The adorable baby face that has been representing Gerber products since 1931 has turned 93 years of age.
Ann Turner Cook, whose face is recognized around the world as an infant, celebrated her birthday last week. Cook was four months old when a family friend portrayed her cute expressions in a charcoal sketch.
Just a year after that, Gerber was ready to launch their baby food and product line and required a baby face to use as their official trademark logo.
Following the company’s call for images, Cook’s photo made its way to the contest where no one could resist her captivating dilated eyes and quizzical open mouth.
It was how the charcoaled drawing made by Cook’s neighbor, Dorothy Hope Smith, won the competition, eventually appearing on every Gerber product as an icon of a healthy and happy baby.
Cook, a retired teacher, had no idea how valuable the drawing could prove both for her and the company.
She said: “I can’t think of anything nicer than to be a symbol for babies. And that’s what I think I became.”
Before her retirement in 1989, the mom-of-four remained a teacher of English literature and writing in Tampa, Florida, for more than 25 years.
Cook told CBS News that she received the first payment by the company in the 1950’s about twenty years after her symbolic expressions were used as a trademark.
She said the amount was ‘enough to make a down payment on a modest house and to buy a first car.’
Amazingly, Cook still has the same beaming smile and broad gleaming eyes on her face that compelled her neighbor to sketch her nine decades ago.
She said: “I always had that expression with my mouth hanging open. Kind of a quizzical expression!”
Cook believes that the popularity her baby face has got is because people get reminded of their own kids whenever they have a look at it.
She said: “Everybody says, my baby or my grandchild looks like the Gerber baby. And it doesn’t matter the ethnicity. And I say, ‘Yes, I’m sure they do!’”
Marilyn Knox, the CEO of the company, said she had ‘little doubt’ about whether or not the baby face had played any constructive role for the company.
“You don’t even have to have the word Gerber on it,” Knox said. “That face is honored as we’re doing the best for our child.”
Cook’s baby face is carved in a stone placed at the entrance of the company’s headquarters in Michigan, and can also be seen on the flag mounted on the headquarters building.
As the company didn’t reveal the identity of its original Gerber baby until 1978, people formed several speculations about who it was.
Many believed that the photo was of either Elizabeth Taylor or Humphrey Bogart when they were a baby. However, Cook was always aware of the fact that it was her.
“I probably was about three years old when mother pointed out the baby food jar and said that was my picture,” she said. “And I thought it was quite a lovely thing!”
Cook said as she grew older, her children and family members would tell ‘to whoever was walking by!’ in the shop that it was the picture of their mother.
“My own children would to go to a grocery store and they would point to a Gerber baby food and they’d say, ‘That’s my mother’s picture!’” she said.
“And, you know, I didn’t know whether to stop and explain, cause it’s kind of a complicated story, or just kind of grin and go on!”
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