You've likely seen his smiling face at your local grocery store. He wears a classic chef's hat and sports a red kerchief around his neck on cans of Americanized Italian foods like mini ravioli and beefaroni. Perhaps you thought he was just a made-up mascot for the Chef Boyardee brand.

But like KFC's famous Colonel Sanders, Chef Boyardee was a real person. Born Ettore Boiardi in Piacenza, Italy, in 1897, he immigrated to the U.S. in 1914 and adopted the anglicized first name Hector. Just a year later, at 17 years old, he had already risen to the role of head chef at Manhattan's prestigious Plaza Hotel.