New England Candy

It's night Dan Ray. I'm telling you Boston's news Radio.

Thirty one degrees here in the Greater Boston area. My name is Morgan White Junior. This is night Side Dan Ray. You should know by now who's been on vacation. And we'll be back Wednesday, the first of January twenty twenty five. I first interviewed this woman about three or four years ago, maybe more, and she had written a book about candlepin bowling. She knew all the names Rosariolikiaraa Stasia, and Ed Zernike, all of the major names of watching Saturday Morning Candlepin

Well, thank you, Morgan. It's a pleasure to be back, all right.

And one of these days we're gonna go candlepin bowling and I'm gonna whoop up on you.

Fine by me.

I'm going to show you no mercy.

Okay, no problem, I'll be ready.

If you wind up beating me, I'm going to say, well, I'm seventy one years old. What do you expect you're near half my age?

Well, something like that, something like that, something like that.

Let's talk about the Candy book.

Yeah, so you know it's actually it's called New England Sweets and it's not just about candy, although candy's a big chunk of it. It's New England Sweets and the subtitle is what is it? Donuts, Bonbonds and Whoopee Pies. So it's really all sorts of sweet baked things, frozen things and candies from New England, but a big chunk of it is candy. We talked about Necho your favorite, the wal Eco Bar.

And.

Yeah, I'm and Joy Peter Paul almenjoy In Mounds were made in Naugatuck, Connecticut for for years, so all sorts of candies came from New England.

What inspired you to write this book?

Uh, you know, I had just finished my book, A Long Route One, and I was kind of interested in writing a book about whoopee pies. That was my original idea. I was in Maine. I was spending a lot of time in Maine, and you know Mainlay's claim to whoopee pies, it's the official state treat And I thought that would be a great book. It has a great story. There's there's controversy, there's you know, three states claim ownership with the whoopee pie. There are two competing actually three competing

Their name came up in my interview with Anthony San Marco a couple of days ago. Arcadia Press.

Yeah, it was a lot of books for years. Yeah.

Yeah. So now that you've got a triple crown of books out there, what's next, Well, you know.

Let's finish this one. I just turned in the manuscript three days ago, so it's not out yet. You know, it's going to go through the editorial process and the design process and the publishing process, and it'll come out in July, July twenty twenty five, and then I'm not sure. I think there's a lot of candy stories that still need to be told. In Boston, Boston and Cambridge used

All Right, you're in the fifth grade, You're a little girl in the fifth grade. You had a whole quarter in your pocket, and in those days, a lot Yeah, a couple of candy bars and a bag of chips. What was your first choice growing up?

My first choice was always Eminem's with peanuts, ah, in that kind of.

Maroon bag, not the dark chocolate bag, because I.

Feel it was a yellow I feel it was.

A yellow, yellowish maroon. You know, it wasn't a dark chocolate bag.

Yeah, that's my that's my point. Okay, that's the point.

And how do you feel about the way eminem has just revamped their advertising in the past ten years and the red Eminem is a smart alec and the green Eminem is kind of a vamp. How do you feel about that?

Eh?

Eh, Okay, I'm not their target audience anymore. I'll just say that.

Yeah, but I bet you still buy.

Them sometimes sometimes, but you know, I'm trying to buy candies that have a New England connection now and Eminems.

You do not. And you know why M and M's was invented.

It was invented for soldiers, right because it didn't melt and World War.

One, so a soldier could eat candy chocolate, which is an energy source, and it wouldn't melt in their hands and you're handling a rifle after chocolate toll over your hand, and they didn't want that, the US Army.

Yeah, yeah, that's very interesting.

That's why they were invented. I know.

It's so interesting and a lot of there's a lot of connection between candy and especially chocolate and the army because they did want you know, they wanted to give chocolates to soldiers for energy, for the calories, the energy and the caffeine. I think so at the beginning of World War One, I think it was the army solicited all the chocolate manufacturers to contribute like these big blocks of chocolate and then the army would slice them down into like chocolate bars and wrap them up and give

All right, I've got a news hit. But when we come back, I want you to put the spotlight as we both have mentioned my personal favorite candy.

Bar, Walleco, Walleco and other company that.

Put it out and the history and why we don't have Walco anymore. So you promised to do.

That for me. I do good.

Susan pregnant, We'll be back. You want to call in and talk to her six seven, five, four ten thirty eight eight eight nine to nine, ten thirty. This is night Side. Dan is off until the new year. I'm Morgan. Time and temperature here eleven fourteen thirty one degrees.

Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World Nightside Studios.

On WBZ News Radio. Susan Bragman is my guest, and she's written a number of books. By the way, are all of them from Arcadia?

Yes, and there's actually New England Sweets is my fourth book. My first one was called New England Neon, which I think you and I have never.

Talked about, but we've we've mentioned it, although I've never yes.

Yes, done and officially yeah, so yes, they're all for Arcadia and New England Neon came out in twenty eighteen, so they've all been in the past, you know a few years.

Have these books put you in a different tax bracket?

Yet?

No, not yet.

I'm still waiting.

Well, everybody go out and buy them. If you hear my voice and you hear Susan with me, go buy her books.

They're great. They're great books, they're interesting, they have a lot of information, good photographs, and they're a lot of fun.

Let me take a call from Woburn and Gary, welcome And what am I going to say to you? Gary? Well, I am going to say that, But what else am I going to say?

Hi? Let me continue? That's your puzzle to night.

Yes, all right, Gary, turn out. This is your last call of the week because you've this is your third call in four days, and you know you're not supposed to call more than once or twice a week, and this is your third call. So until the new year, no more calls for you. But you're here now, doctor Susan.

All right, Susan, get your favorite candy bars at sixty one years of age? Or was way back when when I was a kid? Was the marathon?

The marathon? So that's not a new not a new England one?

Is it?

Not?

In my book?

No?

Okay, I'm sorry, I did even know that.

It's all right, I can't.

Think of all new England candy bars.

But I do have a question.

What you guys are talking about war and so forth, of World War two and so forth. My question is this is did the companies charge the United States government to give the chocolate to the soldiers?

I'm not sure, I know, I think okay, you I know if you don't of the United States government paid the companies.

It's like the United States government paid the cigarette companies to give cigarettes for the soldiers.

Do they recoisition the chocolate? So they yes, yes, so they purchased it. Yes, Okay.

Here's my last one?

Is this?

Uh I'm not even sure if it's noise one, but here it goes. We've heard of Russell Stova chocolates.

Mm hmm, that's yeah, that's it.

Go ahead, Well, russell Stova is usually a holiday chocolate all through the years. And let's face the facts. I mean, you never really see it all year long. Where is russell Stova located?

Oh?

Not here. I'm not sure where Russell Stover is. I know there were a whole bunch. There was Whitman's, there was Russell Stover, there was Shrafts. Shrafts was here. Of course. It was Cupboard, Oh yeah, candy cupboard and that was that ultimately became a neco brand that was originally Level and coverle who rhymed and they were they were a Cambridge They were a Cambridge company and they made candy cupboard,

Okay, very good. My last common says when the Christmas time, you know, when they mocked on the candy down to twenty five I have fifty and seventy five percent off. Yeah, okay, true story. CBS Pharmacy where I live, back about four years ago, it was down to seventy five percent off.

What a nice sky you were.

Yeah, I am and they can be looking. That sound great?

Thank you, Gary. You take care of happy holiday sper Merry Christmas into Happy New Year. Anyone else wants to do?

What? Gary? Did?

Your phone number six one, seven, two, five four ten thirty or eight eight, eight, nine two nine ten thirty. I've got Susan Brakman here. And do you want to talk about your previous books as well as the Candy book or your next book? Where do I Where do I direct the conversation?

Let's talk about wal Eco bars.

Yes, Gary distracted because.

They will be in New England suites, so they will be in the forthcoming book. So there was a company in Brockton called the FB Washburn Company and they started in eighteen fifty six. Francis Washburn named it after himself, of course, and it started as yeah, well they all did at that time. And he opened a bakery. It was originally a bakery in Brockton, but their most popular item was a coconut cookie, so he tried to figure

Why did he stop? And then why did they stop?

The company stopped again, no official explanation except it seems they stopped in the eighties and they wanted to focus on their hard candies. They had just purchased seventy seventies candy, which made ribbon candy, right, and they wanted to focus on their ribbon candy. And they were also making Dad's root beer barrels, They made sower bawls, they made lollipops, and they made lollipops like for bank lobbies and stuff

There's a candy bar route there from England called Bounty and now it's the closest in taste to the Walleco bar. Almond Joy or Mounds does not even in my taste buds make me reminisce about Walleco, but the Bounty bar does. Now, I know you're focusing on candy made in New England. Do you know anything about the Bounty bar.

I know it's not sold in the US, right, It's sold in England and maybe Canada, but I think England and there are a.

Few stores around here that sell it.

Yeah, yeah, but it's it's not I think it was designed to be an imitation of the Mounds bar, and yeah sound Mounts. Mounts used dark chocolate, almon Joy uses milk chocolate.

And almond Joy has the nuts obviously has.

The almond Yeah, right, and does not right, because sometimes you feel like a nut, heytimes you don't.

Hey, that phrase, that phrase might catch on. Maybe we'll make money on your ability to make magic phrases.

Yeah, if only I know, I know. So that's the third well ego, But can I tell you there's a funny PostScript. Yes, they had in the nineteen sixties when they were still making the bars, they I think they tried to get sort of hip and groovy and they had a competition with local bands to write a radio jingle and the winning group was called a Flat Earth Society and they were a akadelic band from Lynn, Okay,

That was the end of that. So what are the odds of somebody buying out the company. I know the company is defunct, but well, enough money they can be brought back and maybe they will go back to making ribbon candy and the wal Eco bar am I Wison past the graveyard here.

Well, you know, they sold they sold the ribbon candy line to a company in Henderson, Nevada, Nevada.

A time.

Yeah, and they sold the other hard candies to a different company. So they sold off all their active candy, you know, active candy lines, so Washburn's is no more. I don't know who has the recipe for well Eco bars. There are still there are still descendants of Harry Gilson who are around, but I don't know that they have the recipe.

Okay. Now you mentioned four books, all by Arcadia Press. Tell my audience the exact title of all four books.

Okay. So my first book was called New England Neon, and that came out in twenty eighteen, and that looked at Neon signs, as the title says, in all six New England states. It looked at you know, existing signs like the Sitco sign, or the Shell sign or Memorial Drive, the Hilltop Steakhouse sign when it was still a Neon sign that said Hilltop Steakhouse. And then you know some historic signs that have been gone forever, like the White Fuel Company sign that used to be in Kenmore Kenmore Square.

And I want people to purchase these books because I want Susan to become independently wealthy and to absolutely I'm going to take a break here if you want to call and speak to Susan, maybe mention your favorite favorite candy product and find out who made it and when and all those things. Six one, seven, two, five, four, ten, thirty eight eight, eight, nine, two, nine, ten thirty Here on night side, where the temperature is thirty one degrees at eleven thirty one.

Night Side Thought with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's news radio.

So some pregnant is here. We're talking candy and the origin of maybe some of your favorite candies, and we talked about Necho New England.

Confection Company Sectionary Company CCO.

Thank you for making me say it the right way.

They had.

I don't know how to put this a little brew haha over the candy hearts that we've all eaten when we were kids and grown up with and the skull butt had that circumstance caused them moving from Cambridge to Revere. Now, I don't know if that's true or not, but why don't you tell that story to people.

I know?

I know about the move from Cambridge to Revere. I'm not sure what bruhaha you're talking about. As far as I knew, they moved because they wanted to consolidate their real estate holdings and they could get a fortune for selling their property in Cambridge. They sold it for like seventy seven million dollars to Novartis and they moved to Revere in I forget what year it was, two thousand and four, two thousand and eight, somewhere like that.

That little walk of land costs how much.

The Neco factory sold first, I believe seventy seven million dollars but now I'm going to have to check with the Nicco.

Factory had that water tower with the word Nicko on the side.

I know, and it used to be striped.

Yeah.

They sold it in two thousand and four for seventy seven million and they painted the water tower. It was a big building, I know, it was a big.

Building youried with regularity. I mean that was the main way.

It's still a big building.

That was the main way to get into Cambridge Bank going over the mass at.

Bridge mm hmmm.

Yeah.

It was right there on mass Aft by Main Street. The one end of confectioner's were ow.

So how are they doing in Revere?

Well, that was the beginning of the end for them. They got sold in two thousand and seven. They got sold to like a you know, a group of investors who were highly leveraged and incurred a lot of debt. And you know, they hung on. They hung on for about ten years, but they were sold. They were sold in a bankruptcy auction in twenty eighteen.

And Neco wafers, well they still.

Make Necko wafers, so Necho wafers and Sweethearts and Canada Mints were all sold to a company Ohio in Ohio called Spangler. They make those, they make dumb dumb lollipops, yes, and Spangler. You know, it took a year to retool whatever they had to do, and they started making Nico Wafers and Sweethearts again in twenty twenty and Canada Mints also, and yeah, a few of the Necho products got a new life after Necho. After Necho went under, So Neco Wafers, Sweethearts,

And is Skybar the same fourth sections that it was when we were kids. Yeah, caramel fudge.

Yeah, peanut butter or peanut. Yeah, it's like caramel fudge peanut and like a vanilla kind of yeah, nugats. Yeah, And the formulas changed over the years. And she, you know when she bought she boughte you know, all the intellectual property, so all the old recipes and she experimented a little bit and went back to you know, either the original or very shortly after the nineteen thirties era flavors, and she upgraded the chocolate as well. So they're really

You know what, young lady, you know your stuff, and I learned.

A lot of really fun stories.

Yeah, I think people should give you credits for what you do know about our favorite candies.

Well, I appreciate that. I enjoy sharing these stories because they're really interesting, and you know, not everybody, not everybody has heard all these details, and some of them are old stories. So you know, people weren't around. I wasn't around in the thirties. You weren't around in the thirties.

No, it didn't turn to the fifties.

Yeah, but later than that you, Oh, who knows. But so my website do you want Can I tell people my website?

Yes, I want you to tell your website.

My website is www dot Rednickel dot com, Red like the color Nickel, likedthecoin dot com.

And I'm on.

Facebook and Instagram as red Nickel neon, which is a nod to my first book. Yeah, yes, and red Nickel. Yes, yes, I was just going to tell you it was sort of named after a slot machine, which I thought might be of interest to you.

Oh, definitely of interest. What slot machine? What's it called, Red Nickel.

Well, it wasn't an actual slot machine. What it was was a photograph I took many years ago when I was at the Luxor in Las Vegas.

And it wasn't years ago because the luxw did can't come around to the late eighties.

Okay, Well, it was in the nineties that I took this picture, and it was a color picture. When the Luxor when the casino was sort of had a red Egyptian theme. Yes, And it was a photograph of a bank of slot machine nickel slots, And so I named this photograph and I was, you know, putting titles on my photograph. I called it red Nickel because it was red and it had nickel slots, and that's where the name came from.

When was the last time you were in Vegas?

Oh, pre pandemic. Oh yeah, it's been a while.

You've got to go back again.

I know, I know. I have a friend in California and we go to Vegas together. But he's had he's had family obligations taking up his time and we just haven't had a chance to to get to Vegas in a while.

Tell you what, You've got my home number. The next time we have plans to go to Vegas. Let me know, maybe, just maybe I can coordinate a trip and I will take you and your friend to the best restaurant in Vegas, which is Michaels and Michael's is at the South Point

It's a deal.

Now, we're just gonna find ourselves in Vegas at the.

Time at the same time.

But if we can coordinate that you're in for, oh my goodness, the meal. For an example, let's say you order for an app appetizer. They're seafood Special. They take a block of ice, and let's say you cut a bowling ball tenpin in half and it's all all ice, and they insert they make holes and insert crab, shrimp, lobster all through that and then there's a candle underneath it so it's illuminated. Oh you can have that, my treat.

I'll pay and deal unless it become rich and famous of these books, well.

Then well we'll settle line and were said of what that figure can be. Susan Brigman is my guests. If you want to call in. You got roughly ten twelve minutes of time to say hello to her and talk candy here on night Side Time eleven forty six thirty one degrees.

Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World Nice Sight Studios on WBZ News Radio.

I've got three people waiting to speak to Susan Brigman. I've got eight minutes to give them their chance.

To do it.

Let's start with Ken and Bridgewater, Line one. Ken, what's up?

Yes, Hi Kenny, how you doing tonight?

Hi? Hi, Susan.

So I had, first of all, you touched on all the candy that I liked, the Wallycos my favorite, and then of course skybars. You gave me information that I had no idea they were being made. So that's wonderful. One of the things that has bothered me for a long long.

Time is the Nestle's chocolate bar. I always thought the Nestle's chocolate was way better than a Hershey's bar, and you can't find them anymore. And I was wondering if you knew anything about the Nestle's chocolate bar used to come in a white package with red letters on it.

Yeah, I don't know really much about that because that wasn't the focus of my research, so I really can't answer that. I'm sorry to say. You know, I know that Nestle's, Hershey, and Mars are the three big candy companies now and they pretty much control the candy bar market.

So I did.

I did discover something quite by accident. If anybody's looking for the Nestle's chocolate bar, which I still think is the best one ever, is if you if you buy the milk chocolate morsels, the Nestle's morsels for chocolate chip cookies, the milk ones, milk chocolate, you could eat like two or three of those at a time in your mouth. It's it's just like the old Nestli's chocolate bar.

All right, How I get my fix?

Melt them down?

Melt them down? Yeah, sure you could do that too.

Ken, you live in Bridgewater, there is a candy store East Bridgewater called Pinches and Pounds. Have you ever been there?

I have not.

It's on the intersection of twenty seven and eighteen.

Call them.

I'm sure you can look up their number and see if they have the candy product you're looking for. Because if it's candy, they specialize in older almost forgotten candies.

Okay, perfect, I'll try it. Thank you very much, Ken, happy too, Thank you. Go to Rick and Bill Rica, Rick.

Good evening, Morgan and Susan.

How are you Susan? Then, when I was a kid, how are you happy? Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, happy everything. When I was a kid in the early late seventies, early agies, I used to grow up in Burlington, mass And I used to go to Dale Pharmacy and see ethel for a watcher m a call it bar and a package of hockey cards. And right across the shree

Lots of fun, sure, thank you every week.

Thank you for your call.

Yeah, absolutely, all right.

Go ahead, Susan Oh.

I was just going to say there was a gum company in East Boston for years called Gum Product, very very clear name, and they made I think during World War Two they made a bubble gum product called Yank Yanks Yanks bubble gum, I remember that. Yeah, So they were around and then they made gumballs also, and they were around till I think thineteen eighty and then they got shut down and now now the building is condos called you know, the bubblegum factory.

All right, let's go to Adlebur and speak to Michael. Michael, welcome to night Side.

Hey, great show as usual. Three quick questions because I know you don't have the time. Was Charleston choo local?

Yes, So Charleston Choe was originally made in Cambridge by a company called Oh it's going to come to me. It was originally made in Cambridge, and then I think they moved to Everett for a while and then they got bought and through a whole bunch of corporate transfers, they ended up back in Cambridge and they are still made in the last candy factory in Cambridge on Main Street.

Oh I'm sorry, I didn't know. Is that the one that makes actually not in Cambridge but Marshall Fluff.

No, that's a different company. That's Mower Jurkey Mower, know right. Charleson Chew was originally made by the Fox Cross Company, but today TUTSI roll owns them and they make Charleston Choose at eight ten Main Street, which is sort of at the corner of Main Street and mass Ave. It's the same building that makes Junior Mints as well.

All right, this one last cook thing, I know you're going to hang up real quick. Whatever happened to the Caravel bar? I was just reading about the seventies. I loved it. I know, I don't know what a candy, but I loved that bar. The one hundred grand on one million grand whatever that one's called. It's close to it, but it's not the same. And the last thing is the Neco waves now made in Mexico.

Are they well? I know they're made by Spangler but it could be they, you know, manufactured elsewhere.

They had to take they had to take the banner off the label made in America.

All right, Michael, I gotta get one more on. Thank you, David, and Lake Placid. You're the last call the night with Susan Brigman.

Go ahead, David, Yes, I was just wondering whatever happened to the Coca Cola signs in Allston.

Oh god, it was.

It was removed.

It was supposed to be saved. It was stored temporarily in the Conrail railroad yard, and it just basically.

Somebody, somebody has it and they keeping me quiet. Bet David, thank you for the question. By all right, Susan, get a whole flurry of calls there at the m Yeah.

That's great.

Thank you. And you make your money sell these books.

Hey, I'm working on it, and thank you. Thank you. Fun to talk about.

Two dates, a candlepin bowling date and a dinner dayton Vegas.

And a dinner date in Vegas. This is great.

You take care of yourself.

Happy new Year, Okay, thank you, Morgan, you Happy new Year.

There you go, Susan Brakeman. I had George go, hey, we're gone tonight. I had Cindy Bruce, and I had Shearffy and Doctor. Thank you to all the ladies here on night Side and Rob, thank you for being Rob. Nancy Gray, thank you too. And all the people who listen to and to are called, thank you for your participation with Nightside. I'll be here tomorrow and I'm just gonna say my parting two words by Boston