Major Passenger Steamship Routes ca. 1900 (Flickr)
Header: (Pomological Watercolor Collection)
Historical Background
"The late nineteenth century—a time known as the Gilded Age, the rise of industrial America, the golden age of travel—was a formative era in the United States. The opening of oceans and countries allowed a young scientist named David Fairchild to scour the planet for new foods and plants and bring them back to enliven his country. Fairchild saw world-changing innovation and in a time that glorified men of science and class, he found his way into parlors of distinction not by pedigree but through relentless curiosity."
(Stone, The Food Explorer, xiv)
Innovation on display at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair (Field Museum)
1893 Chicago World's Fair (Field Museum)
In the early 1900s, steamships crossed the world’s oceans, connecting countries and continents which had never before been searched for plants that could contribute to the agricultural success of the United States.
Fairchild staffed the USDA booth at the World’s Fair. He described it as "the greatest dream-city man had ever built. It burst upon the conscious of Middle Westerners with a force which it is impossible for the generation of today to understand. Electric lighting was new, and the lagoons with gondolas, new electrically driven motorboats, and magnificent fountains lighted by colored electric lights, were all bewildering." Fairchild was inspired by this innovation.
(Fairchild, The World as Garden, 26)
Farmers in America
Despite these technological and economic advances, agriculture was a stagnant industry. Most farmers were growing the same kinds of wheat, corn, and oats. Entire farming industries were just one drought or blight away from being wiped out. American farmers needed new species and varieties of plants to remedy their situation.
"There is something radically wrong in our industrial system. There is a screw loose. The wheels have dropped out of balance. The railroads have never been so prosperous, and yet agriculture languishes. The banks have never done a better or more profitable business, and yet agriculture languishes. Manufacturing enterprises never made more money or were in a more flourishing condition, and yet agriculture languishes. Speculators and incorporations never accumulated fortunes more rapidly, and yet agriculture languishes. Towns and cities flourish and ‘boom’ and grow and ‘boom’ and yet agriculture languishes. Salaries and fees were never so temptingly high and desirable, and yet agriculture languishes."
(The Progressive Farmer, April 28, 1887)
"The first and most evident reason for the introduction of economic plants into any country, and that to which the ordinary mind at once refers, is the building up of new plant industries. To the most casual observer it must be apparent that the number of useful plants, compared with those of which man makes no use, is very small. The menu of the average American dinner includes the product of scarcely a dozen plants, and yet the number which could be grown for the table would reach into the hundreds."
(Bulletin by David G. Fairchild, "Systematic Plant Introduction: Its Purposes and Methods," 1898)