America's First Food Spy

Sidedoor

Smithsonian Institution

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4.6 • 2.3K Ratings

🗓️ 28 February 2018

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In the 1800s, the American diet was mostly made up of meats, potatoes, cheese, and perhaps the occasional green bean. Fruits and other veggies? Not so much. But that all changed thanks to a group of 19th century food spies – globe-trotting scientists and explorers who sought exotic crops to enhance America’s diet and help grow the economy. A pioneer among them was David Fairchild, who nabbed avocados from Chile, kale from Croatia, mangoes from India, and much more. In this episode, we learn about Fairchild's remarkable adventures and take a surprise trip to the Smithsonian archives to uncover a rare piece of food spy history.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Side Door, a podcast from a Smithsonian with support from PRX. I'm Tony Combe.
0:15.0	Okay, so confession time. In addition to being a podcast host, some days I also work at the farmers market at a picklestand.
0:25.9	I know it's weird, but I just love food.
0:28.4	And after my shift, I shop around for fresh produce, things like lemons, avocados, peaches, leafy greens, and I always feel kind of old
0:36.0	school. Like, this is how it must have felt to shop in the 1800s, before grocery stores were really
0:41.0	a thing. But in reality, if I was shopping back then I
0:44.5	wouldn't have been feeling my reusable bags with fruits and veggies. That's
0:48.8	because 150 years ago Americans ate mostly meats and cheeses.
0:52.8	And if fruits and vegetables were on the menu,
0:54.8	it was typically things like root veggies or cabbage,
0:58.1	sometimes green beans, basically crops that you could grow in your garden.
1:02.3	After all, this was a time before
1:04.4	refrigerators and there was always a chance that your salad could come with a
1:07.9	side of cholera. But in the late 1800s, Americans got a little more
1:11.7	adventurous. People began eating more foreign fruits like
1:15.9	bananas and grapefruit and veggies like broccoli. U.S. businesses, farmers, even
1:21.0	the government realized that there was money to be made off of these exciting, tasty crops.
1:25.0	But first, someone had to find them, and that often involved international adventure,
1:31.0	intrigue, and in some cases danger.
1:35.2	So this week on Side Door, we learn all about Food Explorer David Fairchild, a man who
1:39.7	traveled the world and took risks all in the interest of finding the next big thing. David Fairchild was a scientist and explorer who traveled around the world from the
2:00.4	late 1800s to 1948 looking for treasure.
	...

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