Man in the Moon Candies owner Amy Stone holds a marshmallow under her chocolate fountain at a bridal show at the American Foundry Sunday. Stone’s shop opens today in Oswego’s Canal Commons.
First Appeared 02-11-07 Palladium-Times By ADELE DELSAVIO
When Man in the Moon Candies opens today in Oswego's Canal Commons, it will be the latest development in a 72-year-old candy-making tradition in the Stone family.
“I like the theme of an old-fashioned candy store. The public wants to go back to a simpler time,” said owner Amy Stone.
Stone sells homemade candies like peanut brittle, almond bark, turtles, peanut and cashew patties, butter crunch, and fudge, and carries commercially made nostalgia candies such as atomic fireballs, root beer barrels and Necco wafers.
She offers special-occasion items like chocolate wedding favors and a chocolate fountain.
She plans to expand her line of sugar-free candy. “It's very much in demand,” she said.
Her four older sisters - Mary Kay, Peggy, Jeanne and Maureen - along with her mother, Jeanne, and father, Bob, are helping her with the business.
Sweet start
The family's candy-making passion started with Stone's grandfather, Ray, who worked for Oswego Candy Works.
“He wanted to start his own business,” Stone said.
He and his wife, Gladys, began in 1935 by making hard candy lollipops in the basement of their West Seneca Street home.
Using a manual candy press that molded three lollipops at a time, they turned out 1,000 each day.
“When my dad was about 12, he'd come home from school and wrap suckers for several hours,” Stone said.
The press produced a lollipop that had a smiley-face design, so the family called them man-in-the-moon suckers.
Disappointment
Although the candies were popular, the Depression made it impossible for the family to secure a bank loan to buy more equipment and continue the business.
Ray went back to the Candy Works.
Postwar pickup
The family picked their business up again when Bob Stone came home in 1946 from his World War II service with the Navy.
“As a veteran he got an extra sugar ration,” Stone said.
They opened Stone's Candy on East Bridge Street, keeping it in the family until it was sold in 1973. The business, still named “Stone's,” is now on West Bridge Street.
Around 1980, Stone said, her father started getting “itchy,” wondering if he could make it in the candy business again.
Stone was in high school by this time. She and her father made taffy and peanut brittle that they sent to her sisters and their friends in college.
“The peanut brittle was well received and so was the hard candy,” she said. “But the hard candy took too much labor.”
Stone, 41, started Man in the Moon Candies shortly before Christmas in 2005.
Tribute
She named the business “Man in the Moon” as a tribute to her grandparents, and the smiley-face candy press sits in a display case in the new store.
Stone still makes the candy at her house on West Seneca Street, a half block away from her grandparents' house.
“There's not enough space for production in the store,” she explained. Both her house and her shop are fully inspected and licensed, she added.
