Skip to main content

Posts

Grover, Frank, and Baby Ruth

It’s been a while since a bachelor has been elected president of the United States.  In fact, it’s only happened twice.  The first was James Buchanan, in 1856, and the second was Stephen Grover Cleveland in 1884.  (The last bachelor to be nominated for president by a major political party was Adlai Stevenson, the unsuccessful Democratic nominee in 1952 and 1956.)  This probably accounts for why there have been so few weddings in the White House.  The first White House wedding took place during Cleveland’s first term, on June 2, 1886, when the president married Frances Folsom. Image of the Clevelands’ marriage.  The couple expressly requested there be no photographs taken. Cleveland had known Frances Folsom all her life.  She was the daughter of Oscar Folsom, his law partner and best friend.  When Mr. Folsom died in a violent carriage accident at the age of 37 in 1875, Cleveland became the executor of his partner’s estate, and took under his wing the widow Emma Folsom and h

Tomato: The Fruit with the Poisoned History

Like a lot of fruits, vegetables and livestock, the modern tomato looks very little like it did before agriculture.  Before it was first cultivated, wild tomatoes were much smaller, probably the size of cherries, and were most likely yellow.  No one knows for sure because in their native Central America and western South America, no one bothered to keep records of the gradual agricultural development of the tomato. By the time the tomato made its way north to the Aztec Empire, it started to take on the round, red appearance it has today.  The word tomato comes from tomatl ([to ˌmatɬ], or “toh MATS”), originating from Nahuatl, the main language of the Aztecs.  It means “fat water” or “fat thing”.  The Aztecs developed the fruit further, coming up with something they called xitomatl ([ˌʃit o ˈmatɬ], or “SHEET oh MAHTS”).   Xitomatl translates roughly as “fat thing with navel”.  When the Spanish arrived in the New World, this is the version of the tomato that they encountered.