Ann Turner Cook, the original Gerber baby whose image adorned the company’s products beginning in 1928, died Friday. She was 95.
Gerber announced Cook’s death in an Instagram post on Saturday. According to The New York Times, Cook died in St. Petersburg, Florida.
“Gerber is deeply saddened by the passing of Ann Turner Cook, the original Gerber baby, whose face was sketched to become the iconic Gerber logo more than 90 years ago,” the company wrote. “Many years before becoming an extraordinary mother, teacher and writer, her smile and expressive curiosity captured hearts everywhere and will continue to live on as a symbol for all babies. We extend our deepest sympathies to Ann’s family and to anyone who had the pleasure of knowing her.”
Cook, who was born Nov. 20, 1926, was 4 months old when a family friend, Dorothy Hope Smith, sketched a charcoal drawing of the cherub-faced infant. Smith submitted her work for a contest held by Gerber in 1928, according to the Gerber website. When the drawing won, Smith said she would complete it, but Gerber officials loved the original work and trademarked it in 1931.
“(Smith) wrote me (later) that she had thought it was kind of unfinished, and if they liked it she could finish it properly,” Cook told WFLA-TV in 2016. “But they were smart enough that they didn’t want anything done to it.”
Cook’s identity was kept private until she joined the company for its 50th-anniversary celebration in 1978.
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“I was a happy, healthy baby and I think that’s why the drawing has been so appealing to people,” Cook told WTVT in 2013. “Because everybody wants their baby to be happy, healthy-looking.”
“Her image has inspired parents everywhere to share their babies’ photos with Gerber,” Gerber wrote in a Facebook post in November 2021.
“I have to credit Dorothy with everything,” Cook told The St. Petersburg Times in 1992. “I was really no cuter than any other baby, but she had wonderful artistic talent and was able to draw a very appealing likeness.”
After moving with her family to Orlando, Florida, in the late 1930s, Cook earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Southern Methodist University, the New York Times reported. She earned her master’s degree in English from the University of South Florida in Tampa.
Cook was an English teacher at Tampa’s Hillsborough High School for 26 years, WTVT reported. She said she began every year answering questions about the Gerber baby.
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“And then I would say, ‘Now we won’t talk about this anymore,’ because I didn’t want it to monopolize the time I had with my students,” Cook told WTVT.
In 2018, Cook met that year’s Gerber “spokes baby,” Lucas Warren, of Dalton, Georgia, WTVT reported. Warren was the first Gerber baby to have Down syndrome.
In 2019, Magnolia Earl, of Ross, California, became the first adopted baby chosen for the annual campaign, the television station reported.
Zane Kahin, of Winter Park, Florida, was named the 2021 Gerber “spokes baby” in June. Isa Slish, from Oklahoma, who was born missing part of her right leg, was named the 2022 Gerber baby.
After retiring as a teacher, Cook began writing mystery novels with Florida subjects, including “Shadow Over Cedar Key,” “Homosassa Shadows,” “Tracing Their Shadows” and “Micanopy In Shadow.”
Cook’s father, Leslie Turner, was a cartoonist who drew the strip “Captain Easy” for more than three decades.
Her husband, James Cook, a major with the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office, died in 2004. According to The New York Times, she is survived by three daughters -- Jan Cook, Carol Legarreta and Kathy Cook; a son, Clifford; eight grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren.
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