The invention of Philly Cheesesteaks

The Philadelphia cheesesteak is a sandwich of legend. Pat’s hot dog stand was founded in 1930 by Olivieri brothers (Pat and Harry Olivieri).

They first served cheesesteaks in 1933 on the corner of Ninth and Passyunk in South Philadelphia. The legend goes that the brothers were bored at lunch and wanted to experiment with something new.

They went to the market for ingredients. He cooked the meat on his hot dog grill, placed the meat onto an Italian roll and dressed it with some onions. And thus the cheesesteak was born. Allegedly, they sold the first cheesesteak to a cab driver for 10c.

As the years passed both employees and customers alike demanded change …. cheese was added. The cheese was added in the 1940s and at first it was provolone, the inspiration of a manager named Cocky Joe Lorenzo.

While provolone remains the cheese of choice for many fans, the true Philly Cheesesteak is topped with Cheez Whiz. Pat’s King of Steaks, still owned and operated by the Olivieri family, is known for its Philadelphia cheesesteak sandwiches.
The invention of Philly Cheesesteaks

Brand of Palmolive

The trademark Palmolive is a well known brand name for soap in various countries. The Palmolive mark distinguishes the product from the numerous other soap products on the market; it indicates the source of the product and it represents the quality of the product and the goodwill of the manufacturer.

Palmolive brand soap was the product of three soap making giants that merged in 1928: New York-based Colgate, Milwaukee-based Palmolive, and Kansas City-based Peet Company.

Colgate-Palmolive-Peet was simply trying to compete with the gigantic Cincinnati-based Procter and Gamble, whose Camay brand was one of the first so-called beauty soaps. In 1953, the company became known as the Colgate-Palmolive Company.

The Palmolive soap originally, was started manufactured by B. J Johnson Company in 1898 in Milwaukee before the company merged its Palmolive company subsidiary with Peet Brothers, becoming Palmolive-Peet in 1927.

Palmolive was the idea of Caleb Johnson making soap not from animal fat but from oils, specially palm oil and olive oil. His first came in 1898, a floating soap to ride on the coattails of Procter & Gamble’s hugely successful Ivory brand.

At the 1909 St. Louis Exposition, however, Caleb discovered some French machinery for makiug hard-milled soaps, which immediately purchased and from that moment, Palmolive assumed its modern form.
Brand of Palmolive

History of Listerine

Bad breath did not become a social problem until the company that sold Listerine mouthwash decided it was. In 1879, Dr. Joseph Lawrence and Jordan Wheat Lambert concocted an antiseptic mixture and dubbed it ‘Listerine’ to suggest an association with Dr. Joseph Lister, who first used a chemical –carboxylic acid - as a disinfectant during surgeries.

Listerine came of age in the 1920s when Lambert Pharmacal Company came up with the idea of marketing it as a cure for ‘halitosis’ or bad breath. One famous advertisement created for Listerine mouthwash contained the headline ‘often a bridesmaid but never a bride’.

The advertisement came out in the early 1920s and was the first time the subject of halitosis had been raised in an advertisement.

By the time of the stock market crash in 1929, Listerine was one of the largest buyers of magazine and newspaper space, spending more than $5 million- almost the exact amount of yearly profits.

After a series of merges in the 1950s, Lambert Pharmaceutical joined with Warner-Hudnut, Inc., to become Warner-Lambert Company in 1955, and Listerine was joined by a number of sibling brands in the new company’s line-up, including Bromo-Seltzer, Schick, Anahist, and many others.

In the 1960s, Listerine competed with Colgate-Palmolive Company’s Colgate 100 and Scope, a product of the Procter & Gamble Company (P&G), but it remained the market leader.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s Listerine maintained its lead in the mouthwash category. In 1984 it claimed the product could prevent plaque buildup and gingivitis and spent $16 million three years later to publicize this attribute.
History of Listerine

Jelly-O Company

Jell-O was invented in 1897 in LeRoy, New York by a carpenter named Pearle Bixby Wait.  Wait also made and sold patent medicines, so he knew how to add colorings and flavorings to prettify products of unsavory origins – such as the boiled calves feet used to make gelatin.

Pearle Bixby Wait

It was his wife, May who came up with the name Jell-O by attaching to the word ‘jell’ the ‘O’, a popular ending for product names at the time. Wait registered Jell-O as a trademark in 1897. The first four flavors of the gelatin desert were orange, lemon, strawberry and raspberry.

Frank Woodward, owner of the Genesee Pure Food Company bought in the formula, for $450. The company launched a massive advertising campaign and by 1902, Jell-O’s annuals sales reached $250,000.

Two years later he introduced the Jell-O Girl and sent horse drawn wagons to rural communities to promote the new product.

The Jell-O so dominated the Genesee Pure Food Company that the firm’s name was change to the Jell-O Company in 1923. Two years later, it was acquired by the Postum Cereal Company (later renamed General Foods Corporation). Postum reduced Jell-O’s price and scored record sales but not record profits. General Foods was merged with Kraft Foods in 1989.
Jelly-O Company

Vicks VapoRub

Lunsford Richardson sold his drugstore and moved to Greensboro with wife, Mary Lynn and their three children in 1891.

He then purchased the Porter Drug Store at 121 South Elm Street.  It served as a popular spot to socialize as well as shop. In 1905 at age fifty, he left the wholesale business and with $8,000 capital launched the wholly owned Vick Family Remedies Companies.

Lunsford mostly found his passion in developing home remedy, creating his own formulas to help customers relive headaches, coughs, and other common ailments.

He experimented with a new remedy to ease his children’s croup symptoms in 1894, blending an ointment of menthol, eucalyptus and other natural ingredients.

Richardson blended menthol into petroleum jelly and produces Richardson’s Coup and Pneumonia Cure Salve.

When rubbed on the chest the stuff did produce the sensation of heat, and as the menthol evaporated it did clear the nasal passages.

The products name was too long, however, so Richardson christened his line Vick Family Remedies, borrowing the name from his brother–in-law, Dr. Joshua Vick. The name Vicks was short, catchy and easy to remember.

In 1917 the company began a widespread distribution of samples on a house to house basis in many areas of the Northeast. Vick was probably the first drug company to hire a doctor to review the medical accuracy of all its advertising copy.

Sales increased each year and by 1929, Vicks products could be purchased in sixty foreign countries.

In 1938 the Richardson acquired the William S. Merrel Company. From this small town operation, Richardson Merrell grew into multi-national $500 million enterprise.

In 1956 Bendectin was introduced to the market, it was a product of Richardson Merrell, whose parent was Vicks.

In October 1985, the board approved the friendly sale to Procter & Gamble, securing a more favorable stock price and outcome for employees.
Vicks VapoRub

History of Liquid Paper

Bette Nesmith Graham of Dallas (1924-1980) learned to type after leaving school, and some years later, while working as a secretary at a bank in Texas, she observed sign writers panting over mistakes. She hated making mistakes on the new electric typewriters that came out in the early 1950.

In 1951 Bette started mixing water-based paints in her kitchen using blender to match the paper and used a watercolor brush at the office to cover problems.

She worked to make the fluid faster drying. Soon every secretary in the building wanted a bottle of ‘Mistake Out’.

Failing to sell the formula to IBM, she began distributing it through her own business. In 1956, her Mistake Out Company was launched, and Bette and her husband, Bob devoted themselves to it full-time.

Sales were slow until an office supply magazine touted her product; General Electric placed the first big order.

By 1977, five hundred bottles of Liquid Paper were selling around the world every minute. In 1979, the Gillette Corporation purchased the rights to Liquid Paper reportedly for a handsome $47.5 million. Liquid Paper now owned by Newel Rubbermaid
History of Liquid Paper

Marmite Food Extract Company

The pioneering German agricultural chemist Justus von Liebig started a company in 1865 to sell the beef extract he had perfected as an inexpensive replacement for meat. He later discovered that brewer’s yeast could be concentrated as a food product.

Some thirty years later, a British firm name the Marmite Food Extract Company ran with Liebig’s yeast extract research had foisted the black spread upon an unsuspecting nation in 1902.

On 15 November 1902, the company applied to register its first trademark for ‘a concentrated preparation, being an article of food’.

The company set-up it’s the first factory in Burton upon Trent, one of the major centers of brewing in Britain.  The yeast need for the paste came from the local Bass Brewery in the town, the largest in the country, and the spread became so successful that the company constructed a second factory in London.

Though the extract recipe is a trade secret, it is still primarily yeast extract with a little added vegetable extract and spice.  When vitamins were discovered just before the First World War, Marmite became what be called today a ’superfood’ and sales soared.

In 1930s, the Marmite Food Extract Company was acquired by Bovril, which was bought in 1971 by Cavenham. The brand eventually ended up with Unilever, which now holds many Marmite trademarks.
Marmite Food Extract Company

Apple Computer

Apple Computer
On April 1, 1976, two college dropouts, Steve Jobs and Stephen Wozniak, founded the Apple Computer Company. They began operating out of garage building the Apple I, which some claim to be the first personal computer to be sold as a fully assembled package.

In the early 1970s, before the introduction of the Apple I, the personal computing products available in the market had limited appeal. They were generally sold by small electronics firms and individual hobbyists through clubs. In many ways, Wozniak’s Apple I still typified the early merchandise. It consisted of an unpacked circuit board wired by Wozniak so that a purchaser could hook it up to a power supply. Within a few years, however astonishing advances in integrated circuitry provided the critical raw materials needed. And programmers began writing software to make the machines appealing to people.

In 1977, Wozniak and Jobs introduced the Apple II. In stark contrast to the Apple I, fundamentally a kit computer with limited appeal though creatively priced at $666, the $1298 Apple II is considered by many to be the first personal computer designed for the mass market. Market appeal came from its attractive physical design, and the fact that it came fully assembled with a standard keyboard, integrated power supply, and color graphics capability.

In 1985, President Ronald Reagan awarded both Wozniak and Jobs the national Medal of technology, the highest honor bestowed on America’s leading innovators, for their achievement at Apple Computer and their contributions in bringing the power of personal computing to the general public.

The success of the Macintosh put Apple Computer in the map. It also resulted in Microsoft recognizing the importance of GUI to future sales. Eventually, the personal relationship between Jobs and Bill Gates led to a period of cooperation, where Microsoft learned the basics of GUI technology, allowing Microsoft to begin its own project: Windows.
Apple Computer