June 18, 2025 • 7 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, whether you're a diehard Cosmic Brownie fan or a lover of Zebra Cakes, Nutty Buddy bars, Star Crunch, or the seasonal Christmas Tree Cakes, Little Debbie is a brand you've likely seen time and time again on grocery store shelves across America. Sharing the story of Little Debbie is Simon Whistler from the “Today I Found Out” YouTube channel and its sister podcast, “The Brain Food Show.”
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American
people coming to you from the city where the West begins,
Fort Worth, Texas. Whether you're a diehard cosmic Brownie fan
or a lover of zebra cakes Nutty Buddy Stark Crunch
for the annual Christmas tree Cakes, Little Debbie is a
(00:30):
brand you've probably seen time and again on almost every
grocery store shelf in America. Here to tell the story
of Little Debbie is Simon Whistler from the Today I
Found Out YouTube channel and its sister, the Brain Food
Show podcast. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
It was nineteen thirty three and the United States was
in the throes of the Great Depression. Nearly a quarter
of the nation was unemployed, and breadlines went on for blocks.
In short many were desperate, including Ode and Ruth McKee,
who had lost most of their money due to a
bank failure. What the couple did still have, however, was
a nineteen twenty eight Whippet car. According to McKee Food's
(01:13):
official history, this is when Ode started selling five cents
Virginia Dare cakes made by Becker's Bakery out of the
back of said vehicle. By the next year, business was
good enough that they were able to purchase a Chattanooga,
Tennessee bakery, Jack's Cookie Company, in what was a unique
arrangement for the time, Ruth became a full managing partner
in the business with her husband. While Odi traveled the
(01:35):
state making sales and coming up with some innovative ways
to reduce new product. She baked, managed the office and
took charge of the few employees that they had. They were,
as the company's official history put it, ideal business partners
because her cautious, conservative nature was the perfect compliment to
his risk taking, adventuresome spirit. Years later, Jack Bihee would
(01:58):
explain that his parents had a unique opportunity during the
Great Depression, and they took a risk. A few months
later that seemed to be paying off, with the bakery
moving to a larger location down the street, but all
wasn't perfect. In nineteen thirty four, they took on Ruth's father,
Simon King, as a partner. It's not clear why they
did it. Perhaps they needed an infusion of capital, or
maybe they trusted King's business instincts. Either way, it doesn't
(02:20):
appear to have been a match made in Cake Heaven.
In nineteen thirty six, over a business disagreement, the company split,
with the couple selling their share and moving to Charlotte,
North Carolina to found a new bakery, while King took
over the Tennessee shop, which he renamed King's Bakery. McKee's
official history leaves a giant gap between nineteen thirty six
(02:42):
and nineteen fifty two. However, it seems that each bakery
operated with moderate success, though with little known about them
other than that It was during this period that Ode
invented what is known today as the company's oldest continuously
sold product, the oatmeal Cream Pie Cream High the original OCP.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
It first hit the shelves in nineteen sixty c two
oatmeal cookies layered with cream. So one wrap, a smile
and taste the dream. Want to guess how many we make?
Speaker 1 (03:11):
Inture is a lot, because today we bake.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
By the mid twentieth century, Ode and his wife decided
to sell their bakery and reportedly mulled over retiring, but
at the request of Ruth's brother, Cecil, who at this
point was running King's Bakery, returns to help out managing
it rather than run someone else's company for them. Not
long after, Ode and Ruth decided to buy the bakery
back and rename it McKey Baking Company. The company quickly
(03:37):
flourished under their management, which included the then innovative idea
to sell their product in family packs individually wrapped baked goods,
which were sold as a packaged deal. Specifically, in the
late nineteen fifties, McKey Foods began producing family packs of
twelve individually wrapped cakes in one unit. Thanks to you
essentially selling them in bulked customers. It allowed the company
to drop the price per unit slightly while enjoying a
(03:59):
significant boost in product sales at the same time. According
to Jack McKee, one of the couple sons, most other
snack companies didn't begin packaging items this way for another
decade or two. This all brings us to how a
straw hat clad, smiling girl named Debbie ended up on
the front of the boxes of mini treats. There are
slightly conflicting stories on how Ode came up with the
(04:20):
idea to use Little Debbie, but the general tale goes
that a packaging salesman, Bob Mosher, told Odie that the
McKee name was boring and that he needed something better
to do sales casting out, Odie supposedly noticed a picture
of his granddaughter, Debbie, daughter of his son Ellsworth and
daughter in laws Sharon McKee, on his desk, and a
light bulb went off in his heat. Still wanting to
(04:40):
use a family name, Odi decided on naming the company's
new line after Debbie and to use the picture on
his desk of her in a straw hat as a logo.
Whether that's exactly how he came up with the idea
or not, we do know definitively that he had said
picture in his office and that after inspiration struck, he
didn't tell Debbie's parents before going through with the final prinsing.
Not long off, the famed penne artist Pearl Freshman used
(05:03):
the picture of Od's desk to create a colored rendition
of the little girl that still graces the boxes to
this day. McKey Foods is still family owned by second
and the generation McKees.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
At our family bakeries, it takes a big talented team
to bake all of these snacks. My grandfather O. D.
McKee believed in innovation and automation. He was the Henry
Ford of snackcakes. While not an engineer by trade, he
spent countless hours in venting ways to make the lines
run more efficiently. My dad, Jack McKee, joined the company
(05:38):
as an engineer in the sixties. I followed in his
footsteps and became an engineer too. Today that innovative philosophy
continues and we're doing things that granddad would have never imagined.
Speaker 5 (05:49):
I've been working at the key Foods of the Bakery
as we like to call us, since I was sixteen
and done basically a lot of different jobs around the company.
Speaker 4 (05:56):
I love what we do. I mean selling Little Debbies,
selling some belt bakery be more fun.
Speaker 5 (06:00):
We have about six thousand employees nationwide, and here in
the Chado Garry we got about thirty five hundred employees
and we just want to treat our employees like family.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
As for Little Debbie McKee Fowler, she's now all grown
up and does the current executive vice president of the
company and runs the Little Debbie brands.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
As a founder of the Little Debbie Bakery, Ruth McKee
was a groundbreaking businesswoman. She was a working mom, and
she encouraged education for employees to advance and grow. Ruth
McKee was a role model for women in leadership. She
was my role model. She was also my grammy. I'm
Debbie McKee Fowler. Today I'm chairman of the board, but
(06:41):
you know me as Little Debbie.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
While the snack cake companies may be struggling, mckeing Foods
keeps thriving. In twenty fifteen, they announced an over one
hundred million dollars investment in their College Dell factory. In addition,
they recently acquired Drake's Cakes, who make devil dogs and yodels,
for twenty seven point five million from the bankrupt host and.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
A terrific job on the production, editing and storytelling by
our own Greg Hangler and a special thanks to Simon
Whistler from the Today I Found Out YouTube channel and
its sister, the Brain Food Show podcast. Check both of
them out. They have terrific and regularly great content and
what a story we heard. Little Debbie is now the
(07:23):
chairman of the board of McKee Foods. The story of
Little Debbie here on our American Stories. Plea habibi here again,
and I'd like to encourage you to subscribe to our
podcast on Apple Podcasts, the iHeartRadio app, or wherever you
get your podcasts. Every story we Are Here is uploaded
(07:43):
their daily and your support goes a long way to
keeping the great stories you love from this show coming again.
Please subscribe to the Our American Stories podcast or wherever
you get your podcasts.
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American
people coming to you from the city where the West begins,
Fort Worth, Texas. Whether you're a diehard cosmic Brownie fan
or a lover of zebra cakes Nutty Buddy Stark Crunch
for the annual Christmas tree Cakes, Little Debbie is a
(00:30):
brand you've probably seen time and again on almost every
grocery store shelf in America. Here to tell the story
of Little Debbie is Simon Whistler from the Today I
Found Out YouTube channel and its sister, the Brain Food
Show podcast. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
It was nineteen thirty three and the United States was
in the throes of the Great Depression. Nearly a quarter
of the nation was unemployed, and breadlines went on for blocks.
In short many were desperate, including Ode and Ruth McKee,
who had lost most of their money due to a
bank failure. What the couple did still have, however, was
a nineteen twenty eight Whippet car. According to McKee Food's
(01:13):
official history, this is when Ode started selling five cents
Virginia Dare cakes made by Becker's Bakery out of the
back of said vehicle. By the next year, business was
good enough that they were able to purchase a Chattanooga,
Tennessee bakery, Jack's Cookie Company, in what was a unique
arrangement for the time, Ruth became a full managing partner
in the business with her husband. While Odi traveled the
(01:35):
state making sales and coming up with some innovative ways
to reduce new product. She baked, managed the office and
took charge of the few employees that they had. They were,
as the company's official history put it, ideal business partners
because her cautious, conservative nature was the perfect compliment to
his risk taking, adventuresome spirit. Years later, Jack Bihee would
(01:58):
explain that his parents had a unique opportunity during the
Great Depression, and they took a risk. A few months
later that seemed to be paying off, with the bakery
moving to a larger location down the street, but all
wasn't perfect. In nineteen thirty four, they took on Ruth's father,
Simon King, as a partner. It's not clear why they
did it. Perhaps they needed an infusion of capital, or
maybe they trusted King's business instincts. Either way, it doesn't
(02:20):
appear to have been a match made in Cake Heaven.
In nineteen thirty six, over a business disagreement, the company split,
with the couple selling their share and moving to Charlotte,
North Carolina to found a new bakery, while King took
over the Tennessee shop, which he renamed King's Bakery. McKee's
official history leaves a giant gap between nineteen thirty six
(02:42):
and nineteen fifty two. However, it seems that each bakery
operated with moderate success, though with little known about them
other than that It was during this period that Ode
invented what is known today as the company's oldest continuously
sold product, the oatmeal Cream Pie Cream High the original OCP.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
It first hit the shelves in nineteen sixty c two
oatmeal cookies layered with cream. So one wrap, a smile
and taste the dream. Want to guess how many we make?
Speaker 1 (03:11):
Inture is a lot, because today we bake.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
By the mid twentieth century, Ode and his wife decided
to sell their bakery and reportedly mulled over retiring, but
at the request of Ruth's brother, Cecil, who at this
point was running King's Bakery, returns to help out managing
it rather than run someone else's company for them. Not
long after, Ode and Ruth decided to buy the bakery
back and rename it McKey Baking Company. The company quickly
(03:37):
flourished under their management, which included the then innovative idea
to sell their product in family packs individually wrapped baked goods,
which were sold as a packaged deal. Specifically, in the
late nineteen fifties, McKey Foods began producing family packs of
twelve individually wrapped cakes in one unit. Thanks to you
essentially selling them in bulked customers. It allowed the company
to drop the price per unit slightly while enjoying a
(03:59):
significant boost in product sales at the same time. According
to Jack McKee, one of the couple sons, most other
snack companies didn't begin packaging items this way for another
decade or two. This all brings us to how a
straw hat clad, smiling girl named Debbie ended up on
the front of the boxes of mini treats. There are
slightly conflicting stories on how Ode came up with the
(04:20):
idea to use Little Debbie, but the general tale goes
that a packaging salesman, Bob Mosher, told Odie that the
McKee name was boring and that he needed something better
to do sales casting out, Odie supposedly noticed a picture
of his granddaughter, Debbie, daughter of his son Ellsworth and
daughter in laws Sharon McKee, on his desk, and a
light bulb went off in his heat. Still wanting to
(04:40):
use a family name, Odi decided on naming the company's
new line after Debbie and to use the picture on
his desk of her in a straw hat as a logo.
Whether that's exactly how he came up with the idea
or not, we do know definitively that he had said
picture in his office and that after inspiration struck, he
didn't tell Debbie's parents before going through with the final prinsing.
Not long off, the famed penne artist Pearl Freshman used
(05:03):
the picture of Od's desk to create a colored rendition
of the little girl that still graces the boxes to
this day. McKey Foods is still family owned by second
and the generation McKees.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
At our family bakeries, it takes a big talented team
to bake all of these snacks. My grandfather O. D.
McKee believed in innovation and automation. He was the Henry
Ford of snackcakes. While not an engineer by trade, he
spent countless hours in venting ways to make the lines
run more efficiently. My dad, Jack McKee, joined the company
(05:38):
as an engineer in the sixties. I followed in his
footsteps and became an engineer too. Today that innovative philosophy
continues and we're doing things that granddad would have never imagined.
Speaker 5 (05:49):
I've been working at the key Foods of the Bakery
as we like to call us, since I was sixteen
and done basically a lot of different jobs around the company.
Speaker 4 (05:56):
I love what we do. I mean selling Little Debbies,
selling some belt bakery be more fun.
Speaker 5 (06:00):
We have about six thousand employees nationwide, and here in
the Chado Garry we got about thirty five hundred employees
and we just want to treat our employees like family.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
As for Little Debbie McKee Fowler, she's now all grown
up and does the current executive vice president of the
company and runs the Little Debbie brands.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
As a founder of the Little Debbie Bakery, Ruth McKee
was a groundbreaking businesswoman. She was a working mom, and
she encouraged education for employees to advance and grow. Ruth
McKee was a role model for women in leadership. She
was my role model. She was also my grammy. I'm
Debbie McKee Fowler. Today I'm chairman of the board, but
(06:41):
you know me as Little Debbie.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
While the snack cake companies may be struggling, mckeing Foods
keeps thriving. In twenty fifteen, they announced an over one
hundred million dollars investment in their College Dell factory. In addition,
they recently acquired Drake's Cakes, who make devil dogs and yodels,
for twenty seven point five million from the bankrupt host and.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
A terrific job on the production, editing and storytelling by
our own Greg Hangler and a special thanks to Simon
Whistler from the Today I Found Out YouTube channel and
its sister, the Brain Food Show podcast. Check both of
them out. They have terrific and regularly great content and
what a story we heard. Little Debbie is now the
(07:23):
chairman of the board of McKee Foods. The story of
Little Debbie here on our American Stories. Plea habibi here again,
and I'd like to encourage you to subscribe to our
podcast on Apple Podcasts, the iHeartRadio app, or wherever you
get your podcasts. Every story we Are Here is uploaded
(07:43):
their daily and your support goes a long way to
keeping the great stories you love from this show coming again.
Please subscribe to the Our American Stories podcast or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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