"I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country." - Thomas Jefferson

1985 DISCOVERY OF FDA TESTIMONY

Thanks to a feature article in the Washington Post, Sunday edition in early January about the "Peanut Butter Wars" and consumer activist Ruth Desmond, I discovered why CPC had fraudulently concealed this incriminating evidence from the 1980 Court. Not only had Jerome Rosefield given knowingly false testimony to the FDA Examiner at the 1966 peanut butter hearings, denying the Examiner's question, "Are you sure there isn't some patent abuse here (with Skippy)?", but CPC officer John Volkhardt had given testimony to the FDA : "Skippy was originally named after the cartoon character who was painting his name on a fence." This blatant admission of trade forgery of Percy Crosby's Skippy signature and comic symbols was the basis of our 1980 lawsuit, yet Volkhardt 's 1980 sworn testimony denied any connection. Rosefield also admitted that the FDA complained about Rosefield's 1933 Skippy label, but he did not reveal to the FDA Examiner in 1966 that the Patent Office had prohibited Rosefield's Skippy application as a matter of statutory law in 1934. I sent a demand letter to CPC counsel Hanes Heller, warning him Skippy would re-enter the food market with an authentic Skippy product, but I got no reply.

My husband and I found a licensee interested in selling Skippy caramel corn with peanuts in a child's sand pail that my sister (a commercial artist) and I designed with Percy Crosby's Skippy character to parody Volkhardt's admissions of trade forgery. Skippy counsel James L. Kurtz advised us to recapture the market "CPC stole from your father", assuring us CPC would "commit legal suicide" if they dared to sue. Annual minimum sales of the product were estimated at $1.5 million dollars, and the artistic pail was an instant success. Then our attorney suddenly refused to represent Skippy, denying that CPC had influenced him. CPC then made a major change on its Skippy label to conceal its imitation of Crosby's distinctive lettering. Our licensee told us they were having problems getting the product on store shelves via jobbers and distributors who were afraid of CPC's reprisal, but did not tell us that CPC had sent a cease and desist letter to our licensee, Pineland Peanut Processors. My husband and I became alarmed when attorney Kurtz warned us CPC intended to sue until we were "both dead." We met with the assistant U.S. Attorney. He told us there was "strong evidence of CPC's fraud on the court in 1980", and assured us he would take action if CPC sued. Both Kurtz and CPC were fully aware my husband had been hospitalized and diagnosed with congestive heart disease, and that further litigation could be dangerous.