Reading Biscuit Town

Post 85 Happy memories of my childhood

During the early 1950s and as a little boy, I used to like the small and round biscuits kept in green oblong tin containers. The then Malaya was still under the colonial rule and it was a privilege that children got to wear shoes, clothing, and to eat food like biscuits manufactured in England.

In 1986 I was studying in Reading (pronounced as ‘Redding’), England and together with my wife and two daughters, we were there for a year. It so happened that while travelling on the upper deck of a bus in town one afternoon, I saw the signboard of Huntley & Palmers. The name was very familiar to me since I was a boy, though at that time I did not know how to pronounce them.

My wife then confirmed that the ‘reading’ biscuits which I took in the 50s were actually manufactured in the town. I was really delighted that the household name in biscuit manufacturing had brought back happy memories of my childhood. I did not expect that one day I would be in the biscuit town to rekindle old dreams!

Huntley & Palmers was founded in 1822 and for the next 150 years, was well known for being "Number One in Biscuits and Second-to-None in Cakes." At its zenith, it was trading in 137 countries. Visitors to the Museum of Reading would be able to see the 1,500 biscuit tins made by the Quaker company.

I’ll never forget the green oblong tin containers which brought joy to my childhood days.

8 March 2011