Harry Burnett Reese (May 24, 1879 – May 16, 1956) was an American inventor and businessman known for creating Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, and founding the H. B. Reese Candy Company. In 2009, he was posthumously inducted into the Candy Hall of Fame.
H. B. Reese was born on May 24, 1879, on the Frosty Hill Farm, an agricultural and dairy farm located near the Muddy Creek Forks Historic District in York County, Pennsylvania. He was of Welsh and English descent and was the only child of Annie Belinda Manifold (1854–1935) and Aquilla Asbury Reese Jr. (1845–1914). In addition to his farmland work, Reese raised frogs that he sold to restaurants in the Baltimore area. By 1898, Reese was an established French horn player who performed with local area bands.
On August 1, 1900, Reese married Blanche Edna Hyson (1882–1968), the daughter of Mary Elizabeth Markey (1857–1952) and Robert Bortner Hyson (1853–1930). Together they had 16 children, 8 daughters and 8 sons (13 of whom survived to adulthood).
Reese's mother Annie Belinda Manifold (1854–1935) and her sisters Elizabeth Turner Manifold (1846–1910) and Mary Collins Manifold (1847–1933) lived with him for the rest of their lives. At least 20 family members were present during a typical Reese family supper and sometimes more than 40.
By 1903, Reese was managing the fishing operations of his father-in-law's cannery business located in Ditchley, Virginia. In 1912 he managed a dairy farm in Woodbine, Pennsylvania, but took a factory job in New Freedom, Pennsylvania, in 1915 to support his growing family.
In 1916, Reese read an ad in the York Daily Record by Milton S. Hershey seeking to hire people to manage and operate his numerous dairy farms that were located in the Hershey, Pennsylvania, area. In 1917, Hershey hired Reese to work as a dairyman at Farm 28-A. In 1918, Hershey asked Reese to manage a dairy farm called the Round Barn. Hershey visited the Round Barn every two weeks because it was an experimental dairy farm that used new milking machines (more efficient than milking cows by hand) as he sought new approaches to animal treatment and milk production. In 1919, Hershey found the Round Barn too expensive to operate and closed it.
Jobless in 1919, Reese formed a new business called the R&R Candy Company that he operated from an old canning factory located in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, where he manufactured milk chocolate covered almonds and raisins, selling them to local stores.
Superior Chocolate and Confectionery Company
Reese knew he needed high-quality manufacturing equipment in order to boost the potential of his Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, candy business. In January 1920, he reorganized the R&R Candy Company as the Superior Chocolate and Confectionery Company and proceeded to raise today's equivalent of $290,000 by issuing stock in the newly formed company. A State charter for the new company was issued on May 14, 1920, with the following company officers:
Treasurer: J. Landis Strickler
Nonetheless, the business ultimately failed.
Under pressure to support his 10 children — with yet another baby on the way — Reese took a paper mill job in Spring Grove, Pennsylvania, where he worked a second job as a butcher. He also had a third job canning vegetables.
In 1921, Reese's father-in-law purchased a home at 18 E. Areba Avenue in Hershey, Pennsylvania, for his son-in-law's growing family. With his return to Hershey, Reese began working at The Hershey Company factory in the shipping department and was soon promoted to foreman.
On the side, working from the basement of his Areba Avenue home, he made a variety of confectionery products including hard candy, chocolate covered nuts and raisins, mints as well as two popular milk chocolate covered caramel-coconut candy bars that he invented:
The Lizzie Bar named for his oldest daughter, Mary Elizabeth.
The Johnny Bar named for his son, John, who worked alongside his father in The Hershey Company shipping department.
The ingredients for both bars included fresh grated coconut, caramel, molasses, cocoa butter and honey. The main difference between the two bars was that the Johnny Bar had nuts as an ingredient. From the very beginning, Reese used chocolate manufactured by The Hershey Company for his chocolate coatings.
Reese incorporated the H. B. Reese Candy Company in 1923. Selling a large assortment of candies on consignment, his employees coated by hand each piece of candy on marble slabs, some coated with milk chocolate and others with dark chocolate that were placed in two-pound and five-pound boxes that were sold in department store candy displays. To promote sales, Reese set up special coating tables in the front display windows of large, downtown department stores and had his employees coat candies in full view of shoppers passing by while other employees handed out freshly made samples.