The Penn's Grove record., 1906-07-27
THE REIGN OF THE TOMATO.
Once Rare and Considered Poisonous
Now Wholesome, Prolific and Prof
table.

The Tomato is the King crop in this
region just now 1t has %supplanted the
cantaloupe, water melon and sweet potato
as a crop with farmers. Its production
has increased very rapidly in the past lew
years, and the increased acreage tins year
over last year in the upper end OF Salem
county snearly if not more than doubled.
Never were so many grown and never
were so many eaten and enjoyed as a
wholeso me fruit.
The English word of direct Indian orig
in most freq uently used is the tomato.
Like the potato it is a native of the trop-
ical or subtropical America and is suppos-
ed to have first come from Peru. 1t was Gull
tivated by the Incas and Montezumas long
before the advent of the Europeans on this
hemisphere under the name OF tumatl or
tomatl. 1t was early introduced into Eu-
rope with its congener, the potato, but it
did not come into general use as a food
product until many years after the latter.
1t was first known to the English as the
Love Apple" to tn French as pomme
d'ammour; to the Italians as pomme
d'amore; and by these names are still
called in those countries, perpetratlng
the old widespread notion that its use as
a food had All influence on the amatory
passions.
Several varieties were know in Eng
land in Gerard's time-l597. Parkinson
speaks of them in 1856 as garden curlos-
ities-under the name OF love apples and
garden apples. They were cultivated
more for their beauty than for any sup
pose use. Dodenes, a dutch herbalist,
mentions them in 1888 as vegetables to be
eaten with pepper, salt and oil. Rumph-
ioC CNoobC of fhanN in 1TSo of two Kinds
called Tomatts used in cooking among the
Malays and by the tia lians called pome-
dorans, and were eXte nsively cultivated
around Naples and Ro me. Stanley found
them growing in Cent raj Africa in large
quantities in 1889.
The tomatoes were introduced into the
United States about the first of the last
century. The garden Kalander, published
by Grant 1horbum in New York City in
1872, gives directions for sowing seed and
raising love apples. Also the Practical
american Gardener published in Baltimore
in 1919, refers to the tomato.
They were first raised in gardens and
about the house as curiosties for the pref
ty red and yellow balls which grew on
the vines. The fruit was small before its
development by cultivation and was con-
sidered poisono us because the plant is OF a
poisonous order-the nightshade.
Even the Horticult ural Society OF Lon
don declared the tomat o to be poisonous.
Undoubtedly the vine is, while the fruit is
wholesome. Some of our oldest inhab-
itants remember th at previous to 1910
neither man, chicke II nor hog would eat
the tomato.
1t was related that the captain of a ves-
sci brought some from Smyrna to a New
York hotel, where they were served for
the first time in that city as ali edible, to
prove that they wei e not poisonous. This
was about 1910. Having been first declar-
ed wholesome by being brought from
Smyrna gave rise to the belief that they
originated in Asia Mino r and to the name
Jerusalem Apples" H~CTIr
Soon after that they were more extern
sively grown in garden S and came into use
as an edible vegetable. In the fifties they
began to be canned TO- household use in
the winter, and in til q sixties late tomat-
oes became a CONNIE rcial product and
began to- be taken to market andcan-
ned in factories for commerce.
About twenty-five years ago farmers in
the upper part of Salem county and the
lower part of Gloucester County began
starting plants in manure hotbeds like
potato plants were at first grown. A
few years later the plants were started in
lighthouses. Spotting them out into cold
beds under glass about the latter part of
March and setting the plants in the fields
about the first of May, produces early
tomatoes about July 1st.
Until three years ago late tomatoes were
extensively grow in South Jersey Delaw-
are and Mar yland and sold to nne
from S. to 81 a ton. In 1903 and 1905
there was a partial failure of the late tom
alto crops in Delaware and Maryland and
the greater extension of the canned goods
market also made a big demand for early
tomatoes Tor canning purposes Early
tomatoes were first shipped from Salem
and Gloucester counties to Baltimore can
ners in 1904. The g reat demand last year
and the continued shortage in the pack
of late tomatoes led the farmers to
double the acreage of early tomatoes in
this region this year. 1000 new sash
were sold in PENIS Grove, making an
increased of about $50 acres more of early
tomatoes in Upper PENIS Neck and Old
mans Township.
The farmers have be en- well rewarded
by their foresight because of the good
prices received in the city markets up to
the 18th. The shipment to Baltimore
Gamers is o large. The pri ce at l5c |
basket. equal to SO a ton, is
tive.