Richard D. Trentlage

Trentlage died of heart failure in 2016 at a hospital in Libertyville, Illinois. He was survived by his second wife and several children and stepchildren. His daughter Linda, one of two children featured in the Oscar Mayer jingle, became an educational administrator in Wisconsin.

In a 2008 interview he said he was still receiving royalties from the Oscar Mayer jingle, which had helped put his children through college.

Trentlage wrote jingles for McDonald's ("McDonald's is your kind of place!"), the National Safety Council ("Buckle up for safety, buckle up!") and V8 ("Wow! It sure doesn't taste like tomato juice."), founding Adver/Sonic Productions. In the late 1990s Trentlage was living in Fox River Grove, Illinois and still writing jingles.

He was married to his first wife, Vivian Youngs, for 23 years and had five children. After divorcing, he married his second wife, Jackie, in the 1980s.

A year later, Trentlage's submission was selected. Mayer sent Trentlage and his children to a Chicago recording studio, with Linda suffering from a stuffy nose again. After successfully testing it in the Houston market, Oscar Mayer used the jingle in its advertising from 1963 to 2010. The company later credited it with the success of the product's nationwide distribution.

In 1962, Trentlage learned that Oscar Mayer was holding a jingle contest for its hot dogs. With the deadline the next day, he wrote:

Trentlage was born in Chicago, Illinois, where he attended Calumet High School. He composed his first jingle in high school, and he played guitar in a band with his brother and a friend. He graduated from Calumet in 1947.

Richard Dale Trentlage (December 27, 1928 – September 21, 2016) was an American jingle writer. He wrote jingles for McDonald's, the National Safety Council, and V8, but he is best known for the long-running jingle for Oscar Mayer wieners. Adver/Sonic Productions was formed by Henry Brandon, Trentlage, and Jack Sherred.