The 20th Century was less than two decades old when Bob McCormack visited Albany, GA with the idea of starting a candy-making enterprise. A January 1919 edition of the Albany Herald announced it this way: “Another new enterprise has been announced. A candy factory will be established here at an early date by ‘Birmingham capitalists."

These Birmingham ‘capitalists’ included Bob McCormack, E.L. Martin, R.E. (Bob) Mills, Charles Myer, and Lawrence McCormack. Each investor had a history in the candy-and-cracker business – Bob McCormack, Mills, Myer, and Martin worked with the Martin Biscuit Company in Nashville and Lawrence McCormack was a candy salesman.

In May 1919, McCormack’s Famous Candy Company began production of the first commercial candy made in Albany. On the 9th day of April, 1919, Albany had its first stick of candy manufactured there.

“I sold the first day’s run to three jobbers in Albany. That was the beginning of Bobs,” McCormack proudly wrote.

In 1920, McCormack wooed and wed his fiancée, Louise Keller. Within a few years they produced three children, Anna Louise, Bob Jr., and Bee. While still a pre-schooler, Anna Louise appeared in ads as the company ‘mascot,’ wearing a hat with “BOBS’ emblazoned on the front and leaning on a box that proclaims “I am Pure and Sweet.”

Famous Candy Company was a success, despite WWI induced sugar shortages. The business created a general line of candies, which included coconut, peanut, stick, hard candy and taffy.

Investor Bob Mills moved from Birmingham to help with administration so Bob McCormack could concentrate on sales and production. Booming sales allowed both Bobs to buy out the other investors and rename the company the Mills-McCormack Candy Company.

In 1924, the company changed its name to Bobs’ Candy Company. Later, the placement of the apostrophe was dropped and the company became Bobs Candy Company.

The 20s rolled into the 30s, and, by the third year of The Depression, national candy sales tumbled 45 percent. Nearly 900 American candy makers went bankrupt. Bobs Candies was an exception.

In the early 1930s, Bobs Candies expanded its production of low-cost pecan candies and continued with chocolates, coconuts, and peanut candies. Bobs introduced a new line of snack foods -- salted peanuts and peanut butter crackers-- and moved to a larger facility to produce them.

William Thomas, a candy maker at Bobs for 35 years, remembers how hard candy was made at the original facility:

“We cooked over an open fire when I came. The rock table for the candy was made of marble. Candy was pulled on a big metal hook on the wall and we pulled it for eight or nine minutes.”

Soon those marble tables would be replaced by water-cooled metal tables, continuous vacuum cookers would replace open fires, and automated pullers and candy spinners were introduced.

By mid-decade, Bobs Candy Company had gained a reputation as the Cadillac of the general candy industry.

New Year’s Day 1940 dawned bright for Bob McCormack and the employees of Bobs Candies; purses tightened by The Depression were loosening, and Americans were buying candies and snack foods at a healthy rate. Bobs product list now included salted peanuts, peanut candies, peanut brittle, peanut butter and peanut butter candies, in addition to the company’s top-selling lines.

Bobs had weathered the worst financial crunch in U.S. history – and actually prospered. Yet it would not weather well the coming storm.

In the early hours of February 10, 1940, a devastating tornado dropped down on the business district of Albany. In a matter of minutes the twister leveled Bobs Candies and created a pile of rubble that took 256 truckloads to remove.

A front page photo from the Feb. 11, 1940 Atlanta Journal shows an aerial photo of the destruction. The headline reads: At Least 17 Dead, 500 Hurt in Albany; Storm Loss Estimated at $9,000,000.

In the photo, a trail of collapsed buildings and rubble scribes the path of destruction.  Near the top left is a crumbled building that, days before, was Bobs Candies.  Sadly, with no tornado insurance, the company would have to rebuild virtually from scratch. Six months after the tornado, Bobs was back in business.

The War Years caused many changes at Bobs Candies: Sugar was rationed, the supply of coconut from the Philippines dried up, and Bobs stopped making pecan candy because the price of pecans doubled, then tripled. Keep in mind that government price controls froze the price Bobs could charge for its candy.

Luckily, Bobs developed a snack food line – peanut butter crackers and vacuum packed peanuts. For the next few years, peanuts supplanted pecans as Bobs' main nut. Like pecans, peanuts were produced locally; unlike pecans, peanuts were readily available during War years.

Again, an innovative spirit helped push Bobs into the forefront. Bobs began vacuum packing its products after the tornado. In the 30s, peanuts regularly packed peanuts became inedible after 10 days on store shelves.  After cellophane wrapping was introduced, products lasted six weeks.  Vacuum packed peanuts lasted from one to five years.

Bobs’ candies were highly regarded by servicemen and women in WWII.  Bobs’ tins of hard candies were warmly welcomed, and American GIs loved sharing the candy with children in war-deprived countries.

During the late 1940s, the McCormack children came to work at Bobs.  Anna Louise, who was the company’s cherubic “Candy Girl” in the 1920s, began work as a bookkeeper. Bob Jr. started work in 1947. Third child, Mary Beatrice McCormack, (known as Bee) began her long career with Bobs in employee and public relations.

Americans clamored for hard candies in the late 1940s, and Bobs saw that they got it. Hard candies had to be shipped and sold from the shelves in a short time or they became gummy and bled color, especially in South Georgia’s high humidity. In 1946, large air conditioners were installed to dehumidify the wrapping room. Then, in 1949, a new machine was introduced that wrapped and sealed the sticks in moisture proof wrappers.

By early 1950, fully 22 percent of Bobs’ stick candy production was broken and tossed as scrap. Bob McCormack asked his brother-in-law, inventor Father Harding Keller, if he had any suggestions to resolve this issue.

Six months later, Father Keller perfected a machine which twisted the soft candy into the spiral striping; then cut the sticks in precise measurements. The Keller Machine revolutionized the stick candy market.

Supermarkets became a uniquely American phenomenon in the 1950s, and transformed how Americans bought groceries, supplies, and goodies.

Studies at the time showed that the distance a shopper walked, not how long they stayed in a store, meant more purchases. Supermarkets introduced aisles and spread staples throughout the store, so that shoppers had to walk by many items to get to the products they wanted or needed.

Enter the notion of impulse buying: Bobs' far-sighted sales staff spent many hours convincing supermarket managers to strategically place attractive candy displays, in order to sell lots of candy – and sell it did.

Bob McCormack Sr., with 30 years experience anticipating market trends, predicted hard candies would be the growth future of his company. The Keller Machine and vacuum wrappers allowed for mass candy cane production. Bobs Candy and Peanut Company now sold products in 600 A & P stores across the South.

Another innovation, break-proof packaging (originally conceived by Bee and Bob McCormack Jr.), allowed Bobs to ship hard candies nationwide.  Bobs’ patented ‘keyhole’ packaging resulted.

By 1956, the Albany Herald proclaimed Bobs “the world’s largest peppermint candy cane producer."

Bobs surmounted the final hurdle to making candy canes in 1958 when two employees, Dick Driskell and Jimmy Spratling, perfected a machine started by Father Keller that created the crook in candy canes. Employees originally caught a strip of soft candy as it came down the assembly line and wrapped it around a wooden mould -- forming the distinctive crook -- while the candy was still warm.

By the end of the 1950s, Bobs Candies, Inc., grew from a three-man operation to an ultra-modern, highly mechanized plant, producing 1.8 million sticks of candy every day and half a million candy canes. National sales of products generated $3.3 million annually.

In February 1963, after 44 years at the helm of Bobs Candies, Bob McCormack Sr. stepped from his role as president and promoted his son to the position. Bob Jr. ran the daily business operations while Bob Sr. retained his position as chairman of the board.

Bob Jr. assumed the helm and immediately began a systematic plan to move the company into a new facility.

The new building included a climatized storage area with temperature and humidity controlled by 260 tons of air conditioning units.

Construction began in the summer of 1967, but Bob McCormack Sr. did not live to see it completed. Bob McCormack Sr. died on September 21, 1967.

By May 1968, Bobs began production in its new facilities.

The 1970s brought about another innovation to Bobs Candies –shrink wrapping. Shrink wrapping provided an eye-pleasing appearance and was a boon to production.

Pure sugar candy sales soared in the 1970s, so Bobs introduced the Groen cooker, it eliminating open fire cooking and streamlining processing of pure sugar candy.

Bob Jr.’s children, Greg, Mary Helen, and Julie joined Anna Louise, Bee, and Bob Jr. at the company in the 1980s.

During 1980, Bobs' employees converted 100,000 pounds of sugar and corn syrup into two million candy canes, daily. In addition to Christmas treats, the new plant made and shipped 236 million candy sticks that year.  A record year -- for both Bobs and the candy industry as a whole --national candy sales climbed, despite an economy troubled by inflation, soaring high interest, increased prices of cocoa beans and sugar, and diminishing disposable income.

The 1980s was a memorable decade for Bobs Candies, Inc. The mantle of leadership would once again be passed to a McCormack, this time it would be to grandson, Greg.

The year that Albany celebrated it's Sesquicentennial; Bobs' employees produced the world’s largest candy cane, an eight-foot-long striped cane that weighed more than 100 pounds.

In December, 1988, Greg McCormack was elected as president of Bobs Candies, Inc.

In 2005, Farley's & Sathers Candy Company, Inc. acquired Bobs Candies.