Jerome Smucker was descended from Swiss immigrants.

The original family name was "Schmucker." In America, the name was changed first to Smoker. But Jerome's father, Gideon, strongly opposed smoking, and so the name was changed again to Smucker.

In 1879, Jerome Smucker opened a cider mill near his Orrvile, Ohio, home. He sold his cider for a penny a gallon. Like most cider mill operators, Smucker sole other products made from apples, including apple butter.

To increase the popularity of this product, Smucker peddled the butter door to door to neighborhood housewives. Sales of the apple butter grew steadily until in 1915, he sold more than $59,000 worth of it. This convinced Smucker to invest in better machinery for making and canning the apple butter.

In 1923, apple butter sales were so good that Smucker decided to expand his product line and sell other types of preserves.

Smucker's jams and jellies began selling nationally in 1942.