Posted on 11/25/2011 5:37:18 AM PST by WOBBLY BOB
DULUTH, Minn.—Jeno Paulucci, a Minnesota business icon whose restaurant ventures included a company that popularized the finger food known as pizza rolls, has died. He was 93. Paulucci's daughter Cindy Paulucci Selton tells the Duluth News-Tribune he died Thursday morning at his Duluth home. His wife, Lois, had died just four days earlier.
In 1944, Paulucci founded Duluth-based Chun King, which sold a line of canned Chinese food. More than two decades later, he sold that company to R.J. Reynolds Food Inc.
(Excerpt) Read more at twincities.com ...
“Nine out of ten doctors recommend Chun King...”
A closeup showed all the ‘doctors” were Asians.
A couple here in Southern Maryland just passed.
Married 71 years , he 95, she 90,He died two weeks prior to his wife.
He had been suffering with a weak heart for the last 5 years and she stayed alive just to keep him alive.
They were a great couple, they will be sadly missed.
He could not live without her. That is a beautiful story. However, I want to die the exact minute that my wife does. If I was the children, I would have a dual funeral (unless she already had hers which I don’t believe with only 4 days).
Pizza rolls, one of my six year old basic food groups.
I’m actually relieved to know that the guy who came up with Pizza Rolls was Italian.
At one time he had a house in Sanford, FL. He was my grandparents neighbor.
Working in a Duluth grocery store as a young man, he discovered a shipment of grapefruit had arrived sprinkled lightly with vegetable oil from a broken container.
His boss told Jeno to throw them out but instead, Jeno made a sign that said “Special...Argentine grapefruit,” and marked the product up $.10 each.
They quickly sold out.
Ha! Some people just have the gift of sales. Love me some pizza rolls!
His hometown of Duluth was a union rathole. He was doing them a favor by providing a frozen foods packing company in a town short on jobs. They thought they would thank him by unionizing it.
Jeno answered the challenge by moving the packing operations 210 miles west to Fargo, North Dakota where unions weren't popular. My sister took one of the first jobs at the new plant.
We lived in MN for several years and part of my job involved being in Duluth-Superior where Jeno was a local legend.
He should have written a business book since he had marketing and sales figured out pretty well.
Jeno was a multi-millionaire, but he never showed it. He was a regular guy.
To this day I still occasionally buy Michelina’s frozen dinners (which Jeno created). Pretty tasty, and dirt cheap.
RIP.
≤}B^)
Chun King was one of the earliest brands of mass-marketed Chinese food in the United States, offering convenient "exotic" dinners in a can. Beginning with chicken chow mein in 1947, Chun King later expanded its menu to include eggrolls and chop suey. Although chow mein was Chinese-American, the maker of Chun King foods was not. The founder and president of Chun King was Jeno F. Paulucci, the son of Italian immigrants. Paulucci began his career in the food industry working in a grocery, and later sold fruits and vegetables from a car. Paulucci saw an opportunity in Chinese food and began canning and selling chow mein. The business grew into a multi-million dollar industry, and in the late 1960s Paulucci sold the company for $63 million. In the 1990s ConAgra and Hunt-Wesson marketed Chun King chow mein, beansprouts, eggrolls, and sauces. St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture, 2002 Gale Group.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_g1epc/is_tov/ai_2419100249/
Chun King Egg Rolls and Chow Mien were the face of Chinese food in parts of the country before Chinese take-out became prolific most everywhere.
Because of that and thought they both sucked I never ventured into Chinese restaurants until my mid 20’s....which were good but once I discovered Thai and Viet I rarely eat it unless it’s one of those bazillion item buffet places and even then that’s only once a year or so.
RIP.
So was Chief "Iron eyes" Cody...
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