While Betty Crocker is often associated with 1950s happy homemaking, she originally belonged to a different generation. Created in 1921 as a “friend to homemakers” for the Washburn Crosby Company (a forerunner to General Mills) in Minneapolis, her purpose was to answer consumer mail. “She” was actually the women of the Home Service Department who signed Betty’s name. Eventually, Betty Crocker’s local radio show on WCCO expanded, and audiences around the nation tuned her in, tried her money-saving recipes, and wrote Betty nearly 5,000 fan letters per day. Finding Betty Crocker offers an utterly unique look at the culinary and marketing history of America’s First Lady of Food.

At a time when polite society wouldn't dream of hanging women's and men's underwear on the same clothesline, a Minnesota manufacturer dared to advertise the unmentionable. "Don't Say Underwear," crowed the ads, "Say Munsingwear!" Consumers of the 1890s responded. The company's wildly popular "itchless" union suits represented a truly revolutionary advance. Beyond these playful and suggestive ad campaigns, In the Mood for Munisngwear provides a fascinating view of the company's labor relations, from sweatshop conditions in the 1880s to the changed world of the 1920s, when Munsingwear provided free medical care, a library, teams and clubs, and Americanization classes.