In February 1992, chicken magnate Frank Perdue received a pie in the face from a protester in a chicken costume during a meeting of the University of Maryland Board of Regents in Baltimore.
Perdue was founder, president and CEO of one of the nation’s largest poultry processors. More than that, he was the face of the poultry industry because of his frequent appearances in folksy television commercials: “It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken.”
Students and animal-rights advocates protested his 1991 appointment to the regents, charging that his factory operations on Maryland’s Eastern Shore mistreated workers as well as chickens.
The feathered protester who targeted Perdue in Baltimore was associated with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).
Perdue, of course, was unfazed by the pie attack.