Is honesty the best policy? Who knows. But some folks suggest William Arnott thought it was.
Scott McKenzie, of Hamilton, said his father told him the macaw parrot on the perch in the logo had a hidden meaning.
As you can see from this image, the perch is in a T-shape. And on his T is the best polly, see.
Which, if you follow, translates to "honesty is the best policy".
Some have suggested this was Arnott's motto. Or perhaps it related to the values of William Arnott, who was dubbed the "biscuit baron". But it could be purely down to his fondness for puns.
William Arnott migrated from Scotland, set up a bakehouse in Morpeth in 1850 and began baking sourdough bread. In 1865, he established the Steam Biscuit Factory in Cooks Hill and began baking biscuits and cakes.
Scott said his father was born in 1911.
"His father probably knew it before him," he said, referring to the possible origins of the story.
A person who claimed to be an Arnott descendant said in a blog they were told the same story.
We reported on Saturday about Arnott's new corporate logo, which caused a bit of a stir. Nevertheless, the traditional logo will remain on biscuit packets across the land.
If Arnott's changed that, biscuit lovers would go nuttier than the nuts in ginger nut biscuits.
Broken Biscuits
Scott McKenzie shared a tale about the classic photo of William Arnott's Steam Biscuit Factory in Cooks Hill.
Scott noted the children sitting down in the front row, with the workers behind them.
He suggested they could be "the kids of the neighbourhood, unless they're related to the workers".
"I remember my dad saying that, at certain times, kids would go to the factory and workers would hand out broken biscuits through the windows in little bags," he said.
Dear Diary
Dead Diary, this pandemic sucks.
No, this is not the secret diary of Adrian Mole. And besides, diaries don't have to be secret anymore.
That's what we're hearing from RMIT University researchers, who say writing in a diary is becoming popular again.
And the diary is now reflecting the social media culture of people sharing [some oversharing] stuff about themselves.
"We keep hearing these are unprecedented times, but it's largely because none of us on this earth today have a true understanding of what it's like to live through a pandemic," Dr Murray said.
The diaries made today and shared publicly will help future generations work out what it was like. Our pandemic diary begins like this: It was scary to see the Chinese welding buildings shut and even scarier when people began hoarding toilet paper ...
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