SOMERVILLE, Mass. - Fluff turns 100 this year.

The marshmallow concoction that has been smeared on a century's worth of schoolchildren's sandwiches has inspired a festival and other sticky remembrances.

Every year, between 5 million and 7 million pounds of the sticky cream invented in suburban Boston in 1917 is produced and sold worldwide. Half of that is bought up by New Englanders and people in upstate New York.

Fluff came of age in the 1960s, when generations of schoolchildren started clamoring for "Fluffernutter" sandwiches. Those are still made by slathering peanut butter and Fluff between two slices of white bread.

Over the past decade, fans of Fluff have been staging an annual "What the Fluff?" festival in Somerville, Massachusetts, where Fluff was born.