On Thursday, August 4, 2016 at 3:54:11 PM UTC-4, Dave Smith wrote:
> On 2016-08-04 2:49 PM, dsi1 wrote:
> > On Thursday, August 4, 2016 at 8:29:09 AM UTC-10, Cindy Hamilton
> > wrote:
> >
> >
> > My guess is that the fruits most people get today did not exist a
> > hundred years ago. They are purpose-built for the market conditions
> > of today.
>
> Your guess is pretty close. There are a lot of things that you didn't
> get unless they were produced nearby, especially the more perishable
> fruits. It took too long to transport them and they did not have
> refrigeration. When I was a kid in the 50s we had mostly locally grown
> fruits, and only when they were in season. Oranges were a rare treat.
> Kiwis, mangoes and their ilk.... never heard of them.

Of course, but somebody, somewhere was eating mangoes. It's not
all about U.S. and Canadian culture. There's a big world out there,
and and awful lot of them eat just as their ancestors did.

> Some of the fruits were much different than what we see. In colonial
> times apples were not the tasty eating type we see now. They were more
> commonly used as a sweetener for baking, and the other thing they were
> used for was making cider.... hard cider and apple jack.

This is all true. Yet, if we jumped in our time machine and gave
a Honeycrisp apple to my great-great-great grandmother and said,
"This is sweet enough to eat", I'm sure she would.

Cindy Hamilton