Why am I passionate about this?

I come from a family of eaters. Food was often at the center of family stories and celebrations. I first became fascinated with apples while I was working on my Ph.D. in history, and my interest has since expanded to include all things related to food history. Iā€™ve taught classes on food history, and a few years ago, I started collecting cookbooks. I blog about my cookbook collection and other historical food oddities on my website.


I wrote

The Washington Apple: Orchards and the Development of Industrial Agriculture

By Amanda L. Van Lanen,

Book cover of The Washington Apple: Orchards and the Development of Industrial Agriculture

What is my book about?

My book is the history of how Washington became the leading apple producing state in the nation. Many people thinkā€¦

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of Wild, Tamed, Lost, Revived: The Surprising Story of Apples in the South

Amanda L. Van Lanen Why did I love this book?

This book made me want to pour a glass of cider. Diane Flynt writes about her hunt for heirloom apples as the owner of Foggy Ridge Ciders in Virginia. Along the way, she shares the rich history of apples in the South.

Her writing is poetic. I could almost taste the apples and smell the evening air in the orchards as she checked on her trees. Flynt makes a strong case for why we need agricultural diversity and how the terroir of place is important for the food we produce.

My only regret in reading this book is that Flynt is retired, so Iā€™ll never be able to taste her fine ciders.  

By Diane Flynt, Angie Mosier (photographer),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Wild, Tamed, Lost, Revived as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

For anyone who's ever picked an apple fresh from the tree or enjoyed a glass of cider, writer and orchardist Diane Flynt offers a new history of the apple and how it changed the South and the nation. Showing how southerners cultivated over 2,000 apple varieties from Virginia to Mississippi, Flynt shares surprising stories of a fruit that was central to the region for over 200 years. Colorful characters abound in this history, including aristocratic Belgian immigrants, South Carolina plantation owners, and multiple presidents, each group changing the course of southern orchards. She shows how southern apples, ranging from northernā€¦


Book cover of Harvesting History: McCormick's Reaper, Heritage Branding, and Historical Forgery

Amanda L. Van Lanen Why did I love this book?

I love books that challenge our accepted knowledge of the past. For over 100 years, textbooks have told children that Cyrus McCormick invented the mechanical reaper. Spoiler alertā€”it turns out the textbooks were all wrong.

Ott takes us through the whole storyā€”how the reaper was actually invented, how the McCormick family created a monopoly on farm equipment, and how they eventually created a monopoly on history. I especially enjoyed the final section of the book, which explains exactly how historians preserved and manipulated history to serve the McCormick companyā€™s ends.

By Daniel P. Ott,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Harvesting History as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Harvesting History explores how the highly contentious claim of Cyrus McCormick's 1831 invention of the reaper came to be incorporated into the American historical canon as a fact. Spanning the late 1870s to the 1930s, Daniel P. Ott reveals how the McCormick family and various affiliated businesses created a usable past about their departed patriarch, Cyrus McCormick, and his role in creating modern civilization through advertising and the emerging historical profession. The mythical invention narrative was widely peddled for decades by salesmen and in catalogs, as well as in corporate public education campaigns and eventually in history books, to justifyā€¦


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Book cover of Children of Change: A Memoir

Children of Change by Carole Kelly,

This is a personal story of Carole and her rise from the ashes of tragedy as a fourteen year old, to success in many areas of her life. Carole graphically depicts the story of how success is the result of a passion and determination that comes from deep inside

Whileā€¦

Book cover of Whose Names Are Unknown

Amanda L. Van Lanen Why did I love this book?

I think Sanora Babb is an underappreciated author. During the 1930s, Babb worked for the Farm Security Administration and was inspired to write a novel about Dust Bowl migrants. Unfortunately, her publishing contract was canceled when John Steinbeck published The Grapes of Wrath.

As much as I love Steinbeck, I love Babbā€™s novel more. She paints a vivid picture of life in small-town Oklahoma through small, domestic details. I appreciated the range of characters across the economic spectrum. Her characters are strong, but they are also aware that they are cogs in a machine, caught in circumstances beyond their control. She manages to highlight the plight of farm workers while maintaining their dignity as human beings. 

By Sanora Babb,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Whose Names Are Unknown as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Sanora Babb's long-hidden novel Whose Names Are Unknown tells an intimate story of the High Plains farmers who fled drought dust storms during the Great Depression. Written with empathy for the farmers' plight, this powerful narrative is based upon the author's firsthand experience.

This clear-eyed and unsentimental story centers on the fictional Dunne family as they struggle to survive and endure while never losing faith in themselves. In the Oklahoma Panhandle, Milt, Julia, their two little girls, and Milt's father, Konkie, share a life of cramped circumstances in a one-room dugout with never enough to eat. Yet buried in theā€¦


Book cover of 97 Orchard: An Edible History of Five Immigrant Families in One New York Tenement

Amanda L. Van Lanen Why did I love this book?

The family stories in this book bring history to life on a personal level. The five families are connected by their immigrant experience, but they approached food in different ways, from family-oriented German biergartens to kosher delis to imported olive oil. Each new wave of immigrants brought their own unique traditions to America, and the neighborhood evolved as each successive group brought something new to the metaphorical table.

I find the tension between maintaining food traditions and adapting them to a new nation fascinating. It also made me think about how much each group contributed to the American diet. 

By Jane Ziegelman,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked 97 Orchard as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

ā€œSocial history is, most elementally, food history. Jane Ziegelman had the great idea to zero in on one Lower East Side tenement building, and through it she has crafted a unique and aromatic narrative of New Yorkā€™s immigrant culture: with bread in the oven, steam rising from pots, and the family gathering round.ā€ ā€” Russell Shorto, author of The Island at the Center of the World

97 Orchard is a richly detailed investigation of the lives and culinary habitsā€”shopping, cooking, and eatingā€”of five families of various ethnicities living at the turn of the twentieth century in one tenement on theā€¦


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Book cover of Confessions of a Knight Errant: Drifters, Thieves, and Ali Baba's Treasure

Confessions of a Knight Errant by Gretchen McCullough,

Confessions of a Knight Errant is a comedic, picaresque novel in the tradition of Don Quixote with a flamboyant cast of characters.

Dr. Gary Watson is the picaro, a radical environmentalist and wannabe novelist who has been accused of masterminding a computer hack that wiped out the files of aā€¦

Book cover of What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories

Amanda L. Van Lanen Why did I love this book?

This book is delightful. Shapiro is one of my favorite food historians. I recommend all her books, but if youā€™ve never read her before, start here.

Itā€™s full of surprising and unexpected stories. Eleanor Roosevelt extracts culinary revenge, Eva Braun drinks champagne while worrying about her weight, and Helen Gurley Brown binges on sugar-free gelatin. These stories left me thinking about my own relationship with food and what that says about the society we live in. 

By Laura Shapiro,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked What She Ate as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'If you find the subject of food to be both vexing and transfixing, you'll love What She Ate' Elle

Did you know that Eleanor Roosevelt dished up Eggs Mexican (a concoction of rice, fried eggs, and bananas) in the White House?

Or that Helen Gurley Brown's commitment to 'having it all' meant dining on supersized portions of diet gelatine?

In the irresistible What She Ate, Laura Shapiro examines the plates, recipe books and shopping trolleys of six extraordinary women, from Dorothy Wordsworth to Eva Braun.
Delving into diaries, newspaper articles, cook books and more, Shapiro casts a different light onā€¦


Explore my book šŸ˜€

The Washington Apple: Orchards and the Development of Industrial Agriculture

By Amanda L. Van Lanen,

Book cover of The Washington Apple: Orchards and the Development of Industrial Agriculture

What is my book about?

My book is the history of how Washington became the leading apple producing state in the nation. Many people think Washington is green, but the areas where apples are grown commercially are deserts. I explore how the landscape was transformed in the early 1900s by irrigation, rail transportation, and real estate developers to create the apple industry that exists today. Not only did Washington growers have to figure out how to grow apples, but they also convinced consumers to pay a higher price for their fruit through clever marketing campaigns and by producing the most perfect fruit possible.

If you ever wondered how apples are produced or how certain varieties of apples, like Red Delicious, came to dominate grocery stores, this book is for you.  

Book cover of Wild, Tamed, Lost, Revived: The Surprising Story of Apples in the South
Book cover of Harvesting History: McCormick's Reaper, Heritage Branding, and Historical Forgery
Book cover of Whose Names Are Unknown

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