Pantsing Your Pez

Back in the late 1970's, professional crazy woman Anita Bryant became disgusted with the unraveling moral fabric of the American people and went on a cross-country rampage attempting to force her morality on the masses, whether they wanted it or not. Had she done this today she would be president, it being the 1970's she was instead stoned to death by an angry mob still caught up in a 'freedom for all' sort of Bicentennial craze. God bless them.

Before her unsightly finish Anita did manage to score a few moral victories against a handful of her many targets, the famous Pez candy company among them. Sickened by the sight of row upon row of nude Pez dispensers hanging in the express line at her local Piggly Wiggly, Ms. Bryant initiated a frenzied campaign of protest that actually drove the venerable company to take notice of her. Feeling sorry for the 'crazy American lesbian' (as the company's CEO called her) Pez introduced a line of Pez clothing hoping to soothe Anita's savage breast. We'll never know if Anita would have been pleased with what her protestations wrought, for by the time Pez clothing hit the American market she was already buried in an unmarked grave in a pauper's field just outside of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

As a child I was not much into Pez, despite the nifty cool plastic cartoon character dispensers. I prefered candy that tasted more like candy and not like really old Flintstone vitamins. Somehow or other I did manage to end up with two examples of these Pez outfits. They were nothing more than a cardboard sleeve with a hole on each end through which you could stick the tube of a Pez dispenser, and yet these simple little gadgets opened a whole new world of play possibilities... now you didn't just have a crime-fighting Batman Pez, you had a crime-fighting purple headhunter Batman Pez-

These are labeled as #6 of set A and #11 of set B, so there are at least 15 more out there somewhere. Daffy Duck always looked best in the lederhosen.

I love a good link so here's one that will take you to one of the best Pez sites on the web, Pez Central.

Addendum: I made most of that crap about Anita Bryant up. She was a professional crazy woman with morality issues, but I really have no idea what she thought about Pez or any other candy company. She didn't like gay people, clothed or otherwise. I can't even place what she looks like although when I hear her name I always picture the actress Nanette Fabray, who played Bonnie Franklin's mother on 'One Day At A Time.' Anita Bryant was never on 'One Day At A Time' nor was she stoned to death although I think someone did throw a pie in her face once... AN EXPLODING PIE!!!