hawk store in the exton square mall type private industry chocolate and candy manufacturer founded scranton pennsylvania u.s. 1936 1936 founder gertrude hawk headquarters dunmore pennsylvania u.s. number of employees 550 website gertrudehawkchocolates.com gertrude hawk chocolates is a chocolate company based in dunmore pennsylvania . the company was started by gertrude jones hawk in 1936 . hawk began her career at the age of 12 after the death of her father . she took a job in a candy shop and later began making chocolates in the kitchen of her home in scranton pennsylvania . following world war ii her son elmer hawk invested his service pay in the fledgling business enabling the family to purchase mechanical chocolate making equipment . the family also used their products in fundraising sales through area churches and schools . in 1959 the pennsylvania department of transportation took gertrude s home for an interstate 81 bridge . the family bought a piece of land in dunmore pennsylvania and built a factory there that opened in 1962 . in addition to the factory the building housed a full service restaurant and a retail area . the restaurant was converted into a candy shop in 1973 . in 1988 the company constructed the gertrude hawk corporate center . the company is now a 90 million annual business with four divisions . it employs over 1 000 people and operates 75 gertrude hawk chocolates chocolate shops throughout pennsylvania new jersey and new york . 1 gertrude hawk manufactures frangos 2 and inclusions for several companies such as ben and jerry s and turkey hill dairy . in february 2008 the company produced a limited edition ice cream flavor with turkey hill called gertrude hawk box of chocolates which featured three different gertrude hawk produced chocolates in milk chocolate flavored ice cream . the company also supplies chocolates and confections to frango the hershey company nestle and fannie may . 1 elmer hawk died on october 18 2013 at 89 years old after coming down with an illness . 3 he was the longtime ceo of the company however his son david took over for him in the past at some point . references edit a b gertrude hawk chocolates about us history dolinsky steve 2005 09 07 . frangos 75 years of decadence . abc wls tv dt chicago . retrieved 2006 12 19 . elmer hawk dies external links edit corporate website retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title gertrude hawk chocolates & oldid 743421216 categories companies based in pennsylvaniachocolate companiesconfectionery companies of the united statescompanies established in 1936 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 9 october 2016 at 15 45 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view