While standing out on our back porch the other day in the sweltering heat and roughly six cigarettes into a really cool chain-smoking session (which our neighbor saw, and then he said, “You look really cool, Fork!”), we remembered there were some Good Pop Cherry n’ Lemonade popsicles in our freezer. Now, the name Popsicle is actually a brand, but we use it like xerox or kleenex (cue copy editor frantically wondering why we didn’t capitalize those brand names only to get to this point wherein we mention we kept them lower-case because we’re making a point), but whatever you want to call those little frozen delights, one question abides: Who the hell knows where popsicles (or frozen juice treats or whatever) came from?
We didn’t. But we do now! And soon, you will, too, thanks to this TOTALLY ACCURATE AND IN NO WAY JOKING HISTORY OF THE FROZEN JUICE TREAT OR POPSICLE OR WHATEVER!!!!!!
As the legend goes, a young lad by the name of Frank Epperson, 11, was doing some kind of weird science project in his Oakland backyard that inadvertently led to him leaving a glass of water and powdered soda mix outdoors overnight with a stick he’d been using to stir those thing right there in the glass. ‘Twas cold that night, dear reader, and when Epperson returned to the glass the following day, he realized that stick was basically a handle.
After that, he perfected the idea over time and kept freezing sweet treats for his buds, who were all like, “Frank, we’re so down.” You’d think his parents or some kind of adult would’ve helped him, but it wasn’t until 1923 that he took a look around and said, “Shit, I should patent these bad boys.”
Back then, however, li’l baby Frankie was calling his treats Eppsicles, because of his name...and because he was trying to cram the word “icicle” all up in there. His pals, however, who were also fans, were all like, “The name sucks huge, bud, have you thought about calling them Pop’s ‘sicles? Y’know, because they’re, like, little sweet pops and also you can keep your dumb icicle idea going?”
Frank was down, and later the thing got shortened to Popsicle (the brand). People loved them pretty much right away, and not just homeboy’s stupid friends with all the naming rules. Turns out young Frank wisely partnered with a distributor called the Joe Lowe Co., which, when it wasn’t cooking up clever rhymes, got Popsicles sold at places like freaking Coney Island, which was the biggest-ass deal of all time.
There’s also something about how, during the Great Depression, the Popsicle company (which is called Popsicle) stuck two sticks all up in their pops, which allowed parents to snap a sweet treat in half and trick their children into thinking they each got a Popsicle. The price didn’t change, either, so, like, cool, right? Definitely cool, just like the Good Pop Cherry n’ Lemonade sweet treat we had on Cigarette Day, which is what we’re calling that day now.
And it doesn’t end there, because Good Humor is pretty interesting, too. Seems that while little Frankie Epperson was busy not patenting his Popsicle in the early 1920s, Good Humor founder Harry Burt had already worked out a type of chocolate that coated ice cream circa 1920. Word on the street is, the name Good Humor came from this really weird idea that people who regularly tasted good food would have nice temperaments, though if you’ve ever met a serious foodie, you know that’s false as hell.
Anyway, apparently these people were also working with sticks at the behest of Burt’s son—and everybody knows a choco-plated ice cream trumps a bit of frozen sugar juice any day.
By 1933, Good Humor opened a big ol’ factory in Chicago, and this is where it gets a little more interesting because, according to the Good Humor site itself, the mob insisted on $5,000 in protection bucks. Seeing as how that’s the equivalent of, like, 30 bazillion dollars today, the Burts refused and the mob destroyed parts of the factory. Still, they persevered through the 1940s and 1950s (when there was a movie about a Good Humor ice cream man for some reason starring Jack Carson, whoever the hell that is). By the 1960s, Good Humor offered over 85 products, though they were all pretty much sweet things of varying flavors adhered to ice cream through science.
By the 1990s, Good Humor was more of a grocery store brand; by the mid-2010s, the company had developed a solar-powered street freezer from which they can sell their things; and by just a couple weeks ago, they featured in my own freezer upon the return of the Vienetta ice cream cake (it’s really just ice cream, but they shape it like a cake and also they’re not as good as anyone seems to think they are).
And this brings us back to the Good Pop Cherry n’ Lemonade frozen treat we had the other day. Turns out it’s the only thing around that makes cigarettes taste better then they already do, so we spent the afternoon puffing and sucking and hanging and praying for rain. As we write this, rain falls on our Midtown office. And while we’re not saying that our offering of ciggie butts and popsicle sticks to the universe caused this light bit of sky moisture, we can only assume it didn’t hurt.
What’re your favorite sweet frozen treats? Let us know! Oh, and before you compose those “you shouldn’t smoke,” emails, just, like, let us live our life, huh? Anyway, have fun knowing these frozen treat facts, and here’s hoping they don’t push other, more vital pieces of information out of your brain—y’know, like, when it’s time to take your pill or what your daughter’s face looks like.
Yes—this totally is a Good Humor commercial from 1996 wherein the tune is pulled from the 1995 Scatman John song “Scatman (ski-ba-bop-ba-dop-bop).” Now, apropos of that, we did some digging into Scatman John. Turns out he died in 1999, which is too bad, but his original song is OUT OF CONTROL. He makes all kinds of weird mouth noises, then does a kind of rap breakdown about following your dreams, how he is most definitely the Scatman and—and this is true—how scatting makes him “hard as wood.” Good lord. See? This is why you come to The Fork. Or it’s why you never come back, who knows?
Also
-So, we’re not saying they’re the ONLY places to get you some local frozen treats, but have you visited Refresqueria Las Delicias or the Oasis Ice Crema Shop? Oh, they’ve got sweet treats alright, and real cold, too. One time we even had a milkshake with a churro in it at Oasis. Just saying.
-Altar Spirits is changing over to summertime hours, y’all, and that means 4-11 pm Wednesday-Friday, then noon-11 pm Saturday and then noon-8 pm on Sunday. You’ll also find specials and snacks and collabs and hangouts and some real nice bartenders like Laurel. We won’t share her last name, but just know that Laurel is awesome and you can tell her The Fork said so.
-That Rudy’s BBQ in Santa Fe is now open and, like cats who want desperately to sleep on anything they believe is new inside the house, Santa Feans are flocking there like crazy. We’ve heard conflicting reports, but we mostly want to remind people that local BBQ joints exist and are likely as good if not way better (and they’re probably way better). Fork readers tell us that Rudy’s is, and we are quoting here, “pretty OK.” Anyway, we’re having deja vu now and can’t remember if we linked to Santa Fe BBQ and Uncle DTs Smokehouse before. If we did, forgive us and be quiet.
-Pittsburgh’s Table Magazine now has a New Mexico iteration. We assume it won’t be full of the same ribald goodness for which The Fork won its Pulitzer (just kidding, they can’t give a prize to a ghost!), but we welcome another series of pretty photos of food on rustic tables taken from above through some kind of absurd camera the likes of which would make our camera roll up in a little ball and die.
-OK, but can we just talk about the Good Humor commercial from above for just another second? Think about how many people that had to go through to become a thing. Someone at Good Humor was like, “Hey, this Scatman John song is pretty OK. What if we just do that?” And then, like, it had to go through committees. Someone had to write the song, but in a legally distinguishable way. Then they had to hire people. Actors. A director. They had to look at rough cuts. Someone had to edit that thing. PEOPLE PROBABLY THOUGHT IT WAS GOING TO BE THEIR BIG BREAK! “Hi, I’m Dave Everyguy, I’m represented by Doug’s Pretty Good Actors and on my reel you’ll see that I proved my rapping and scatting abilities in that ‘96 Good Humor commercial based on the Scatman.” It’s chilling to contemplate, y’all.
-According to an email that came our way, a franchise called Chicken Salad Chick (which, the email says, is the only Southern-inspired fast casual chicken salad restaurant concept in the entire freaking nation) is heading to New Mexico with a five-unit agreement. You’re gonna see one in Santa Fe sometime soon. Cool enough, but before you get too excited, we recommend watching the recent Last Week Tonight with John Oliver about Subway franchises. It’s bone-chilling. Here’s a link to watch for free.
-OK, but, like, also, think about the people at Good Humor who were all high-fiving in the hallways about having done a version of the Scatman song a year (a fucking year!) after it was a thing. They were going home to their spouses all like, “Honey? I’m feeling really great about this Scatman-esque song. Kids are gonna love it!” And they were probably telling their friends and, like, feeling all confident. THIS IS A REAL THING THAT HAPPENED AND IT IS FREAKING US OUT!
-BUT THEN WHAT HAPPENED AFTER THAT? WAS IT A HIT?! DID THEY DO BETTER BUSINESS?!?!?! WAS ANYONE PROMOTED AT GOOD HUMOR? FIRED?! WHY DON’T WE HAVE COMMERCIALS LIKE THAT ANYMORE?! ARE WE OBSESSED BY ITS WEIRDNESS, OR DO WE SIMPLY MISS A SIMPLER TIME WHEN SOME OLD GUY WITH A MUSTACHE COULD RAP NONSENSE AND AN ICE CREAM COMPANY WOULD USE IT TO BUILD A COMMERCIAL?! WAS SCATMAN COMPENSATED?!?!?!
Here’s that Scatman John song, just so you can check it out and believe how off-the-rails the whole thing truly is.
More Tidbits
-Netflix has apparently rebooted Iron Chef and you’re reaping all the benefits of...that. Guess the chefs, who currently rank as Zinc Sauciers (shoutout to Bender Bending Rodriguez), have the right stuff to take over a stadium. We don’t actually know, we’ve never seen the show. If it’s your jam, though, maybe follow this link for more.
-Some company called Eleven Madison is taking the idea of the meal kit to absurd proportions with a $300 vegan version, and the folks at Eater-dot-com put it to the test. We love so many vegans, but when it comes to things like this, we totally get why others don’t.
-With gas prices seemingly ever on the rise, food delivery apps are ending programs that helped their drivers fill up. Seems wack to us, especially since these people are now likely faced with breaking even or making very little in the way of actual money. According to this piece, the gas surcharges were applied to customers (UberEats, for example, added a 45-cent surcharge), but that’s all ending next month. We don’t like this, so...yeah. For what it’s worth, Uber, if you’re reading this, we’d probably even pay a whole buck if it meant not screwing over people who are already probably only working for you out of desperation. Life sucks.
-Hold up, fans of Jif peanut butter—that jar of not-as-good-as-Skippy in your pantry might have been exposed to salmonella! Parent company Cargill is extending a recall of Jif products as well as certain Ritz crackers and other products. The company says it is not aware of any reported illnesses, but, like, it’s important to be diligent.
-Did people get bonuses for the Good Humor/Scatman commercial? Is there some nerd with a Clio out there? Multiple nerds with Clios? Do you even know what a Clio is? It’s the award for advertising and such. Is there some doofus out there with a freaking Clio on their mantle, and when people come over they’re all like, “Oh, my Clio? Well, hang on—lemme just pull up this Scatman John song real quick and then I’ll explain?” IS THERE? WE NEED NAMES! WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND! THERE IS NOTHING ANYMORE!! NO MAN, NO GODS, NO HUMANS!! THERE IS ONLY SCATMAN! HE IS RIGHT BEHIND YOU. HE IS SCATTING! YOU EMBRACE YOUR PARTNER FOR COMFORT. THEY ARE SCATMAN NOW.
-Lastly, in not just local news, students at Johns Hopkins created an edible tape to keep burritos from falling apart, and this might be the single best piece of news in the history of the world, at least until we unveil our silicon-based device that will allow people to eat smothered burritos while on the go.
A Totally Scientific Breakdown of The Fork’s Correspondence
In this week’s print edition of SFR, we check in with chef Joel Coleman, who has left his Fire & Hops gastropub behind to focus on the La Lecheria ice cream brand.
Number of Letters Received
35
*And we weren’t even here last week, so, like, what the hell, man?
Most Helpful Tip of the Week (a barely edited letter from a reader)
“You know meat corn dogs exist, right?”
*YES, OBVIOUSLY WE KNOW THAT!
Actually Helpful Tip(s)
The meat newsletter that reader Laurel G. sent—it was illuminating and really gives us something to chew on, so to speak.
*Because you chew meat...
Absolutely NOT The Scatman,
The Fork