THANK YOU, MRS. BROWN

As a boy, William Danforth worked in his father's store in Charleston, Mo. Every Saturday he watched the Brown brood come to town, all clad in red and white checks. It was convenient for Mrs. Brown to make the entire family's clothes from the same bolt of checkerboard cloth, and when it came time to go home...well, you couldn't miss a Brown kid.

In 1902, Danforth was looking for a distinctive dress for his products, and remembered Mrs. Brown. His reasoning was sound, for the red and white checkerboard identified his products just as boldly as it had the Brown family. The Checkerboard trademark has since been used with a consistency unique in American business. Even Company headquarters in St. Louis is known as Checkerboard Square.