TRIVIAL PURSUITS: What do the M’s stand for in M&Ms?

Forrest Mars Sr., of the Mars candy company, came up with the idea of a hard shelled candy with chocolate at the center. In 1941, he struck a deal for the chocolate with Bruce Murrie, son of Hershey president William Murrie, because he anticipated there would be a chocolate shortage in the pending war.

They named the candy M&M, which stood for “Mars & Murrie.”

The deal gave Murrie a 20% stake in the candy, but this stake was later bought out by Mars when chocolate rationing ended at the end of the war in 1948.

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