For some, Halloween is all about creepy crawlies and silly costumes. Just give me the candy.
Of course, Halloween candy makes me think of the creepiest candymaker who never was, Willy Wonka.
Willy Wonka may be as British as his creator, Roald Dahl, but the Wonka Candy Factory is in west suburban Itasca. Wonka was invented by Dahl in his 1964 children’s novel “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.”
Among Wonka’s confections was the Everlasting Gobstopper: “I am inventing them for children who are given very little pocket money,” he says. “You can put an Everlasting Gobstopper in your mouth and you can suck it and suck it and suck it and suck it and it will never get any smaller!” (The real version produced by Chicagoland’s Willy Wonka Candy Factory has a somewhat shorter life.)
Willy Wonka candies started to become reality when Chicago’s Breaker Confections licensed the name for merchandising tie-ins with “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory,” 
Breaker introduced Everlasting Gobstopper 
Launched as a family firm in the 1950s, Breaker produced Licorice Gems and H-Bombs (spicy jawbreakers). The company became part of Sunmark Companies in 1965. In 1980, Breaker changed its name to Willy Wonka Brands; Nestle acquired Sunmark in 1988 and renamed the division the Willy Wonka Candy Factory in 1993, reorganizing to put all of its kiddie candies under that label in 2005.
The real Willy Wonka Candy Factory is located at 1445 W. Norwood Ave., Itasca.
Nestle’s Wonka products also include Wonka Bars
Maybe, if you’re really lucky, you’ll find a Golden Ticket and get to visit the factory….
