Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield were childhood friends from Merrick, New York. Although Greenfield finished college, he found himself unable to make his way into medical school. Cohen dropped out of school. In 1977, Cohen and Greenfield completed a correspondence course on ice cream making from Pennsylvania State University's creamery. Cohen has severe anosmia, a lack of a sense of smell or taste, and so relied on "mouth feel" and texture to provide variety in his diet. This led to the company's trademark chunks being mixed in with their ice cream. On May 5, 1978, with a $12,000 investment (), the two business partners opened an ice cream parlor in a renovated gas station in downtown Burlington, Vermont. In 1979, they marked their anniversary by holding the first "free cone day", now an annual event at every Ben & Jerry's store.