The History of Fresh Produce

Who was Edgar J. Watson, the Florida farmer shot dead by his own neighbours in 1910? Was he really the serial killer of Everglades legend, suspected in the murder of the outlaw Belle Starr and accused of murdering his own harvest crews rather than pay them? And how much of his fearsome reputation can actually survive contact with the historical record?
Join John and Patrick as they journey into the Ten Thousand Islands to separate fact from folklore in one of Florida's most notorious murder legends — uncovering, beneath the myth, a genuinely fascinating story of vegetables, sugarcane, and a fragile agricultural frontier where reputation could be as valuable as land.
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In Sponsorship with Cornell University: Dyson Cornell SC Johnson College of Business
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Why did rural labourers burn tax records during the Peasants' Revolt of 1381? How did American wheat farmers try to seize control of the railroads in the 1890s? And why, in 1962, did French growers actually fight each other with artichokes?
Join John and Patrick as they trace six centuries of farmers rising up against landlords, railroads, governments and markets — from medieval England and the Breton "Artichoke War," through the great Indian farm protests of 2020, to the tractors that brought the Netherlands to a standstill and are still rolling through the streets of Europe today. Same grievance, different century: who controls the food system — and who pays when the rules change?
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In Sponsorship with J&K Fresh.
The customs broker who is your fruit and veggies’ personal bodyguard. Learn more here!
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Join the History of Fresh Produce Club for ad-free listening, bonus episodes, book discounts and access to an exclusive chatroom community.
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Who was John Chapman, the barefoot, tin-pot-wearing nurseryman who became one of America's most beloved folk heroes? Why were his millions of apple trees destined not for eating, but for cider and applejack? And how did a man who secretly controlled a small fortune in frontier land come to be remembered as a penniless wandering saint?
Join John and Patrick as they strip away two centuries of Disney-fied legend to uncover the real Johnny Appleseed — a hard-nosed frontier businessman, a devoted follower of a radical Swedish mystic, and the accidental architect of the chaotic genetic lottery that gave America the Golden Delicious, the McIntosh, and the modern apple itself.
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In Sponsorship with J&K Fresh.
The customs broker who is your fruit and veggies’ personal bodyguard. Learn more here!
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Join the History of Fresh Produce Club for ad-free listening, bonus episodes, book discounts and access to an exclusive chatroom community.
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Why did the Suda insist a Greek comic playwright died after being struck by a pear? How did the Emperor Augustus's own precautions against poison get defeated by figs still hanging on the tree? And why could sixteenth-century chroniclers not agree whether a King of England was killed by apples, pears, plums, peaches, or simply overeating?
Join John and Patrick as they trawl through history's long and stranger-than-it-sounds relationship with fatal fruit and veg — from poets choked on grapes at Greek symposia and a Roman prince's fatal party trick, to a 99-year-old man killed by a falling coconut, a watermelon-eating contest that ended in tragedy in Brazil last December, and a devastating public health mystery in India that took decades to unravel.
---------
In Sponsorship with Cornell University: Dyson Cornell SC Johnson College of Business
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Join the History of Fresh Produce Club for ad-free listening, bonus episodes, book discounts and access to an exclusive chatroom community.
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How did a plant that Victorian botanists dismissed as something you'd find growing on a rubbish heap become the sacred mother grain of the Inca Empire — and how did the Spanish nearly stamp it out of existence by banning it as a religious act? Why did quinoa's spectacular twenty-first century success on global markets cause farming communities who had grown it for seven thousand years to start eating less of it? And, what exactly is the "quinoa paradox"?
Join John and Patrick as they tell the story of quinoa — from the shores of Lake Titicaca to the UN General Assembly, via a golden digging stick, four centuries of colonial suppression, and a UN resolution...
----------
In Sponsorship with J&K Fresh.
The customs broker who is your fruit and veggies’ personal bodyguard. Learn more here!
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Join the History of Fresh Produce Club for ad-free listening, bonus episodes, book discounts and access to an exclusive chatroom community.
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Email: historyoffreshproduce@gmail.com