I attended the Blake School in Hopkins, MN but was born in Hershey, PA in 1955 where my grandfather, H.B. Reese, invented the No. 1 selling candy brand in the United States, REESE'S Peanut Butter Cups. On July 2, 1963 seven years after the death of my grandfather in 1956, the H.B. Reese Candy Company merged with The Hershey Company in a tax-free stock-for-stock merger making the Reese family the 2nd largest Hershey Company shareholder, surpassed only by the controlling shareholder, Hershey Trust. 

Since the community of Hershey, Dauphin County Orphans Court Judge Warren Morgan and Pennsylvania attorney general Mike Fisher stopped the sale of Hershey in 2002, the stock price of The Hershey Company (HSY) has increased by +270% while simultaneously the quarterly Hershey cash dividend has increased by +400%.

Which calls into question the accuracy of the following statements:

"Hershey is a publicly traded corporation owned in perpetuity by a nonprofit trust. That unwieldy and deeply unorthodox arrangement contains a probably unsustainable legal contradiction."

1. The Hershey Trust (Milton Hershey School Trust) was created to benefit in perpetuity the Milton Hershey School. The Hershey Trust Indenture clearly states that the Milton Hershey School Board of Managers (Hershey Trustees) have sole discretion to buy and sell Hershey Trust assets (including the Trust's Class A and Class B shareholdings of The Hershey Company).

2. Fortunately in 2002, we were able to dismiss eleven of the Hershey Trustees who were in favor of selling the Trust's controlling interest in The Hershey Company.

3. Furthermore in 2007, the Hershey Trust forced the resignations of all Hershey Company Board Directors (except one) who were held accountable and responsible for the poor performance of The Hershey Company during that time period.

Sincerely,

Brad Reese