National Jelly Bean Day

Today’s Food History

on this day in…

1662 John Tradescant died. He succeeded his father as naturalist and gardener to Charles I. 1818 Cadwallader C. Washburn is born in Livermore, Maine. In 1866 he built a flour mill at St. Anthony Falls, Minnesota and his Washburn-Crosby Co. (forerunner of General Mills) would market Gold Medal flour.

1832 Julius Sterling Morton was born. He was the founder of Arbor Day, first observed in Nebraska on April 10, 1872. Over one million trees were planted.

1889 The U.S. opened Oklahoma to homesteaders and the Oklahoma land rush officially began at 12 noon.

1913 Thomas Wright of New Jersey patented a method to load ice on to refrigerator railroad cars.

1948 Prosper Montagne died. Montagne was one of the great French chefs of all time. He is mainly remembered as the creator of Larousse Gastronomique (1938), a comprehensive encyclopedia of French gastronomy.

1964 The New York World’s Fair opens in Flushing Meadows on the same site as the 1939 World’s Fair. I had my first Heineken beer at their exhibition there. As a matter of fact, I spent every weekend there from April to October for the 2 years the Fair was open. I sampled music, food, beer and wine from around the world, and it helped to inspire my interest in cooking and food history.

1970 The first Earth Day was celebrated. Is our environment better or worse today?

1996 Erma Bombeck died. Writer, humorist, you will find some of her quotes about family and food on the Food Reference website.