Should The Lollipop Be CT's State Candy? Fairfield Class Says Yes

FAIRFIELD, CT — A group of Fairfield third-graders are hoping their sweet idea will become Connecticut state law.

The class at Timothy Dwight Elementary School has reached out to Fairfield’s legislative delegation in hopes of making the lollipop the official state candy of Connecticut. The third-graders welcomed the delegation Friday to Dwight Elementary, where Fairfield’s legislators proclaimed April 30, 2021, to be Lollipop Day across the state and presented an official citation.

“We never really thought this would happen,” said third-grader Amelia Neubauer, who helped lead the lollipop effort with her classmate, Jacqueline Glick.

The push to make the lollipop the state candy came about while the class was studying Connecticut government, said teacher Joan Robb, adding students did research and wrote to legislators to help get the idea off the ground. One of Robb’s previous classes attempted a similar effort to make Pez — which are made in Connecticut — the state candy. The proposal died in committee because Pez is a brand as well as a type of candy, she said.

"Lollipop is fair game,” Robb said.

The lollipop was given its name by George Smith, whose New Haven company began producing the candy in 1908.

“Now, people all over the world love lollipops,” Robb’s class said in a letter to state Rep. Laura Devlin, R-134. “But they were invented here! We should claim them!”

Devlin was joined Friday at Dwight by state Reps. Jennifer Leeper, D-132, and Cristin McCarthy Vahey, D-133, as well as state Sen. Tony Hwang, R-28.

“You inspired all of us to make today, April 30, Connecticut’s state Lollipop Day,” Leeper told the class. "Even though you’re in third grade, you can still do big things.”

The students asked the legislators questions about their work in government, such as what they do each day, who inspires them and if they ever argue about bills, a question that was met with some laughter from the adults in the room.

McCarthy Vahey explained to the class that of the thousands of bills proposed in Connecticut, only a few hundred become laws. The lollipop bill will be drafted next year, Robb said, in the hope that it will eventually become a law.