Philadelphia Candy Patriarch Carl Goldenberg Dead at 85
By Mike DeNardo
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- An iconic figure in Philadelphia candy lore is gone.
Carl Goldenberg, of Goldenberg's Peanut Chews fame, died yesterday at the age of 85.
The family started the company in 1917, and Goldenberg's Peanut Chews have been sticking to teeth in Philadelphia ever since.
Carl Goldenberg, one of the third generation of Goldenbergs to manufacture the famous Chews, died Monday of prostate cancer at his center city home.
The brand was sold to Bethlehem, Pa.-based candy company Just Born in 2003, which continued to make Peanut Chews at its plant in Holmesburg (top photo).
"With Carl's passing we've lost an icon in our industry," says David Shaffer, co-CEO of Just Born. "Philadelphia lost a wonderful, philanthropic human being, and the Born and the Shaffer families have lost another friend."
Just Born removed the Goldenberg name from the package several years ago. But sales dropped, so the name was restored in 2011 and the Peanut Chew business rebounded, Shaffer says.
