Happy Birthday, DQ! Get Free Ice Cream on Monday at Dairy Queen

By Dennis Robaugh (Patch National Staff):

Dairy Queen celebrates its 75th anniversary on Monday, March 16, with Free Cone Day — all customers will receive a free small vanilla soft-serve ice cream cone, at participating locations.

Founded in Illinois, Dairy Queen is now America’s largest ice-cream chain, with 5,900 locations in 49 states and a dozen other countries. Sherb Noble opened the Joliet Dairy Queen on June 22, 1940, at 501 N. Chicago St. Though it hasn’t been a Dairy Queen since the 1950s, the building still stands as a city landmark.

Soft-serve ice cream was developed in Illinois by a friend of Noble’s, a gent named John Fremont “Grandpa” McCullough, along with his son Bradley, in 1938. They sold the frozen treat at a store Noble owned in North Dakota, and on the first day sold 1,600 servings. They opened the first Dairy Queen two years later in Joliet.

The company is headquartered today in Edina, MN, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway. (That Warren Buffett is one smart operator.)

Dairy Queen will be requesting donations for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals.

In the Peninsula, there’s a Dairy Queen located in San Bruno, Daly City and Redwood City. For contact information and more locations near you, visit the Dairy Queen website.