The Candy Bar War

Imagine if the price of your favourite treat went up 60% overnight. Wouldn’t you be upset?

Well, this is precisely what happened on April 25^th, 1947, after the end of World War 2 when government price controls were removed. Wages remained low. Money was tight.

Black and white photograph of a group of children standing outside a store called WigWam, some licking ice cream cones, holding placards saying variations on the wording ‘Don’t be a Sucker, Don’t buy 8c bars’.

Kids protesting the rise in the price of a candy bar.

A group of Ladysmith kids went to the local candy store, called The WigWam. Anticipating the delicious taste of their favourite chocolate bars, they were shocked to find that instead of 5¢, the bars now cost 8¢! This was a huge blow as their pocket money – if they were lucky enough to get any – was about 15¢ weekly. It meant that their pocket money wasn’t enough – they couldn’t afford chocolate bars!

Well, the kids didn’t take this lying down….

They decided to gather their friends and parade downtown with signs protesting the price rise. With their motto ‘Don’t be a sucker – don’t buy 8¢ candy bars’ they encouraged kids to go on strike by not buying 8¢ candy bars in an attempt to force the candy companies to lower their prices. One of the kids, 16-year-old Parker Williams, had an old truck – a 1923 McLaughlin. This was daubed with slogans: kids piled in and others marched behind waving placards and chanting

We want a 5¢ chocolate bar

8¢ is too high by far

Get behind our buyers’ strike

A 5¢ chocolate bar

rah rah rah

They protested for three days in succession. Initially viewed with amusement by adults, the protest spread, first across Vancouver Island, then over to Vancouver and from there all across Canada. This was serious politics. Kids everywhere were marching and demanding a return to the 5¢ chocolate bar by singing the Candy Bar Song.

Unfortunately, it all came to an end without the price being lowered. Accusations of communists influencing the kids to cause chaos, combined with the candy companies justifying the hike in price due to increased production costs and product shortages, lowered public support for the movement, and by the middle of May, the protest had fizzled out.

Unlike the 5¢ candy bar, the WigWam survived along with the story of how a children’s protest in a small town turned nationwide.

Painted mural of young girls in colorful dresses standing in front of a shop entrance, Dwyer’s Confectionary, licking 5c ice cream cones while holding placards protesting against 8c candy bars. The left 1/5 of the mural shows a partial page of a song’s music score proclaiming ‘we want a 5 cent bar’.

A mural in Chemainus, Vancouver Island, showing kids licking 5¢ ice cream cones instead of eating 8¢ chocolate bars while protesting against the rise in price of chocolate from 5¢ to 8¢ during the 1947 Candy Bar War. Painted: 2017

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