Sophia Sturiano
Eden Hirschi wearing a Hershey Bar costume
As a freshman, senior Eden Hirschi often brought up her relation to Milton Hershey as a topic of conversation. Milton Hershey, famous chocolatier and founder of the Hershey Chocolate Company, is her sixth cousin four times removed – their common ancestor was Swede Franz Hirschi. According to her, the Hirschis immigrated to America and one half of the family decided to change their last name. “The way I spell it is German [and] is the original spelling. [Hershey’s side of the family] came to America and they changed the spelling to become more Americanized,“ she says.
Eden hopes to one day visit Hershey, Pennsylvania, the town founded exclusively for the workers of the Hershey factory and home to the HersheyLand theme park.
Eden herself prefers dark chocolate and says “No disrespect to Milton Hershey, but I don’t necessarily like Hershey’s milk chocolate.”
However, she enjoys Hershey Kisses and the Cookies and Cream Hershey Bar. Eden believes that Hershey’s will always be a S’mores staple. “It’s the perfect S’mores chocolate, nobody’s ever going to use any other chocolate.” Her favorite chocolate bar of them all? Almond Joy.
While Milton Hershey dabbled in caramels before starting his chocolate business, Eden’s family actually makes caramel from a family recipe every winter. Perhaps when she graduates, she’ll consider picking up a hobby as a confectioner!