Accidental Invention

Everyone has eaten popsicles a one time or another, but did you know that they were actually a complete accident…albeit a sweet accident. The popsicle was “invented” by one Frank Epperson, who was a mere 11 years old at the time. The year was 1905. Epperson had been enjoying a sweet drink that he was stirring to keep it mixed. When he went to bed, he completely forgot about his sweet drink, and left it on the porch overnight. It was a freezing cold night, and when he woke up, he found the frozen drink with a stick in it. Like most curious kids, he gave it a try, and thought it was great.

Epperson decided that he was on to something, especially on the hot days of summer. Epperson named his new treat the “Epsicle” and shared it with his friends. It was an instant hit, and Epperson continued to make and share his accidental invention with his friends, and later his own children. As kids will do, Epperson’s kids changed the name. They began calling the treats “Pop’s ‘sicles” and the name stuck. In 1922, he unveiled his creation at a fireman’s ball, where it reportedly became “a sensation.” By 1923, Epperson started selling the frozen treats to the public at Neptune Beach, an amusement park in Alameda, California. Epperson being the smart man that he was, applied for the patent in 1923, and the “Popsicle” brand name was born. In 1924, he secured a patent for his “frozen confectionery,” initially named “the Epsicle ice pop.” Later, at his children’s suggestion, he renamed it Popsicle. The original Popsicles came in fruity flavors and were advertised as “a frozen drink on a stick.”

Six months after patenting the Popsicle, Good Humor filed a lawsuit against Popsicle Corporation. By October 1925, they reached an out-of-court settlement. Popsicle agreed to pay Good Humor a licensing fee to produce frozen suckers made from ice and sherbet. Meanwhile, Good Humor retained the exclusive right to manufacture similar products using ice cream, frozen custard, and related ingredients.

In 1925, Epperson sold the rights to the Popsicle to the Joe Lowe Company of New York, which created a subsidiary called Popsicle Industries to market the product. “I was broke and had to sell all my assets. I haven’t been the same since,” he later admitted. In 1965, Popsicle Industries was acquired by Consolidated Foods Corporation (later renamed Sara Lee). By 1986, Sara Lee was struggling to make Popsicle profitable and sold the United States operations to the Gold Bond Ice Cream Company in Green Bay, Wisconsin. In 1987, the Canadian operations were sold to AmBrit Inc, and in 1990, Empire of Carolina purchased the Canadian operations from AmBrit. Meanwhile, in 1989, Good Humor, a subsidiary of Unilever, acquired the United States rights to Popsicle from Gold Bond and integrated the operations into its Good Humor-Breyers division. Finally, in 1993, Unilever bought the Klondike brand and the Canadian Popsicle operations from Empire of Carolina, thereby reuniting the brand for both markets under the Good Humor-Breyers division.