KU Alumni Owned Wertz Candies Featured on Discovery Channel’s Dirty Jobs

If you happen to be a fan of the Discovery Channel hit show Dirty Jobs, you may have noticed KU alumnae Jean Wertz ’79 sporting a Kutztown University hat as she appeared in an episode featuring her family’s candy store in Lebanon, Pa.

The episode, titled “Fuel Tank Cleaner” in reference to the episode’s lead story, first aired in July 2006 and has been in rotation ever since.

Wertz, a 1979 graduate with a degree in Art Education, originally intended to teach. As fate would have it, however, Wertz returned to her family’s 75 year old business, Wertz Candies, and built a career combining art and chocolate. “I always considered myself to be a painter first,” says Wertz of her craft, “the chocolate art evolved as a means to survive in an environment where art was not just marginalized but unimportant.”

Wertz’ chocolate artistry includes a talent for creating edible chocolate paintings, using Wilbur chocolate, food coloring, gold sugars and confectionery glaze. Chocolate celebrity portraits the likes of Al Roker and Ozzie Osbourne have been presented to their real life counterparts on air. She was also commissioned to create 37 chocolate paintings to accompany the Toledo Museum of Art’s Van Gogh “Fields” exhibit. Wertz also made a pair of chocolate boots for the Toledo Museum of Art, which closely resembled those worn by Dirty Jobs host Mike Rowe.

The Wertz family contacted Dirty Jobs early in 2006 about shooting a show at the candy store. The producers replied within weeks and made arrangements to tape the show in February. “It probably didn’t hurt that we included a box of our hand-dipped chocolates,” admits Jean Wertz.

Once at Wertz Candies, Mike Rowe’s dirty deeds involved all the messiest chocolate making chores they could devise. He participated in making peanut butter cups (you have to hand-knead globs of raw peanut butter) and caramel corn. But, Rowe got his biggest kick out of making chocolate “dog poo."

At first, Wertz wasn’t sure if she wanted to recreate the unusual commission she once received from an area veterinarian. “For the past ten years of my life, I’ve been devoted to changing public perception of chocolate as not only a food, but also an artistic medium. In one fell swoop, it turned to poop.”

And so, at the end of the episode, Mike Rowe takes a big bite of his chocolate dog poo creation as he tells his viewers to ask for the Dirty Jobs special whenever they’re in Lebanon.

Wertz says the experience with Dirty Jobs was very positive and enjoyable. “Mike and crew had a ton of fun being in a candy store all day. Mike is very bright, self-deprecating, funny, accessible, and potty-mouthed – all characteristics that we appreciated. He was more than happy to meet people and sign autographs. I ad no idea how popular he was or I would have been more nervous.”

But Wertz isn’t exactly new to television and other forms of national media. She and her art pieces have been seen on the Food Network’s Unwrapped, The Sharon Osbourne Show, Ladies Home Journal, Women’s World Magazine, and Appleseeds, a children’s periodical.

Wertz credits Kutztown’s art department, particularly George Sorrels, for the skills she now brings to her artistry. “I had a perfect background for developing a new approach working with chocolate: drawing, painting, sculpting, 2 & 3D design, and jewelry-making.”

Wertz Candies, Inc. has a storefront location on Cumberland St. in Lebanon, PA. For more information on the candy store and Jean Wertz’ chocolate art, please visit here.