Grandma Peterson and Meadow Gold (and Billboards)

Went to Dick's Market to buy mayonnaise and came out with a lot of other stuff. I did exercise restraint because I wandered close to the bakery but bought no donuts.

My treat was Meadow Gold Ice Cream which was on sale 2/$5 so I got French Vanilla (fancier than regular and a necessary staple of life - Vanilla is a flavor - not the bland absence of such). Along with that I got Rocky Road which has real miniature marshmallows.

Enjoying my Chocolatey nutty marshmellowy treat, I thought back to my farm Grandma's big freezer chest out on the rarely used front porch, technically the front of the house that was much more like the back because friends and family used the back porch that opened to the farmyard. Only boyfriends coming to see my teenage aunts used the alleged front door. Anyway, that deep freezer always had Meadow Gold ice cream and popsicles. It also had Clover Club potato chips for some reason as Grandma thought that was how you kept them fresh. We'll deal with Clover Club some other time.

But I had to figure out why my Grandma preferred Meadow Gold. It is good quality stuff. It might be that my Grandfather sold his milk to Meadow Gold. There was a processing dairy in Boise back then. And my Grandma was the type to have brand loyalty.

On Meadow Gold's website, a little history is given about its founding in the Midwest and then, in 1948:

the Meadow Gold name moved West, specifically in Utah where Arden family took on the name to become Arden's Meadow Gold Dairy. Over the ensuing years, the dairy name was abbreviated to become simply Meadow Gold Dairies, which remains today.

The past two decades saw the Borden operations buy out Beatrice ownership of Meadow Gold, creating a nationwide dairy and related products company. Borden's Dairy Division was headquartered in Columbus, Ohio until the fall of 1995, when it was moved to Ogden, Utah.

So there is a local angle even if more recently it was bought out by a Texas Conglomerate.

One thing my Grandma was not happy about was the Dairy Council's campaign promoting "Every body needs milk." I found an AP wire report from 6 May 1970 and what I believe was the billboard that offended my Grandma:

This says "Connecticut Dairy Council." I think there were several versions.

Well, the news article says what it says, but I don't remember any billboard with a woman in slacks. . . .

I think I'd better finish my ice cream and quit while I'm ahead. Bless you, Grandma, Grandpa, and Meadow Gold.