The gum cleverly capitalized on the nation’s postwar patriotic pride in the wake of their recent victory, not only via its name (derived from the rocket-propelled weapon invented and deployed by American troops) but also through its red, white and blue packaging. His four sons decided to save the family from certain penury by starting a new penny candy business, Topps Chewing Gum Inc., with the name borrowed from an eponymous Chattanooga candy company they purchased.įollowing the end of World War II, the Shorin brothers - Abram, Ira, Joseph and Philip - aggressively set about supplanting their then-dominant competitor, Dubble Bubble, manufactured by Fleer, through the launch of Bazooka Bubble Gum.
But by 1938 - by then Chigorinsky had changed his surname to Shorin - the business was flailing. Not in your area Please direct your local retailer to contact us here. In 1891, Morris Chigorinsky emigrated from Russia to the United States, where in the early 1900s he assumed control of the American Leaf Tobacco Company.
This article originally appeared on The Nosher.Ĭhew on this: One of America’s most iconic gum brands was originally a Jewish-owned tobacco business.
