Penny Candy, Bubble Gum and Other Candy Memories
Watch out, everyone. It’s nostalgia time again. This morning I passed a truck on the way to work that was making a delivery of penny candy to a local store. You can’t really get penny candy anymore, can you? When I was a kid, I used to spend some Saturdays at my father’s store — he sold candy, cigarettes, lottery tickets, comic books, etc. — and always helped myself to a little candy called an Ice Cube. It was basically a little chunk of chocolate wrapped in gold paper. My father also stocked a lot of specialty bubble gum. I was a bubble gum addict. At one time I ate 10 pieces per day. The only thing standing between me and adolescent toothlessness was my luck in inheriting decent teeth. I liked Bazooka the best because it had that ridge down the middle and it came with a comic. My favorite candy bar as a child was one they no longer make: Butternut. I also loved Milky Ways. Read my essay about Butternut bars over at the blog Candy Addict.
June 17th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
Reason # 405 why I love Dylan’s Candy Bar
June 17th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
I’m a few years older than you, yet I don’t remember penny candy. I do remember a candy counter at my elementary school where you could buy candy bars for a nickle. Zero was my favorite and last year I discovered that those are still made and the Exxon Tiger Mart near where I live sells them.
June 17th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
Yes, yes, yes, the Bazooka Bubble Gum!!! Nothing else was quite like it.
I liked the candy cigarettes. Milky Way was the candy bar of choice for us as well – put it in the freezer. Good stuff.
June 18th, 2008 at 1:35 am
You can get penny candy. It doesn’t cost a penny but you can still get all that stuff. Have you BEEN to Yummy’s on Rt 1 in Kittery. We go on a little trip there EVERY summer and man, do we stock up on candy. Stuff you just cannot find anywhere else. It’s only about 1.25 hours north of us and SO worth the drive. Take a day trip.
http://www.yummies.com/
June 18th, 2008 at 1:38 am
Oh, and they have your ice cubes.
http://www.yummies.com/browse.cfm/4,128.html
June 21st, 2008 at 11:29 pm
There was a penny candy store about a 15 minute walk from my house and in the summer, my girlfriends and I would walk to the store, with our radio earpieces blasting (remember those?). My big dilemma would be whether to spend 12 cents on the new Archie comic, or 5 cents on a bag of assorted candies and then another nickel on a bag of french fries. I was from Montreal, so we doused french fries in vinegar, salt AND I added ketchup. You can see the dilemma.
As for gum…Bazooka was the best. As were jawbreakers. I think they were 3 cents each. And I loved sponge toffee. I had 13 cavities in one year. Parents…not pleased. Should have stuck with the Archie comics!
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:06 am
Let’s see, BB-Bats and Safe-T-Pops (with a waxed piece of twine for a handle) Other penny items are still around, but more than a penny. Jolly ranchers, little Tootsie Rolls, Dum-Dums, Mary Janes (snicker, that name has been funny for 40 years!).