What was the original Fruit of the Loom logo in 1871?
Executive summary
Contemporary accounts and the company’s own history say Fruit of the Loom’s pictorial trademark was registered in 1871 and grew out of fruit paintings used on cloth — originally an apple with additional fruits added by the artist’s daughter — producing a colorful still‑life label rather than a horn‑of‑plenty composition [1] [2]. Modern retellings vary about exact composition (apples, grapes, berries, pears and other fruits are all named in sources), and some later summaries incorrectly say a cornucopia was part of the original image [3] [4].
1. How the 1871 trademark came to be: a painted fruit label turned company mark
Robert Knight adopted the trade name “Fruit of the Loom” in the 1850s and, according to the company history, had printed labels showing a painted apple and then more fruits applied to bolts of cloth; he registered the trademark in 1871 (trademark number 418) after those labels proved commercially useful [1] [2].
2. What contemporaneous sources say the picture showed: still life of fruits, not a horn
Multiple histories and the company narrative describe the original artwork as a realistic, colorful still‑life of fruits — apples, grapes and other berries — painted by “Miss Skeel” (Rufus Skeel’s daughter) and used on printed labels and cloth; this still‑life depiction is the frequent description of the early mark [1] [5] [6].
3. Variations in descriptions: which fruits and what framing differ across accounts
Writers differ on exactly which fruits appeared and how they were arranged. Some summaries list apples, purple grapes, currants/berries and pears; other accounts emphasize an apple that was later joined by grapes and additional named varieties (Ne Plus Ultra grapes, Non Such pear, Non Pareil cherries, Seek No Further apple) as the painted series expanded [7] [1] [8]. Visual elements (frames, ribbons, ovals, clouds, tablecloths) appear in later retellings and reconstructions rather than a single authoritative 1871 printed image in the sources provided [4] [9] [10].
4. The cornucopia (horn‑of‑plenty) claim: contested and likely a later memory error
Some modern pages assert the original logo included a cornucopia overflowing with fruit; other sources and the company deny the cornucopia was ever part of the mark and point back to painted fruit on cloth — not an overflowing horn — as the origin [4] [3]. The disagreement fuels the popular “did it or didn’t it?” memory phenomenon, and available sources show the cornucopia claim is not supported by Fruit of the Loom’s history narrative [4] [1].
5. Why accounts differ: sparse primary visuals and repeated retelling
The earliest visual evidence is described in company history rather than reproduced in every modern summary; later logo histories, fan pages and design blogs recreate or reinterpret the look (square frames, ribbons, ovals or tablecloth still lifes) leading to divergent reconstructions. Secondary articles sometimes assign a specific framed composition or banner that likely reflects later 19th‑century graphic treatments rather than a single canonical 1871 art plate [11] [4] [8].
6. How historians and logo sites characterize “the original” image today
Logo historians and sites generally converge on the idea that the first pictorial mark was a painted, realistic arrangement of fruits used as a printed fabric label; many reconstructions show an apple plus grapes and berries inside a framed device with the name on a ribbon or oval — but they disagree on details and on whether specific elements (clouds, tablecloth, cornucopia) were original or later accretions [7] [11] [8].
7. What we can reliably assert from the available reporting
Reliable points across the records: [12] the Fruit of the Loom name was in use by the Knights by the 1850s and formally registered as a trademark in 1871 [2] [1]; [13] the pictorial mark originated from painted fruit labels produced for bolts of cloth by a Miss Skeel and expanded from an original apple to include other fruits such as grapes and berries [1] [5]; [14] claims that the original 1871 trademark definitively included a cornucopia are contradicted or not supported by several histories [4] [3].
8. Bottom line for the original 1871 logo question
Available sources agree the original 19th‑century mark was a painted still‑life of fruit used on cloth labels and later registered in 1871; specifics about exact fruit types, framing and decorative motifs vary in retellings, and the cornucopia version appears to be a contested or later‑added memory rather than the clearly documented original [1] [2] [4].
Limitations: primary contemporary artwork from the 1871 registration is not reproduced in these summaries, so exact pixel‑level composition is reconstructed from later company histories and logo analyses rather than a single archival image in the provided sources [1] [2].