HONOLULU – Wallace “Wally” Amos, the writer of the cookie empire that took his title and made it well-known and who went directly to change into a youngsters’s literacy recommend, has died. He was once 88.Amos created the Well-known Amos cookie empire and sooner or later misplaced possession of the corporate — in addition to the rights to make use of the catchy Amos title. In his later years, he turned into a owner of a cookie store known as Chip & Cookie in Hawaii, the place he moved in 1977.He died Tuesday at his house in Honolulu, along with his spouse, Carol, at his facet, his youngsters mentioned. He died from headaches with dementia, they mentioned. “Together with his Panama hat, kazoo, and boundless optimism, Well-known Amos was once an ideal American luck tale, and a supply of Black pleasure,” mentioned a remark from his youngsters, Sarah, Michael, Gregory and Shawn Amos. They mentioned their dad “impressed a era of marketers when he based the sector’s first cookie retailer” on Sundown Street in Los Angeles in 1975. Wally Amos was once additionally co-founder of Uncle Wally’s Muffin Co., whose merchandise are present in retail outlets national. However Amos mentioned the celebrity by no means truly mattered a lot to him.“Being well-known is extremely puffed up anyway,” Amos advised The Related Press in 2007.His muffin corporate, based totally in Shirley, N.Y., was once initially based as Uncle Noname Cookie Co. in 1992, a couple of years after Amos misplaced Well-known Amos, which nonetheless extensively makes use of his title on its merchandise.Amos had mentioned the Well-known Amos cookies offered lately are not like his cookies, which had a number of chocolate, actual butter and natural vanilla extract.“You’ll be able to’t evaluate a machine-made cookie with home made cookie,” he advised the AP. “It’s like evaluating a Rolls Royce with a Volkswagen.”Uncle Noname, then again, foundered as a result of debt and issues of its reduced in size producers.The corporate filed for chapter in 1996, deserted cookies and went into cakes on the recommendation of Amos’ industry spouse, Lou Avignone.Inside of his now-shuttered Hawaii cookie store, he offered bite-sized cookies very similar to those he first offered on the Well-known Amos Hollywood retailer. Amos additionally was once lively in selling studying. His store, for instance, had a studying room with dozens of donated books, and Amos generally spent Saturdays sitting on a rocking chair, dressed in a watermelon hat, studying to youngsters.The previous highschool dropout penned 8 books, served as spokesperson for Literacy Volunteers of The united states for twenty-four years and gave motivational talks to companies, universities and different teams.Amos earned a large number of honors for his volunteerism, together with the Literacy Award introduced through President George H.W. Bush in 1991.“Your biggest contribution for your nation isn’t your signature straw hat within the Smithsonian, however the folks you will have impressed to discover ways to learn,” Bush mentioned.In one among his books, “Guy With No Title: Flip Lemons Into Lemonade,” Amos defined how he misplaced Well-known Amos even sooner than it was once offered for $63 million to a Taiwanese corporate in 1991. In spite of powerful gross sales, through 1985, the industry was once shedding cash, so Amos introduced in out of doors traders.“The brand new homeowners wolfed up extra of my percentage till unexpectedly, I discovered I had misplaced all possession within the corporate I based,” Amos wrote. Ahead of lengthy, the corporate had modified possession 4 instances.Born in Tallahassee, Fla., Amos moved to New York Town at age 12 as a result of his oldsters’ divorce. He lived with an aunt, Della Bryant, who taught him how one can make chocolate chip cookies.He later dropped out of highschool to enroll in the Air Pressure sooner than operating as a mailroom clerk on the William Morris Company, the place he turned into a skill agent, operating with The Supremes, Simon & Garfunkel and Marvin Gaye sooner than borrowing $25,000 to release his cookie industry.He was once the primary Black agent within the industry, his son, Shawn Amos, mentioned. “Our dad taught us the price of laborious paintings, believing in ourselves, and chasing our desires,” his youngsters’s remark mentioned. “We additionally know he would like it should you had a chocolate chip cookie lately.”Copyright 2024 The Related Press. All rights reserved. This subject matter might not be revealed, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed with out permission.
