Having read Gillian Tett’s article (“How the Kit Kat went global”, Magazine, FT Weekend, March 20) I find it odd such a lengthy piece did not arouse any interest in the origin of the name.
Our family believed, in Tett’s words, that “Kit Kat” was the product of the Rowntrees “having a flexible mind and being willing to pinch good ideas from any source” including the name.
My paternal grandfather was married to the daughter of a judge, who took a pretty dim view of his daughter being married to a man with a name like a chocolate bar.
Legal action was taken against the Rowntrees. The case was lost on the grounds that “Kit Kat” was the sound the bar made when broken. My family’s view was that it came out of the phone book as an unusual, and therefore commercially useful name and was “pinched”!
The name Kitcat — one branch still spells it with a double ’t’ Kitcatt — originated in the 17th century in Dorset. It was variously spelt KitCot, KatCot, Cotcat as well as numerous other variants, no doubt the product of broad Dorset accents and rudimentary spelling.
Commercially the family were the founders of Kitcat & Aitken, the stockbrokers where I was the last remaining Kitcat, and also Lewis Kitcat, publishers of Lloyd’s Register of Shipping inter alia, with the account “Number 1” at the Bank of England.
Wayne Kitcat Abinger, Surrey.
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