• January 18, 2010

This year is the 50th anniversary of McKee Foods' packaged snack-cake brand, Little Debbie. That would make Little Debbie around 60, judging from the appearance of the little girl pictured on boxes of Little Debbie cakes.

The image depicts the granddaughter of O.D. and Ruth McKee, the founders of McKee Foods, a family bakery, per the company. The girl, Debbie McKee-Fowler, is now an executive with McKee Foods.

The Collegedale, Tenn.-based company will commemorate the brand's 50th by giving away 50 vacation packages. Each vacation includes roundtrip airfare for two anywhere AirTran Airways goes in the continental U.S., two nights in a Holiday Inn, a rental car for two days and a $200 cash card. Registration is at littledebbie.com.

The company says it has sold more than 150 billion Little Debbie snacks since 1960, and that the Little Debbie Facebook page has 510,000 fans and more than 4,500 followers on Twitter. --Karl Greenberg