death_date birth_place other_names nationality birth_date known_for image article_title name occupation
1 june 1967 new york , new york margaret fogarty american september 14 , 1897 founder of pepperidge farm margaret rudkin.jpg margaret rudkin
 margaret rudkin baker , businesswoman
margaret rudkin

margaret rudkin -lrb- née fogarty -rrb- -lrb- september 14 , 1897 -- june 1 , 1967 -rrb- , of fairfield , connecticut , was the founder of pepperidge farm .
born in manhattan , she was the eldest of five children of joseph and margaret `` healey '' fogarty .
she was taught to cook by her grandmother , who started her off with cakes and biscuits .
she moved to long island when she was 12 .
rudkin graduated valedictorian from her high school ; afterwards , she worked as a teller in a bank .
in 1919 , rudkin got a job with mcclure jones and co. , where she met her future husband , henry albert rudkin .
they were married on april 8 , 1923 , and together they had three sons .
in 1926 , the two purchased land in fairfield , built a home and called the estate pepperidge farm after the pepperidge tree `` nyssa sylvatica '' .
although fairly well off , they suffered somewhat during the great depression and made ends meet by selling apples and turkeys .
margaret rudkin was inspired to found pepperidge farm due to her son mark 's asthma , whose reactions to preservatives and artificial ingredients prevented him from eating the town 's bread .
rudkin was devastated that her son could n't enjoy the bread , so she decided she would create a non-allergic bread for him .
bread , being the foundation of rudkin 's family tree , was no secret to rudkin and within 5 days she created her first product , a whole wheat bread .
after offering it to the local doctor , who immediately ordered it to sell to his patients , rudkin was soon selling it in her town .
four months later she was selling it in new york with her husband as delivery man .
soon she was distributing her bread -lrb- both whole wheat and white loaves -rrb- across the country .
within three years the endeavor had outgrown the small farm bakery and a large commercial bakery was opened in norwalk on july 4 , 1947 .
although world war ii caused problems due to rationing , the bakery was producing 50,000 loaves a week in 1948 .
by 1950 rudkin was appearing in commercials on television .
at the same time , under her management the bakery was expanding into other products , including the goldfish snack .
in 1961 she sold the business to the campbell soup company and became a director of that company .
although having sold pepperidge farm , she still ran the company until her retirement in 1966 .
margaret rudkin died of breast cancer in 1967 at the age of 69 .
according to june 2 , 1967 , article in the `` new york times '' , she was survived by her three sons .
her husband had died the year before .
she is buried in the woodlawn cemetery in the bronx , new york city .
her son mark became a landscape architect known for working on famous gardens in france , such as the jardins du nouveau monde .
