The glassine bags have the brand name displayed on a pennant. While this plan did not prevent substitution entirely, at least it did insure the peanuts being always fresh, and made it possible to sell the package for a nickel.
The only weak link in the chain, as explained by J. M. Cecil, the agent handling the account, was the loop-hole left for substitution by the dealer because the public as a whole did not know that Pennant peanuts must necessarily be sold in Pennant peanut bags.
“You can see that the unscrupulous dealer was able to fill the request for Pennant peanuts with any peanut in any blank glassine bag he might choose,” said Mr. Cecil. “We first interested the Planters in advertising as a means to curb substitution, making the point that advertising would educate the public to expect Pennant peanuts in the Pennant bag, and would make the unscrupulous dealer fear to attempt substitution.
“At the time this campaign was first broached, the Planters had a splendid distribution, and a crackerjack sales force. The sales force took to the advertising idea warmly, and has been using the advertising to the utmost. The confectionery trade, as you probably know is done primarily through confectionery jobbers with the assistance of missionary men from the house working directly on the retail trade. The bulk of the business, however, comes through the jobber. So the Planters finally decided to try advertising for two reasons. First, as explained, to discourage substitution, and secondly, to awaken among the jobbers a real desire to sell Pennant peanuts rather than the ordinary run of peanuts.”
New England was picked as the try-out territory for the newspaper advertising, while a car-card campaign is running in the elevated and subway systems of the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Co., to catch the Coney Island and beach resorts crowds.
The copy plan was worked up into a portfolio for the salesmen, and to be sent to the jobbers. For counter display the company sells the dealer a glass jar with a tight fitting top, making the jar an arbitrary purchase.
The copy, which runs into large space, to be followed by smaller reminders, features a character—“Mr. Peanut”—being an animated goober in the shell, wearing a black stove-pipe hat and carrying a cane. Mr. Peanut is the mouthpiece for the text, which explains the origin of the whole shelled peanut, expatiates in timely accents on its nutritive value, as in the example reproduced on page 67, etc. For example, this dialogue:
“Mr. Peanut: ‘Doctor, are peanuts good for kids?’
“Dr. H. W. Wiley: ‘The peanut is a very valuable food. It is highly nutritious.’”
Then this character leads the reader through the Virginia plantations where the peanuts grow, and into the store, where he points out with his cane the glassine bags with the trade name, and the glass counter jar. Some of the copy features the picnic and baseball idea, while another ad aims to get the peanuts a place on the dinner menu.
The newspapers receiving the business were asked to give simple co-operation in mailing out proofs of the campaign to the trade in each city, and to assist by advice the Planters’ salesmen, who were instructed to call at the newspaper offices as soon as they reached such towns.
By this advertising campaign the company hopes to meet successfully the inevitable competition that has already made its appearance—if the tin for tin cans lasts! Everyone can imitate the appearance of its peanuts, and can adopt identically the same method of package distribution, but it is expected that the advertising will educate the public to ask for these peanuts by name, and, more important still, to expect these peanuts to be sold them in Pennant bags.
Estimates have been made up for the Middle West, and if the New England campaign works out as well as it has started, it is probable that the effort will be extended to national proportions.
The success of Planters’ advertising
campaign was reported in the Fourth Estate, February 9, 1918.
Inexpensive Peanut Is Successfully Advertised by Southerners—A Daring ExperimentPrinters’ Ink, October 10, 1918, said
“We have grown to look upon certain articles as lacking the inherent requirements of advertising.
It was not so very long ago, for instance, that when a manufacturer conceived the idea of putting up package sugar and giving it the dignity of a trade-mark insignia, special publicity and localized newspaper campaigns, his associates scoffed.
“Can’t be put over!” they declared. “People will always buy sugar in bulk. There’s so little you can really say about sugar, after all. It isn’t like selling an automobile or a perfumed soap or a patent-process bean. No, they’ll look on it as only another scheme to give short measure in a fancy container.”
And thus discouraged at the outset, this manufacturer went right ahead, conceived a trade-mark, prettied up a package and advertised it for all it was worth. The copy men and the artists, set to work on this job, discovered to their amazement that there was just as much to say on the subject of sugar as on any other product.
Brilliant advertising sprang into existence and is still going strong.
The newspaper work has been notable for its educational value and vivid success it has achieved.
Now it has come to be that a very humble little article—one that advertisers have considered hopeless for generation gone—ascends to the rather exalted altitude of “the fat appropriation.”
“Peanuts have been trade-marked!”
No longer will the smiling Italian on the corner have things all his own way. His shrewd subterfuge of the pinched bag and the ever-decreasing number of goobers inside will be open to challenge.
The public need not submit to it. The “Fresh Hot Roasted” at about three for a penny will have to brush up its conduct and make good.
For a man with the strength of a big conviction went down into the Southern home of the peanut and talked matters over with the planters.
They, in turn had conceived a kindred scheme, but were not quite prepared to know how it could be brought to a fruitful head.
From the foundation of the idea up, here is the way the committee reckoned.
Peanuts are universally liked. It is unnecessary to educate or even greatly cultivate the “peanut appetite.” Everybody likes ’em, from youth to old age.
It may happen that we may get out of peanut range for a month a time, but when we buy a package and nibble for a few minutes we remember how tasty they always are.
And you can’t stop at a dozen!
The hunger for the humble goober approaches the ravenous. “I can’t stop eating them” is an old and favorite saying.
Here was a treat factor, a business asset, the committee banked on. The market was as wide as the world.
But there were many inferior grades of peanuts on the market.
The kind that are roasted on the street corners are not always palatable.
They are scorched and burned and maltreated.
They are either overdone or underdone.
True, some package goods were on the market, but they were not well known. They had never been advertised to any extent.
No one had gone about it professionally and with the earnest intention of dignifying the business.
Would there be a steady, ready, unfailing market for a selected peanut, grown right and roasted right and presented to the public in a clean, bright, appetizing manner?
The committee thought so. It was sure of the fact!
A Daring Experiment
But to devote thousands of dollars to actually advertising a five-cent bag of salted peanuts was a daring experiment.
Could it make its weight felt soon enough to justify the expenditure?
How was the advertising to be done?
Where would the advertising appear? In what mediums and under what conditions?
An advertising agency was called into conference.
It was an agency accustomed to food products—and the Southern territory. For, oddly enough, these adventurers in advertising resolved to take the bull by the horns.
They would try out the scheme right down in the country where the peanuts were grown.
If it succeeded there it would be universally successful.
It must be explained at this juncture that the Planters Association was composed of good business men.
They represented the higher order of things.
Plantations under their jurisdiction were skillfully managed. Only the best goobers were raised. They had the finest peanut stock on the market.
There was none better.
Perhaps it was this very fact that made the proposition so promising. It is seldom possible to snow under a superior article.
People will find quality. The “just nachally” nose it out.
These broad acres seldom felt the blight of “bad crops” or uncertain weather conditions. Such peanuts as came in from outside sources were passed upon by experts, men who “lived” peanuts and knew them from the ground up.
And they formed a combine—joined together to see if the raising and marketing of peanuts could not be put on a profitable, professional plane. They pooled an appropriation and “went to it.”
An unassuming insignia was already in existence, the relic of a previous, unimportant advertising experiment.
It was a simple flag upon which “Pennant Brand” was emblazoned.
This had grown to be more or less important as a symbol of the Planters Association.
But the agency saw further possibilities in the way of a trade-mark.
Thus “Mr. Peanut” came to life, an animated peanut in the hull, fat, smiling, wearing a monocle and a high silk hat and carrying a cane most jauntily.
Next came the system of distribution.
Dealers were supplied with a large and most attractive glass container, with an outlet for filling small transparent oiled-paper bags.
They were generous-sized bags too, and with a flowing measure of peanuts. The dealer could keep them practically air-tight in the container and fill the bags as trade demanded
But he was cautioned in every case not to short measure.
The bag must contain so many peanuts, no less.
The margin of profit permitted of this inflexible rule.
The public confidence was to be won, not only because of the quality of the peanuts, but the amount given for the price. The bags were appropriately decorated.
News-stands everywhere were interested in the experiment. Subway station stands collaborated.
Railroad depots fell into line. Confectioners saw the advantage of the plan.
The distribution was skillfully and thoroughly conducted.
Nothing tends to discourage the public as much as difficulty in securing an advertised article. It is disastrous to any campaign. It nullifies and deadens the fattest appropriation.
Yet so many manufacturers are weak in this respect!
And now a word concerning the product.
Pennant Brand Peanuts are selected peanuts. They are the pick and the choice of many. Only peanuts of a certain size and quality are permitted to pass the goober censor. They are roasted by men who know, and salted according to a secret process. They really represent the last word in peanuts.
And they are always the same!
The Campaign.
Then came the advertising campaign.
Twelve pieces of newspaper copy were conceived after many conferences. The space used was three columns by twelve inches in depth—and larger.
Rather generous for a newcomer, eh?
Here was where Mr. Peanut came in.
He was pictured in every ad, in different humorous poses.
The glass container and the bags and tempting displays of peanuts were drawn by artists under careful agency guidance.
The copy went straight to the point.
It told how the public could now secure a dependable peanut. How there would be no more “guess work.” Where the goobers were grown, by whom, and how went into the text.
What was practically a guarantee went in every one of those little oiled-paper envelopes.
No more stale, tough, poorly-roasted peanuts! That trial and tribulation was over.
And Mr. Hoover’s aid and advice was gained.
The Food Administrator and Conserver very willingly stated that the food value of peanuts could not be overestimated.
They were fine as a steady diet.
They were bully for children as well as grown-ups.
Their use was, in a way, a war measure.
Peanuts were as nutritious as meat. People would do well to eat them.
The public, in this great newspaper campaign, was asked to call for Pennant Brand peanuts, not just peanuts. They would discover the advantage of this, it was promised. This initial campaign went into Southern papers.
In a town as remote and as small as St. Augustine, Florida, the series appeared first.
The results exceeded all expectations everywhere.
The public responded.
It did ask for Pennant Brand peanuts, and liked them, and kept returning for more.
And now Mr. Peanut will bow to audiences all over the country.
Newspapers will carry his message in a smashing campaign that will be second to no food product now on the market.
In fact, the experiment has been so entirely satisfactory that the association is going into the Saturday Evening Post, just to clinch matters.
The first effort will comprise eight wonderful pages—think of it!
For peanuts at five cents the bag.
But it was newspaper advertising that proved the worth of the idea!
Newspaper advertising convinced the association that the public will support a worthy project.
Contact was obtained instantly.
An advertisement appeared one day, and results could be actually traced and run to cover the next.
That is one of the fine things about newspaper publicity.
You are not left in doubt.
Your verdict is a speedy one!
The national advertising campaign for Planters’ Pennant Brand debuted in The Saturday Evening Post, February 23, 1918.
Four weeks earlier Planters’ application to trademark the
pennant was published in the Official Gazette of the United States Patent Office, January 22, 1918.
The pennant had been in use since March 1910.
A
trademark application for the two words, Mr. Peanut, was published in
the Official Gazette of the United States Patent Office, September 22,
1925.
Officers and representatives of Planters Nut and Chocolate Company were pictured in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, March 1, 1929.
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Richmond Times-Dispatch, March 1, 1929
SIDEBAR: SOME OTHER NUTS
Jonas Longs Sons
O’Connor’s Candy Kitchen
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“Let Miss Peanut Serve You”
Official Gazette of the United States Patent Office, June 8, 1926
Scientific American, April 1928
Further Reading and Viewing
The Saturday Evening Post, October 19, 1918, advertisement
The Saturday Evening Post, December 14, 1918, advertisement
Richmond Times-Dispatch, April 8, 1919, advertisement
The Peanut Promoter, November 1919, Amedeo Obici profile
The Peanut Promoter, December 1923, How Advertising Put Mr. Peanut on the Map
National Nut News, October 1928, World Peanut King Has Unique Career
Nation’s Business, December 1928, An Adventure in Peanuts
The Independent (Elizabeth City, North Carolina), December 7, 1928, Dollars are Guarded; Nickels Are Loose [Amedeo Obici profile]
The Fifth District Banker and Financier, October 1930, The Story of “Mr. Peanut”
Atlantica, February 1931, Amedeo Obici, America’s “Peanut King”
Norfolk and Western Magazine, August 1936, Bay Point Farm [Amedeo Obici’s residence]
Compressed Air Magazine, May 1941, The Popular Peanut
Evening Star (Washington, DC), May 22, 1947, Amedeo Obici Dies
Evening Star (Washington, DC), December 11, 1955, Mario Peruzzi, 80, Planters
Nut Chief
Senior Scholastic, March 1, 1956, A Lesson Plan for The Personal Story of Mr. Peanut
Virginia Cavalcade, Summer 1958, The “Peanut King”
Famous American Trademarks (1971), Mr. Peanut
Suffolk News Herald (Virginia), August 20, 1989, A Tale of Two Cities, Suffolk Sketchbook 1989
National Museum of American History, Founding Fragments—Mr. Peanut
Italian Sons and Daughters of America, The Beginning (and End) of Mr. Peanut
Peanut Pals, fan club
WVEC, The history of Mr. Peanut
Visit Suffolk, Virginia: Hometown Legend Amedeo Obici
Suffolk Headlines, Mr. Peanut’s 100th Birthday
National Peanut Day, September 13.
The Peanut 1917 yearbook, Suffolk High School, Planters Nut & Chocolate Co. advertisement
The Peanut 1924 yearbook, Suffolk High School, Planters Nut & Chocolate Co. advertisement
The Peanut 1925 yearbook, Suffolk High School, Planters Nut & Chocolate Co. advertisement
The Peanut 1924 yearbook, Suffolk High School, Planters Nut & Chocolate Co. advertisement
The Peanut 1925 yearbook, Suffolk High School, Planters Nut & Chocolate Co. advertisement
The 1926 Peanut yearbook, Suffolk High School, Antonio Gentile’s brother, Romeo, pictured on pages 16 and 27.
(Next post on Monday: Jean Callahan, Unknown Letterer)
