The age-herald., 1898-10-12
ABOUT PEANUTS.
Their Popularity Became General After the
 Civil War.

The American people are evidently very part al to peanuts" remarked a large pea nut planter in Virginia to the writer re- gently, flor ther are nearly 4,000 0OO bushels of them consumed in the United States annually. Before the civil war the peanut was only a holiday luxury to the majority of the people living in the north, the day when the circus was in town, during the country fair and the great and glorious Fourth of July being the principal occa- sions that the popular yearning for the nut was in any measure satisfied. The product then amounted to barely 50O,0O0 bushels year.
 'At the close of the war when the sol diers returned north thousands of them had cultivated such liking for the nut, which they had often pulled from the ground and roasted at their campfires while in Virginia Tennessee and North Carolina, that the crop then raised in these states didn't begin to supply the demand. Wideawake far mers saw the point, and small garden patches where peanuts had been grown for generations were soon abandoned for broad fields, and today Virginia and North Caro- lima are growing 4,0O0 0OO bushels of peanuts a year-a result due almost entirely to the civil war and the habit the federal troops contracted of eating large quantities of the nuts. Naturally, the returned soldiers de- mand for peanuts placed them within reach of the rural population in the north, and the nut soon ceased to be a holiday luxury.
 When the war broke out most of the peanuts consumed in this country were raised in North Carolina. A great many were also imported from Africa. They were of inferior quality. In fact, the best ante bellum peanuts were poor compared with the nuts grown today. But the demand for the nuts in recent years has not had the effect of improving the North Carolina product or increasing its yield to any great extent. Virginia and Tennessee, however woke right up under the increased demand. and improved cultivation has produced a nut, especially in Virginia, that is as near perfect as 1t can be.
 T don't suppose there are many people who know that the peanut came to this country with the first cargo of slaves that were landed on our shores It is a native Of Africa, and in its original state as full Of grease almost as a bit of pork. Culti- Vation and change of soil have greatly re- duced the oleaginous quality of the nut although the North Carolina variety has enough grease yet to find ready sale in France, where it joins it's African ancestor and cottonseed in supplying not a little of the olive oil we find in the restaurants and family groceries. Norfolk, Va, is the greatest peanut center in the world, and handles annually 100000 bags or 5000 ,OOO bushels
 Tt is a pretty sight to see a peanut plan- tation when the vines are in blossom, The blossoms are a bright yellow and the vines are a vivid green. As soon as the blossom appears fine branch forms on the vine and shoots down into the ground. The peas, as the nuts are called on the planta- tion form in the shoot beneath the ground, potatoes. ic in October the vine is ploughed up, and the nuts hang to the roots. Vines and all are piled in cocks in the field, and in twen- ty days the nuts are ready to be pulled off, placed in bags and taken to the factories. There they are cleansed of dirt assorted polished in revolving cylinders and put in- to bags ready for the market"