By: Rénald Fortier
Ingenium – Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation
“Luring Adam’s Progeny” in order to make it “Buy Empire Fruits from Home and Overseas” – The 1929 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show and the role played by the Dominion of Canada in that major British event, part 1
The English actress Mary Godwin biting into a Fameuse apple in her role of Miss Canada, at the Imperial Fruit Show held in Birmingham, England, October 1929. Anon., « Mademoiselle Canada. » Le Terroir, February 1930, cover page.
Do you like apples, my reading friend? The antihero and dark trickster of the very popular American fantasy / supernatural swashbuckler movie series Pirates of the Caribbean, Captain Hector Barbossa, really liked those delicious fruits. Indeed, can you guess what was the first thing he would do after the curse which afflicted him and his crew was lifted? Eat a whole bushel of apples!
While it is true that today’s adventure in the world of science, technology and innovation will not involve anything as drastic, the truth is that we will gorge ourselves on a fruity story involving the 9th edition of the Imperial Fruit Show, held in Birmingham, England, between 25 October and 2 November 1929.
Put on your time travelling seven-decade boots, my reading friend, and grab yourself an apple, a Fameuse / Fameuse du Canada / Snow White apple perhaps or, as that cultivar was also called, a Snow Apple / Pomme de neige, and… Yes, you can grab two.
I recognise the hand of my honourable and ever curious reading friend poking through the ether. Is there a difference between a variety and a cultivar, you ask? A splendid question. To make a long story short, a rare occurrence in these parts I will admit, a variety is a naturally occurring variant of a species. A cultivar, on the other hand, is an artificially occurring variant of a species, a variant developed by people to express desirable traits, and…
Yes, you are quite correct, my eagle-eyed reading friend, the fruits in the basket placed in front of a rising English musician turned actress in her mid 20s, Mary Godwin, in her role of Miss Canada at the Imperial Fruit Show, were indeed Fameuse apples from Québec. You read the caption on the magazine cover you saw a few moments ago, good for you.
Was that cultivar really “the favourite of the royal table, in England,” you ask? Err, I simply have no idea.
Incidentally, the magazine in which yours truly found the illustration at the heart of this issue of our amaaazing blog / bulletin / thingee, in other words Le Terroir, was the official mouthpiece of the Société des arts, sciences et lettres of Québec, Québec, an organisation seemingly far more interested in literature and the arts than in science, a choice which was typical of the lay elites present in Québec at the time.
The Société des arts, sciences et lettres and its mouthpiece respectively came into existence in late 1917 and early 1918. The former was officially dissolved at some point in 1978, more than 3 decades after the disappearance of Le Terroir, but back to our story.
Lady Phyllis Maud Griffith-Boscawen, born Dereham, caught by a photographer as she nailed shut a box of apples at the ‘Daily Mail’ Imperial Fruit Show, London, England. She was the South African British spouse of the British Minister of Agriculture. The 64 year old Sir Arthur Sackville Trevor Griffith-Boscawen had married his 27 year old personal secretary, his second spouse, in mid August 1921. Anon., “Great Fruit Show.” The Daily Mirror, 29 October 1921, 6.
As far as yours truly can tell, the first Imperial Fruit Show opened its doors in London, England, in late October 1921 and welcomed its last visitor in early November. That event was organised by a major British daily, a staunchly conservative and imperialist daily in fact, Daily Mail of London, in conjunction with the Ministry of Agriculture, the National Farmers’ Union and various British association of fruit growers.
That show was also known as the ‘Daily Mail’ Imperial Fruit Show.
Most of the fruits on display at the Crystal Palace, a ginormous cast iron and plate glass exhibition space, were fruits produced by Malus domestica trees, in other words domestic / orchard apple trees. No less than 10 000 or so packages of British and Canadian apples were on display. Wah!
Would you believe that the 2nd and 3rd prize for exhibits of dessert apples went to British Columbia growers, while the 3rd prize for 20 boxes of any culinary cultivar went to an Ontario one?
As tempting as it would be, I will not bust your chops by listing all the prizes won by Canadian apples in later editions of our show.
You are welcome.
A small donation would be most appreciated. A bottle or three of some rare Belgian ale would do just fine.
Were you able to find a bottle or three of Westvleteren 12, a dark amber and extra strong (10.2% alcohol) Trappist ale brewed by monks at the Sint-Sixtusabdij Westvleteren, near… Westvleteren, Belgium, quite possibly the rarest and most coveted brew on our big blue marble, yours truly would be in debt forever, but I digress.
By the looks of it, an organisation known as Imperial Fruit Show Limited of London became responsible for organising each edition of the Imperial Fruit Show fairly early in the game. Said shows were supported by the principal British fruit product manufacturers and the British fruit producing industry.
A large advertisement for Canadian apples put out by some (government?) organisation that yours truly has yet to identify, and this in order to publicise the fruits on display at the 1938 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show, held in Bristol, England. Anon., “–.” The Western Daily Press and Bristol Mirror, 3 November 1938, 4.
Incidentally, the last Imperial Fruit Show took place in late October and early November 1938, in Bristol, England. And yes, there were piles and piles of Canadian apples on display.
Yes, yes, the last one. You see, the 1939 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show was cancelled soon after the onset of the Second World War, in September 1939. That great show did not reappear after the end of that horrible conflict.
And yes, my supremely knowledgeable reading friend, the Canadian government’s Fruit Trade Commissioner between September or October 1933 and some point in 1939, William Bramwell Gornall, might have been involved in the creation of the advertisement published in The Western Daily Press and Bristol Mirror that we saw a moment ago.
Now, my impatient reading friend, you and I both realise that the topic we shall study today is neither the 1921 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show, nor the 1938 edition of that event. Nay. Dear friend, we are gathered here today to look into the 1929 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show and, more specifically, the role Canada played in that event held in Birmingham, more specifically in Bingley Hall, the first (1850) purpose-built exhibition hall in the United Kingdom. Shall we begin?
And no, my overly romantic reading friend, Bingley Hall was not named after the amiable, carefree, cheerful, expansive, handsome, modest, wealthy and young Charles Bingley, one of the main protagonists of Pride and Prejudice, a novel published anonymously in January 1813 by the English novelist Jane Austen.
The first mentions of the 1929 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show, an event supported by the British Ministry of Agriculture, the Empire Marketing Board and the departments / ministries of agriculture of British Dominions and colonies / dependencies / protectorates, that yours truly was able to uncover were published in January 1929. And no, my flag waving reading friend, Canada was not mentioned in those newspaper articles.
To answer the question which has yet to coalesce in your little noggin, the Empire Marketing Board was set up in May 1926 to promote trade within the Commonwealth / Empire and encourage British consumers to buy items produced therein.
Given its status as the largest fruit show on our big blue marble, the Imperial Fruit Show would offer to visitors tonnes and tonnes (tons and tons) of preserved, fresh, dried and canned fruits from all over the Commonwealth / Empire, 285 or so metric tonnes (280 or so imperial tons / 315 or so American tons) of fruits if a contemporary source was to be believed. Australian strawberries, Indian mangoes, South African gooseberries, Canadian apples of course, and more.
Incidentally, yours truly was puzzled by the mention of Australian strawberries in an early 1929 British newspaper article. You see, Australia being in the Southern hemisphere of our planet, late October and early November down under was equivalent to late April and early May in the northern hemisphere. Given that it took 6 or so weeks to travel, by ship of course, from Australia to England, would Australian strawberry growers have been able to harvest ripe fruits in early October, let alone in late September? Now that I think about it, would it even be conceivable to send fresh strawberries from Australia to England by ship?
Might the journalist who wrote the aforementioned article have been overenthusiastic? Or was he referring to preserved, dried or canned strawberries? I simply cannot say. Sorry.
And no, sending those scrumptious accessory fruits / false fruits / pseudofruits / spurious fruits from Australia to England by aircraft was not an option in late 1929. The first regular passenger flights between those two regions of the world only took place in April 1935. A one-way trip lasted 12 and a half days, by the way. Anyway, let us move on, and…
You are puzzled, are you not, my reading friend? Well, an accessory fruit is a fruit whose flesh does not develop from the ovaries of a plant’s flowers. Can we move on now? Thank you.
The fact that the 1929 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show was held in late October and early November meant that apples from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, three countries located in the Southern hemisphere of our planet, were not yet ripe, which certainly helped Canadian and British orchardists in their quest to win prizes, and…
Were the various editions of the Imperial Fruit Show held during the Fall to maximise the likelihood that fruit growers hailing from the United Kingdom would win prizes, you ask, my reading friend? Yours truly is shocked by such a display of cynicism. We all know that the English are impartial, and…
How about the fact that the vaults of the British Museum, in London, are chock full of items acquired more of less ethically / legally / violently during the good old days of empire, you ask? Err, let us not go there, shall we?
This being said (typed?), yours truly must admit that you might want to look for a television documentary series whose title says it all, namely Stuff the British Stole. Very interesting content.
All right, all right, it looked as if the 1928 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show, held in Manchester, England, between 19 and 27 October, was held at that time in order to meet the requirements of English fruit growers. As it turned out, those fruit growers were not too, too happy. You see, the dates chosen fell within the height of their marketing period.
Putting back on track the train of thought which had been derailed by the aforementioned Australian strawberries, it should be mentioned that fruits would not be the only items on display during the Imperial Fruit Show, and… No, I very much doubt that tomatoes were on display, and this even though the tomato is in fact a berry, just like the eggplant and… the cucumber (Yuck!).
This being said (typed?), there were, err, potatoes on display. I know, I know, what can I say (type?). There were potatoes on display at the 1929 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show. Go figure. Incidentally, those stem tubers were in the fruit display of Northern Ireland.
And yes, my reading friend, there were also cucumbers (Re-yuck!) on display, not to mention honey from New Zealand and Australia a well as wine from the latter.
Speaking (typing?) of… cucumbers, human beings are basically just cucumbers with anxiety, a thought you put in my path, my reading friend and thank you for that. Indeed, yours truly can actually prove that statement. A typical cucumber is 95 % or so water, whereas a typical Homo sapiens is 55 to 60 % or so water. What do you think the missing 35 to 40 % or so consist of, hummm, if not anxiety?
A slightly cropped version, sorry about that, of a photograph showing an apple grading machine on display at the 1929 edition of the Imperial Fruit Show, Birmingham, England. Anon., “Imperial Fruit Show – Huge London Blaze.” Birmingham Gazette, 23 October 1929, 12.
As yours truly was saying (typing?), fruits would not be the only items on display during the Imperial Fruit Show of 1929. Nay. The work performed by a couple of British research stations would be highlighted as well. In addition, the Ministry of Agriculture, yes, the British one, would stage demonstrations of fruit packing and grading, and this with the very latest tooling available. Indeed, a grading machine capable of grading 100 000 or so apples a day would be displayed in action. Yes, the machine in the photograph we just saw.
One of the fruit trees, an apple tree in this case, which was transported to Birmingham, England, for the duration of the Imperial Fruit Show. Anon., “At the Imperial Fruit Show.” Birmingham Gazette, 25 October 1929, 4.
Some fruit trees were even transported to Birmingham, very carefully of course, for the duration of the show. Shipped from the Long Ashton Research Station and East Malling Research Station, in England, those trees would be used to illustrate various approaches to cultivating, manuring and pruning said trees.
Mind you, a 10 or so year old apple tree was displayed in midair with its huge root system in full view. Preparing that display had of course required the careful removal of a ginormous among of soil before the tree could be carted away.
Much was expected of a central element of the show known as the Palace of Beauty located within the walls of Bingley Hall. Girdled by a garden and artistically decorated, that pavilion was to house 8 exhibits. Each of those would feature a young and attractive female Homo sapiens wearing a costume related to the exhibit she represented.
And yes, as you might have guessed, a competition would be held to find out which was the fairest of them all. The fairest exhibit, I think.
Incidentally, one of those young British women wore a kimono. I know, I know, go figure. Another young woman portrayed Ygieía / Hygieia, the Greek goddess of hygiene, health and cleanliness. She might, I repeat might, have been the pretty face of the stand of W. & T. Avery Limited, an English manufacturer of weighing machines based in… Birmingham.
Miss Canada, played by the aforementioned Godwin, represented Canada. That moniker was only her stage name, however. Godwin’s birth name was Guinevere Goodman. She was born in London, England. Sadly, yours truly does not know when Godwin / Goodman was born. To quote Rubeus Hagrid, the half-giant who held the positions of gamekeeper and groundskeeper at the Scottish coeducational boarding school known as Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, sorry about that.
A brief digression of I may. Yours truly came across a Guinevere Eileen Goodman, born in London, who 6 years old in April 1911, when the 1911 British census was taken. A person by that name passed her piano teaching exam at the Royal Academy of Music in December 1924. I strongly suspect that this woman and Mary Godwin were one and the same, but back to our story.
To quote John Forsyth Smith, the Canadian government’s Fruit Trade Commissioner,
The Canadian stand showed an orchard vista, with a grassy slope in front, on which the word ‘Canada’ was worked out with apples, strays of maple leaves and an apple tree carrying several fruits also figuring in the scheme of decoration.
Dressed in a lovely blue costume made of some sort of fluffy material, Godwin sat on a side of the stand, on a rustic chair, with a constantly renewed pile of gorgeous apples at her feet. And yes, the pile of apples was depleted because Godwin gave an apple to many passing children.
The Canadian kiosk was so charming that many newspapers published a photograph showing a smiling Godwin reigning on her domain. Yes, quite possibly the photograph at the very beginning of this article.
Incidentally, Godwin’s choice of stage name was no mere happenstance. Nay. As you well know, the English novelist Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin was the spouse of the radical English romantic poet / philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley. Mary Shelley, as she was also known, wrote the world renowned Gothic epistolary novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, published anonymously in January 1818, but back to our story.
Now, would you believe that Hagrid and a person who is very dear to me were born on the same day of the same year? How about that? How about that? Sorry, I digress.
The Palace of Beauty was one of the popular attractions intended to counteract the fact that the drawing power of a typical fruit show to the general public was not all that great. After all, my reading friend, how many displays of apples would you be able to view without getting bored?
The other attractions which accompanied the Palace of Beauty were a dance hall contiguous to and opening out of the main show building and the Savoy Orpheans, a dance band formed in 1928 which should not be confused with the (far?) superior Savoy Orpheans dance band formed in 1923 at the Savoy Hotel, a luxury hotel located in London, but I digress. Again.
By the way, the people responsible for the Canadian stand decided to take advantage of the dance hall’s probable popularity to hold a contest. At a certain point each day, the music would stop and one person would count the number of apples in a large basket. The person or persons holding the right ticket given at admission, a ticket whose number corresponded to the number of apples in the basket, would win a prize.
In July 1929, British newspapers announced that every person visiting the Imperial Fruit Show would walk away with a small package or bag containing fruits (apples, grapefruits, limes or oranges, as well as canned fruits, for example) from the United Kingdom, as well as from other locations, locations which seemingly included Dominions like South Africa, New Zealand, Canada and Australia, not to mention, perhaps, British territories like British Malaya and the British West Indies.
And yes, schoolchildren who visited the Imperial Fruit Show would also go home with a small package or bag containing fruits.
All in all, an expensive proposition, and this at a time when the post-First World War period of prosperity of the United Kingdom was over and done with, well, at least for the British working class.
Mind you, one might have argued that a good percentage of the fruits and fruit products consumed in the United Kingdom in 1929 were gobbled by members of the middle and upper classes, which were doing much better than their working class compatriots, thank you very much. And long live Capitalism.
The cherry on top of the cheesecake, and one that not too many people could have predicted of course, was the Great Crash / Wall Street crash which walloped the world from Black Thursday, 24 October 1929, onwards. And yes, the Imperial Fruit Show welcomed its first visitor the following day. Talk about timing…
This being said (typed?), British newspapers also announced that, contrary to previous years perhaps, some of the fruits displayed by all exhibitors, 3 000 or so packages actually, would be sold to visitors, albeit in small quantities, by members of the Birmingham Retail Fruiterers’ Association, I think, and this at normal prices.
With 100 or so metric tonnes (100 or so imperial tons / 110 or so American tons) of apple alone on site, there would be a lot of fruits to sell.
Incidentally, some of the fruits in question would come from Ontario, Nova Scotia and British Columbia. Incidentally, again, the display of the latter province was arranged and taken care of by its newly appointed market commissioner, the Anglo Canadian politician Thomas George Coventry.
Yours truly presumes that Ontario’s first commercial fruit representative performed a similar duty. Interestingly, the recently appointed Andrew Fulton performed his duties on behalf of both the province’s government and the Ontario Fruit and Vegetable Growers’ Association of Toronto, Ontario. If you must know, Fulton had previously occupied the position of Chief of the Markets Division of the Fruit Branch of Canada’s Department of Agriculture.
As had been the case in previous editions of the Imperial Fruit Show, the Canadian exhibits would be among the largest and most attractive, with more entries than ever before perhaps.
Like their counterparts in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, Canadian fruit growers regarded that show as a great, if not the greatest opportunity to make their goods known to British buyers and consumers.
Mind you, the possibility of carrying off one of the money prizes was well worth considering.
By the way, cash prizes for competitions in which fruit growers from the Commonwealth / Empire could participate came to £ 1 000, if not £ 1 500, sums which corresponded to $ 96 000 or so and $ 144 000 or so in 2025 currency.
Incidentally, Canada’s large presence at the Imperial Fruit Show did not go unnoticed in the United States. Massachusetts apple growers hoped that this Canadian presence would stimulate the appetite of British consumers for all types of fruits, including apples grown in that state.
Before I forget, some of the fruits produced by growers hailing from the United Kingdom, as well as Dominions like South Africa, New Zealand, Canada and Australia, not to mention British territories like British Malaya and the British West Indies, were displayed in a large area set up by the Empire Marketing Board. That large area might in fact have been a pavilion, located, I think, within the walls of Bingley Hall.
Yours truly has a feeling that governments in Canada, either provincial and / or federal, covered the costs of transporting the tonnes and tonnes (tons and tons) of Canadian fruits across the ocean blue, to merry olde / jolly olde England.
Interestingly, various New Zealand fruits kept in cold storage in England since the spring of 1929 would be on display, perhaps in a cold storage section of the exhibition. Indeed, it looked as if apples, pears and plums grown in the United Kingdom would also be on display in the same spot.
Also worthy of interest would be the combined display of seasonable fruits and vegetables put up by two all female educational institutions, Studley Horticultural and Agricultural College for Women, near… Studley, England, and Swanley Horticultural College, near… Swanley, England.
Two of the individuals who were said to be “largely responsible for the success of the Canadian fruit exhibits,” namely George E. McIntosh, Dominion Fruit Commissioner, on the left, and William Richard Motherwell, Canada’s Minister of Agriculture. Would you believe that the scrumptious pile of apple at the centre of this image consisted of… McIntosh Reds? Anon., “Not Cannon Balls, But Canadian Apples.” Edmonton Journal, Magazine Section, 26 October 1929, 2.
Two of the individuals who were said to be “largely responsible for the success of the Canadian fruit exhibits” were George E. McIntosh, Dominion Fruit Commissioner, and William Richard Motherwell, Canada’s Minister of Agriculture.
If yours truly may be permitted to express an opinion, the people who grew, harvested, packed, loaded, transported, unloaded, transported, displayed, etc. the fruits in question were more likely to be “largely responsible for the success of the Canadian fruit exhibits.”
The fascination many people, often straight, white and Christian male Homo sapiens, have had, and continue to have, for so-called great men, and those individuals are most often dead straight, white and Christian male Homo sapiens, all too often responsible for the death of a lot of people, had and continues to have serious limitations. Wider cultural, economic, political, religious and social factors tend to be rather more important, and...
Err, to clarify, neither McIntosh not Motherwell fell within the type of death dealing great men described a few seconds ago.
Speaking (typing?) of great men, an expression like pharaoh Khnum Khufwy built the great pyramid has me rolling in the aisles. Just imagine that good pharaoh carrying one by one the 2 300 000 or so blocks of stone which made up that structure. Assuming he had ruled for about 45 years, Khnum Khufwy would have been carrying 140 blocks a day, every single day, each block weighing 2 600 or so kilogrammes (5 750 pounds or so) on average. No time off, no vacation.
That herculean labour would have required a lot of magic potion, and… Magic potion? Getafix?? Asterix??? Nothing?! Really? Sigh…
It might be time to end the first part of this article, do you not think, my reading friend? Might your mind be wandering, I wonder?
See you next week.
Rénald Fortier
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