October 4, 2017 • 41 mins
From monkey lifehacks, to Victorian shame about bananas to why slipping on a peel became the go-to gag, Will and Mango are ready to dish on the Cavendish. Featuring the International Banana Club’s Top Banana, Ken Bannister.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Guess what will? What's that mango? So this is embarrassing
to admit, but I had no idea. There was a
giant exhibition in eighteen seventy six celebrating america Centennial. I mean,
I had heard of the eighteen seventy six World's Fair,
but I didn't realize it was also called the Philadelphia
Centennial Exposition. And for the little I've read about it,
it sounds amazing. It does take a big man to
(00:22):
admit that you had not heard of that. But but
what do you mean, like, what was so amazing about it? Well,
first of all, the attendance was staggering, Like ten million
people showed up and that was one fifth of the
US population at the time. Wow, I had no idea. Yeah,
And and there were tons of incredible things on display.
So like the arm and torch for the future Statue
of Liberty was there, it was just out sitting on
a long The first automatic dishwasher was there on display,
(00:46):
along with like sewing machines and typewriters, a mechanical pencil
for people to gak at. There was also this new
fangled thing called hinz ketchup. You may have heard of it. Yeah,
people could testify dunking pieces of sausage in it. But
the two things that got the most type the telephone,
as demonstrated by Alexander Graham Bell, which people were in
total of. I mean, this is a lot of amazing
(01:07):
stuff in one place, all right. And so so what
was the other thing? The banana? Of course, the banana. Yeah,
so according to this amazing book Banana by Dan Copple,
the fruit was unveiled as this healthy and cheap alternative
to the apple. Before the bananas were the status symbol,
almost like caviare, but all of a sudden they were
being marketed to everyone. Actually, let let me read you
(01:28):
a quote from one of the admirers there. To my
young and impressionable mind, this was the most romantic of
all the innumerable things I had seen that any of
the vast buildings. It was the tangible, living and expressive
symbol of the far distant and mysterious tropics. And to
be clear, we're talking about a banana here, right. So
that that was from Frederick Upham Adams. He was the
(01:50):
inventor who would go on to streamline the locomotive, and
of all those incredible inventions, it was the banana that
captivated him and also the rest of America. But why
are banana's cheap when they come from so far away?
And how did fruit get so popular? And is the
banana actually going extinct? That's what today's episode is all about.
Why don't we dive in? Yea? Hey there, podcast listeners,
(02:29):
Welcome to Parttime Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as always
I'm joined by my good friend man guest ticket, and
sitting behind the soundproof glass boarding a banana rama sweatshirt
is our pal and producer Tristan McNeil. My sweatshirt, Tristan, So,
I know you've been wanting to talk about the banana
and whether it's actually going extinct, you know, for a
while now. But before we get into that, why don't
we tackle a little outstanding business from our coal a
(02:51):
Wars episode from last week. I guess it was right
all right? Well, first off, we we wanted to have
the Soda Jerks on for a quiz, but unfortunately it
didn't work out because of timing. So we want to
let you know about these guys. The Soda Jerks have
a wonderful soda review site and they you know, taste
and review all sorts of sodas from Crazy Delicious kinds,
the one that tastes like ranch dressing. Yeah, that that
(03:14):
ranch soda review is so great. But when we realized
we couldn't have them on, they told us, make sure
you talk about Crystal Pepsi and how TAB tried to
sabotage it. Actually hadn't heard the story before they mentioned it,
but now we absolutely have to share it. Definitely. So
when Crystal Pepsi came out, it was obviously making this
huge splash, and Coke wanted to take the wind out
of Pepsi's sales, but they didn't want to release a
(03:35):
clear cooke because they thought that could be damaging for
their coke brand. Yeah, that's right. So instead they did
something super devious. Coke took the brand from their stable
they knew wasn't popular, which was TAB, and they released
a clear version to compete with Pepsi. It. Did you
even remember clear TAB? I can't say that I didn't.
And they didn't put that much effort to it, and
I'm not sure how much they worked on the formula,
(03:56):
but they didn't even put the product in a clear
bottle to show that it was clear. They just put
Tab clear on the can, and like, customers assumed that
it was clear, right, And as the soda jerks pointed out,
this was totally genius, like evil genius. Yeah, and you know,
and because Tab was a diet drink, people just assumed
Crystal Pepsi was diet too, and it turned off a
large percentage of the market. And years later, co insiders
(04:20):
admitted that the effort was to kama kaze the brand.
I mean that's their wording. They said, that's what the
plan was all along. And basically they knew their Crystal
Tab would fail, but they hoped it would take down
Crystal Pepsi with it, and it did. Yeah, it's a
funny bit of history from the Cola Wars that we
totally would have missed. And you can find the soda
jerks that the soda jerks dot net. And for those
(04:41):
of you who wrote in with brands we should have mentioned,
from Iron Brew to Doc Brown Cellarray, we promised we'll
give them a taste and sneak those into future soda
episodes down the line. Alright, so I guess we gotta
get back to banana here. So Mango. I know this
is on air, but I've got to say, I was
watching you in the office this week and I saw
you pick up a banana, look around, and then you
quickly flipped it around and peeled it. But you weirdly
(05:05):
look so embarrassed doing it. It was kind of like
you were doing something sneaky that you weren't supposed to
be doing. I know, because eating banana backwards feels so wrong.
So for those of you don't know, and I'm guessing
that's most of you, a few years ago I changed
the way I peeled my bananas. Before I'd always just
used the stem part as the pool tab, kind of
a way everyone's trained. It's actually kind of a clunky
(05:26):
way to do it because it never actually pulls easily.
But then I saw this life act that if you
just turned the banana upside down, not only does that
stem become a convenient banana handle, but it's actually way
easier to peel. Plus you don't get any of those
annoying strands stuck to your banana, Like how much thought
you'd put into this, but that actually that's how monkeys
eat them, right, Yeah, So so for me that was
(05:46):
the kicker, right, Like, when I read that, I was
like humans, You idiots, Why don't you just eat the
way monkeys have been doing it forever? Monkeys are so smart,
smart type like monkeys, we should I know everything. But
but then this week I read this article on Business
Insider where Catherine Milton, who studies primate diets, went off. Here,
I'm going to read you this quote. I'm not sure
(06:08):
where the myth that monkeys eat bananas started. I personally
suspect curious George, but it's time for it to stop.
Wild monkeys don't eat them exclamation point. The whole wild
monkey banana connection is a total fabrication. She sounds pretty
ticked off. So but let me get this right. So
monkeys don't eat bananas. No, they do eat bananas. Her
point was just that monkeys only started eating bananas after
(06:30):
humans cultivated them, and that bananas are actually too sugary
for monkeys and can give them toothaches and diabetes. But
when she was pressed on the topic, she gave my
favorite quote in the article. Quote, of course monkeys and
apes aren't stupid, they're relish eating bananas once they're exposed
to them. All right, So, just to recap on this,
wild monkeys don't eat bananas, but civilized monkeys who have
(06:52):
been exposed to the finer things do eat bananas, but
they shouldn't eat them because of diabetes. Yeah, bingo, Okay,
I'm glad we've settled that. All right. So, I know
we've got a lot to say about the banana. And
obviously the big question we're asking today is our bananas
going extinct. But what's kind of strange is that if
that happens, this will actually be the second time a
top banana has gone extinct. Yeah, so, so you're right.
(07:14):
Basically the banana that everyone fell in love with from
the eighteen seventies until the mid nineteen hundreds, and that's
the one that started the banana craze. It was called
the Gross Michelle or for those of you who want
English translation from the French, Big Mike. I never know
that fairly Big Mike was not to be the perfect banana,
and the flavor was completely different from what we know
(07:34):
speaking of. I actually went to this pop up magazine
show a while ago. Have you have you gone? I
like how we've been in for like fifteen seconds and
you're already on a tanta here. But no, I actually
have not been to one but I know you've said
they're they're pretty great. Yeah you should go. So for
those of you don't know, Pop Up Magazine tours the
country performing a live magazine curating like twelve or thirteen
different writers to speak in a night, and they have
this live orchestra that actually scores the stories, and sometimes
(07:57):
they include shadow puppets or video or these scents. Three experiences,
I honestly tell everyone about them. Yeah, but when I
was at one in New York, they had a chef
who handed out two types of marshmallows to the crowd,
and as she talked about cinnamon in wartime, she had
his taste one marshmallow and then the other, and it
was crazy. So the first one was like a cinnamon
(08:18):
sprig flavor you all know it was. It was pretty tasty.
And then the second was the cinnamon that used to
be available from Vietnam in the nineteen fifties but was
discontinued in the US after the war started. It had
this really like sweet and juicy and big red flavor.
It was almost like two cartoonish to seem like a
natural flavor, and you kind of realized cinnamon gum was
(08:38):
meant to resemble the Saigon version of cinnamon, not the
milder one we've grown accustomed to. And that's kind of
the same with the banana. Like the gross Michelle was
the sweeter, more custody, and really more delicious banana. It
was actually so delicious that when there was a blight
in the nineteen fifties and the crops started going extinct,
banana companies assumed people would revolt if they switched banana
(09:01):
styles on them, which is exactly what they eventually had
to do. Well, And to be clear, Big Mike was
just one of over I don't know, like a thousand
banana species in the world, right, but but a number
of them have seeds so hard they'd actually like break
your teeth if you've been to them. So some are
more like plantains and less sweet. Some are totally inedible.
But the gross Michelle banana was considered like the perfect banana.
(09:23):
It didn't often have seeds, it didn't bruise easily, so
you could just pile them on a boat without boxes.
Its flavor was never off like the bananas you get
in the stores today. It grew year round, and it
was hardy and resistant to most things. At least until
this mysterious Panama disease started wiping it out in something
like a decade. It basically took out all the gross
Michelles with it, all right. And so just just to
(09:45):
tie this up here, that the Caven Dish, which was
the inferior banana both in taste and how it bruised,
that was picked as the replacement, partially because it looked
like the Big Mike, but also because it was resistant
to this Panama disease. Is that right? Well? You know,
I was looking up styles of bananas because reading about
the Big Mike made me curious what other flavors you
(10:05):
can get from a banana. And here are a few
of the ones I really want to try. You know,
I love lists of like strange fruit. So what's in
your top three? All right, I'm just gonna read off
my list here. So so first, the one that I
really want to try is called the apple banana. It's
actually so sweet. It sometimes called the candy apple banana.
It's slightly pinkish and more juicy than a regular banana,
(10:26):
and also sweet, and it doesn't really ever brown. And
you can find this in Hawaii. It's so funny, like
you say all these words like juicy and candy apple,
and I actually can't imagine how good it is. But
what I know is I really want to try one.
I know, So what else you got? All right, there's
something called the ice cream banana. Speaking ones that we
should try. It almost sounds like I'm just making these up.
This one is real. Also called the blue java banana.
(10:48):
It's this strong plant that's hardy enough to survive monsoons,
but it's also got a vanilla flavor to it, and
the flesh is kind of pudding like, which I can't
decide if that sounds delicious or gross, but but in fact,
a lot of people actually eat this with a spoon. Yes,
so I think I've seen monkeys eat those with a spoon,
but not wild monkeys, definitely not wild monkeys. Well, a
(11:09):
lot of people call it the tastiest banana. And then
there's also the red banana, which is short and sticky
and also really sweet, and I don't know, you get
lost in all these banana descriptions that I almost want
a banana kind of sort of walk me through each
of these things. But the fact that the bananas that
come to the States are cavendish makes you crave these
so much more so I definitely want to talk more
(11:32):
about the Cavendish and I feel like the way it's
talked about in these books, it's almost like this mediocre,
flavorless garbage fruit. But even mediocre bananas are good well,
and Americans certainly do love them. I was reading this
New York Times article on the Secret Life of the
City Banana. So there are twenty million bananas distributed around
New York City every week, every single week. That's eighty
(11:54):
million a month and seven twenty million bananas a year.
Like I did the map on that so quick, and
that's just in New York City. That's crazy. But as
much of America loves bananas, apparently India loves them even
more so. According to a two thousand fifteen article in
The Hindu, the country producest of the world's bananas, but
basically exports none of it. Like their entire economies in
(12:16):
Central and South America built exclusively on banana exports, and
India turns down all of that money. They only send
out one percent of their bananas and they hoard the
rest for themselves. And i'mlike, in the US, you can
find tons of varieties of bananas there, but that isn't
the tangent I wanted to take you on. I wanted
to tell you about the weirdest fact I learned this week,
and that's that the forbidden fruit in the Bible might
(12:37):
actually be a banana. I like how you have a
tangent from a hand to it. All right, this does
sound interesting, though, so so what do you mean by this?
So couple is out this amazing argument that the banana
might actually be what he took a bite out of,
and he's got all sorts of evidence for it. So
you start with the fact that the banana is, well,
you know, this pretty suggestive looking fruit, and you can
(12:58):
see what it might be thought of as racy or forbidden.
And as you and I have both read before, the
Bible never actually like specifically mentions what the fruit is,
but it is described in the Koran, and their Copple
says it's talked about as a tree whose quote fruits
piled one above another in long extended shade, whose season
is not limited, and whose supply will not be cut off.
(13:20):
And you know, as any New Englander will tell you,
there's a very clear apple season. But that description as
Copple points out, really describes the bunches upon bunches of
bananas growing multigenerationally and in continuous rings on the plant,
and then he backs this up with talk of climate.
So basically, when scientists looked at the description for the
Garden of Eden and this idea of a place that's
(13:40):
bound by four rivers, they were already thinking that two
of the rivers with the tigers and the euphrates, but
then they found evidence of two rivers that used to
exist near them, and that land wasn't aspitable to apples.
It's prime banana growing territory. That's pretty wild. And so
are there other people who also believe this? Yeah, apparently
there were a number of scholars whople leave this, including
(14:01):
car Linnas you know he's that taxonomist. In fact, the
scientific name he gave bananas was Musa paradisiaca, or wise
fruit of paradise. And uh. Copple has one other bit
of evidence. Apparently bananas used to be mistaken for figs
before they were well known, maybe because they had seeds
and we're stickier. But but Alexander the Great, when he
(14:23):
tried to banana and in India, reportedly thought it was
a fig and in Hebrew translations, Copple points out that
the fruits, often translated as the fig of eve plus
fig leaves make like a lot more sense as something
that they could use to cover off their body when
you realize they're banana leaves, something people actually used to
use to cover up their bodies in history, right right, Well,
you know the description of the bananas foal, it comes
(14:45):
up a lot and I actually read that in Victorian
times bananas were cut up and sold and foil and
that was because the idea of buying or eating a
banana hole would offend these you know, delicate Victorian sensibilities,
which is kind of funny to read about. But you
know what's so funny about this whole forbidden root thing
is that the banana is basically a sexless plant. I mean,
bananas are all clones of one another, grown from clippings
(15:06):
and not seeds. It's how all cavendish tastes so uniform.
But also while those big mics died off and they
all have the exact same vulnerability. But beyond that, for
all this talk about the male anatomy the fruit of
the banana that we eat, it's actually the female part
of the bananas anatomy. That's crazy, And I mean, the
banana is all contradictions how so, so I was actually
(15:28):
thinking about this earlier. But like almost everything good you
say about it has an opposite. So, like the plant
has devastated countries and economies, you think about banana republics
or whatever, but it's also kept nations in Africa fed
and out of wars. It's considered the perfect package fruit
because it's portable and transports so well without getting the
fruit itself dirty. But the peels were also easy to litter,
(15:49):
and once up our time, they were considered the bane
of society. It's sold for super cheap in the US,
and it's almost considered this simple fruit of the people.
But to get it here, tons of people are exploited it.
And and also all these fancy technologies from the cold
chain to railroads to radio systems, they all had to
be innovated. Yeah, and there's a ton to cover there,
(16:09):
and and I definitely want to start by how the
banana got to the US. But quickly before we do,
why don't we take a break, So mango, it's pretty
rare that we have a guest that aligns so perfectly
with the topic. But today we've got Ken Banister TV
on the program. And now now Ken's the founder of
(16:30):
the International Banana Club. Did you ever think you'd be
speaking with the founder of the International Banana Club? And
and in case you were wondering, the TV after his
name stands for top Banana of course, Ken Banister. Welcome
to Part Time Genius. Thank you my pleasure. Hey, so, Ken, um,
would you tell us a little about the International Banana
Club and why do you decide to celebrate the banana
(16:52):
in the first place. Well, this is a fun bunch.
I started back in nineteen seventy two, and uh, it
all came about as my secretarious husband, who was a
Steve Adore unloading bananas in Long Beach, California, gave me
a role of ten thousand banana stickers. So, as the
president of a manufacturing firm making Reflectus all products, I
(17:15):
took that roll of stickers to a trade show in Atlanta, Georgia,
and started handing out banana stickers to people to affix
to their I D badges, And I assured them that
everybody would smile if they saw that banana sticker. One two,
they would get a discount tree, it would improve their attitude,
(17:39):
and it would remind them to stay in good health
and consume one finger or one banana every morning. So
what I did to get people excited motivated about the
banana turned into a club. I had a card made
and decided that I would offer b M's Banana merits
(18:02):
and to degrees in Banana Street for sending things to
do with banana is in good taste. Nothing with cruder
lestibous would be accepted. So that's how the collection got started.
This was clear back in nineteen seventy two. What kind
of benefits do you get as a member of the club.
And is it true that Ronald Reagan was a member? Well,
(18:25):
yes he was. I I inducted him. His title was
PB President Banana. Everybody gets the title of their choice.
I told him he should probably select the PB, and
he said, you know that's fine. Man. We've had lots
of of celebrities playing this bunch over the years because
of the purpose, which is to keep people smiling, their
(18:47):
spirits up and give him a chance to get some recognition.
That's pretty terrific. Now, what's the best response you've gotten
from presenting your membership card to someone to get a discount. Well,
the best response and for me, has been getting out
of about six different speeding tickets by the California Highway Patrol.
(19:11):
I'm not kidney. We get upgrades and hotels by simply
showing the membership card and saying, well we we usually
get an upgrade at no charge. But I held it
up in the window as the police officer walked up
and said driver's license and insurance proof, and I said, oh, officer,
(19:32):
with a smile on my face, very enthusiastically, no tickets please.
It's been Anta Club. I've had several dozen members report
success in getting discounts at restaurants, special favors at hotels,
(19:53):
and you name it. If you ask, you know, if
you're not afraid to ask, you'll you'll get something if
you're pleasant about it. I love how all of these
benefits have nothing to do with like getting more bananas.
It's just that these are even better than that though.
It's pretty great. Now. You you were on the you
were on the Tonight Show a few years back, and
on the show you were showing some alternate uses for bananas.
(20:14):
So can you tell us a little bit about that? Yes,
every morning, I have one finger one banana, that's the
term for one banana. And uh. Then I take the
peel and I rub it across my teeth and it
will if you know to do this on a regular basis,
it will help whiten your teeth. Then uh, if I
(20:37):
have any kind of a bite from an insect, I
will rub the inside of the peel on that bite.
It also serves as believe it or not, a treatment
for your hair, your shoes. You can shine your shoes
with the inside of the peel. And I take I
take those banana peels in the morning and I plant
(20:59):
those peels at the roots of the rose bushes. What's
that do? Well, that's it serves. It's like fertilizer. You
can't waste anything these days, you know. And you know
they all come in the shape of a smile, those
bright yellow, elongated edible fingers. They they're just I have
I've been eaten one hand a week for over well. Gosh,
(21:24):
I'm seventy eight years old, so I think I started
eating bananas when I was about five or six. But
isn't it funny that that banana role of banana stick
has got us started and we've got an international club
with over fifty five thousand card carrying members around the
world's great and I must answer a hundred or more
(21:48):
emails every day trying to keep people's spirits up, especially
when things go wrong like this morning, and we have
to keep smiling. We have to keep our spirits up,
we have to be positive, and we have to support
the team. And that's what the Banana Club is all about.
So I did want to talk to us for a
second about the International Banana Museum. It's actually in the
(22:10):
Guinness Book of World Records for most items devoted to
anyone fruit. And when I was online, I saw some
really funny things. I saw this portrait of of a
bride who was holding a bouquet of bananas. I saw
the banana putter that that you've handed out to various
celebrities like Bob Hope and stuff over the years. But
(22:31):
what is your favorite thing in the International Banana Museum. Well,
it was, and still is and will always be the
petrified banana that a girl when I was giving a
lecture back in Wisconsin raised her hands and ken bananas.
I've got something for you. I've got a petrified banana
that I found in my closet. It has been in
her closet, I guess a year or so. And she
(22:54):
I said, well, if you send that to me, I'll
give you a hundred banana merrits and a degree and
Dana Anistry a master's degree. And she did. And I
had it on the wall of the museum for almost
twenty five years. And it's in the shape of a smile.
But it's certainly an old Gummer smile, dark dark brown
(23:17):
and hard as a rock and mounted on in a frame.
It's really something to see what people send. And of
course if somebody sends something that's off color, I send
it right back with de merits. We'll have to we'll
have to come check out the museum sometime. But for
all of our listeners, you can visit or join the
(23:38):
International Banana Club online at International Banana Club dot com.
But Ken Banister, Top Banana, thank you so much for
joining us on Part Time Genius. You bet you my pleasure.
Keep smiling. Welcome back to Part Time Genius, and we're
(24:05):
talking bananas and specifically how the bananas started migrating up
to America. So about five or six years before they
made their glorious debut in Philadelphia. This sea captain named
Lorenzo dow Baker. He bought about a hundred sixty bunches
of bananas back with him, almost on a lark, like
he'd gone to South America ferrying gold miners down there.
(24:26):
But when his when his boats started leaking, he realized
he needed to make a pit stop, so he pulled
into Jamaica where he fixed his boat, and for some
reason he loaded it up with bananas, and if the
wind hadn't been at his back, the fruit might have
gone bad on the journey. But he made it back
to New England in a quick eleven days, and he
sold the fruit for two dollars a bunch, netting him
(24:46):
about sixty dollars in today's money, and within a year
he was the biggest exporter of bananas from the Caribbean.
He even bought land in Jamaica where he started the
world's first commercial banana company. Right, but you know, I
remember reading that Baker was only so good at his job.
I mean, bananas were good business, and there are accounts
of his workers lighting cigars with five dollar bills and
(25:06):
getting them into all sorts of trouble in the Jamaican Nights,
but Baker was a seafair through and through, and along
the way he teamed up with His most enthusiastic buyer
was this gentleman named Andrew Preston, who had risen up
the ranks from a janitor at a Boston grocery store,
and when he first saw the bananas at the port,
he immediately scooped them up to wholesale, and before long
(25:27):
the two had taken on investors and started Boston Fruit,
which three or four names later would be called Chakda.
But Andrew was kind of a genius, right, I mean,
he was definitely clever and very ambitious, and he wasn't
taking any chances with his produce. Entire boatloads of the
fruit could show up at the harbor rotting if winds
were rough or if the trip, you know, took a
(25:48):
few days too long. So he really invented the cold chain,
which you know we talked about in our Inventions episode
a few weeks ago. But this was before air conditioning.
So Preston cooled as bananas the old fashion way with
giant blocks of ice, and he also ensured that bananas
kept cool along the way in storerooms and refrigerated box
cars every step of the process. As Copple puts it,
(26:12):
ice became so essential to banana profitability that at least
one banana merchant bought up every ice factory along the
Gulf coast. Has reduced no middleman cooling costs, made his
company the second biggest success story in the banana industry.
That company was called Standard Fruit or what you might
know now as Dull, and you can start to see
(26:32):
why big Banana is referred to as al palpo or
or the octopus. They started getting their tentacles into other
businesses and owning the entire supply chain. One other small
thing I read about Preston that I really liked, though,
was that he painted his fleet all white to reflect
the sun. I just thought it was so smart because
you read about it now as this technique for keeping
your house cool, but it's funny that it's been going
(26:54):
on since the nineteen hundreds. And he also marketed the
boats as cruise ships, where tourists could tag along for
a fee on the ships to Jamaica, and if they
were feeling too hot at any moment, they could open
a vent and let the chilled banana air cool them. Down.
Let's let's take a step back for a moment. It's
actually an insane thing Preston and others were doing when
you think about it, I mean they were essentially buying
(27:16):
the super perishable item, transporting it thousands of miles, and
selling it as cheap as possible. It doesn't seem like
that could work. And Preston wanted to make the banana
more popular than the apple, which sounds outrageous because the
apple is clearly the most American of fruits. But he
actually managed to do this. But the only way the
economics of something like that can work is if you
(27:37):
work on a really large scale. In by nineteen eleven,
one of the boats they were using, the six a Olah,
was big enough to carry five hundred railroad cars full
of banana. That's not the boat was half the size
of the Titanic, and it was only one small part
of Boston Fruits Great White Fleet. Actually, it's funny to
see how much has changed and how much hasn't in
(27:58):
the banana industry. So in that time spiece you were
mentioning earlier, there's this super cute part where all these
green bananas come to New Jersey and make a pit
stop to ripen and the way it's described, it's almost
like they're hanging out in tanning beds, just relaxing for
three or four days before they have to complete their journey,
and they're just focused on getting their glow on on.
(28:19):
On one hand, the banana industry is just impressive. I mean,
they came up with the tropical radio system so that
boats were alerting the laborers of the exact moment their
boats were arriving, so that fresh green bananas can meet
them at the docks and get loaded up at the
perfect moment possible. And everything was just syncd up so
exactly like this is the early nineteen hundreds. And they
(28:39):
were also incredible marketers. They put coupons and cereal boxes
for free bananas that were somehow paid for by the
serial company to make the meals healthier. But they invested
in infrastructure to like railroads. Railroads were built across South
and Central America purely for the protection and distribution of
bananas and really not at all to help the people
of those countries. But the model that banana companies established
(29:02):
was ingenious, yeah, but also evil. I mean it's essentially
the model for banana republics. So the banana company would
come in offer to build a railroad with government's help.
Then when government funding dried up, they'd offer to build
the rest for free if they got a sweetheart deal
of some sort, you know, the low taxes, free land,
little oversight. And once they had their hooks in and
(29:25):
needed the governments to bend on their whims, they'd install
a new dictator. By the way, did you know, oh,
Henry actually came up with the phrase banana republic. He
wrote it in this short story while he was fleeing
the law in Honduras, and that's amazing. So uh. But
by the way, I know, I told you I didn't
really want to talk too much about banana republics because
they are interesting and actually deserve their own show. But
(29:48):
I did want to talk a little bit about Jacobo R. Benz,
who was elected freely in Guatemala in and I wanted
to talk about it because his story is just the
most nakedly transparent of these stories. So for context, At
the time, the big banana companies were hoarding land, and
they secretly knew that this banana blight was coming in
(30:08):
a big way and that they needed as much land
to turn out as many viable bananas as possible, and
as the blight came, their plan was simply to expand
into new territories. But our bends hated the fact that
the banana companies owned all this land, I mean, supposedly
seventy of the nation's arable land, and they weren't using
any of it all right, So so he just tried
(30:30):
to take it back kind of. I mean, he was
also negotiating for workers rights, which is what Boston Fruit
was now called conceded too. But uh, but he also
wanted this unused land for peasants, and he was willing
to pay for it. He told United Fruit he gave
them six dred thousand dollars, and when they laughed and
asked where he got that sum from which they valued, uh,
(30:50):
they valued the land closer to sixteen million dollars, he
responded that he'd taken that estimate directly from the declared
value they were paying on their taxes, like United Fruit
had for year has been cheating on their taxes, and
our bends in the government just you know, accepted those
numbers at face value. But when our Ben's tried to
take their land, United Fruits basically ruined him. The next
(31:10):
terms and United Fruits negotiations were hand delivered by the U. S.
State Department. I mean, this is a business dealing. Think
about how crazy that is. And the company also funded
journalistic research on Guatemala that showed our Ben's was a Communist,
which he wasn't, but they circulated the report to eight
hundred lawmakers and staffers in d C. And in the
city plagued with rabid McCarthyism at the time. They spent
(31:33):
a year convincing Congress our Ben's was the Soviet dupe.
And they also circulated these horrible photos of our Ben's
atrocities of corpses thrown into mass graves, which were actually
photos of earthquake victims, but presented like there were casualties
of our Ben's as rule. And the fingerprints on this
are pretty damning. I mean, the U. S. Secretary of State,
John Foster Dallas, was a partner and United Fruits law firm,
(31:57):
and Dallas's brother was head of the CIA. The money
and interest they were all super entangled. And once the
congressional opinion was swayed and the banana companies had made
their case, this is about ninety three. That's when Eisenhower
authorized the CIA to get rid of our bends. And
when our bands finally resigned, he was humiliated in front
(32:17):
of the press. I mean he was stripped down to
his underwear before being escorted onto a plane. And for
the rest of this life, this man, who like tried
to do good for his country was the stateless, depressed
shell of a man who finally committed suicide. And also,
we could get cheaper bananas. And that's just one horrifying
story of El Palpo. There are dozens of them as
(32:38):
it ravaged through various countries in Central America. Yeah, I mean,
you're you're right, this is definitely depressing. I know. Um,
so I was thinking we should lighten the mood with
some banana humor. So I know you did a little
digging on why slipping on banana peels became such a
comedy trope, Like you set the stage talking about our
bends and they're like, tell some banana, all right, well
(32:59):
let me all this up here. But but looking at this,
so before it was a visual gag, the banana peel
was was kind of a hazard. I mean, people just
littered them everywhere in Virginia Scott Jenkins incredible book. It
was called Bananas An American History. She talks about how
kids at Sunday School were warned that a stray peel
could lead to an innocent person getting injured, and how
(33:19):
that injury could leave them in the poorhouse for life.
The boy Scouts were told picking up a stray peel
was a good act for the day. One scam artist,
according to The New York Times, was arrested after she
claimed she'd fallen seventeen different times on various banana peels,
all in a span of like four years or something.
But as the streets became cleaner, it found its way
(33:40):
to vaudeville, and according to the a Vy Clubs, Sliding
Billy Watson was the original. And now don't confuse sliding
Billy Watson with Billy Beef trust Watson, who was a
competing comedian at the time. So I also like what
you were talking about, Charlie Chaplin. Oh yeah, the the
gag was used by everyone, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, all
the silent film stars. But there's this conversation where a
(34:02):
film director asked, years later, how do you make the
banana gag feel fresh, and he asked, Chaplin, do you
show the banana first and then the lady or close
up on the lady and then the banana and then
have the slip, and Chaplain immediately said neither. You show
the lady approach, then the banana peel, then the two together.
Then you show the woman gingerly stepping over the peel
(34:24):
and disappearing down a manhole. I know the company's doubted
whether they could switch out the big mike and still
have people buying bananas, but they pulled off an incredible transition. Yeah,
(34:48):
that's true. We eat more bananas now than we ever
did in the Gross Michelle days. But part of it
is just that banana companies are excellent marketers. I mean,
any group that could so underhandedly like pull off those
coups us also have an incredible handle on traditional marketing
and with things like you know, the Miss Jakeda campaigns,
or how they got doctors to endorse bananas as a
(35:08):
great baby food or whatever. I mean, they quietly up
the demand. It's true, but I think we should get
back to the original question, which was what's the state
of the Cavendish today and is it going extinct? Yeah? So,
The truth is banana companies are worried. So while the
Cavendish was resistant to the Panama disease that took out
the Gross Michelle, that disease has other variations and Cavendish
(35:30):
isn't holding up well against those. There's also this airborne
virus called black cigatoca that requires a tons of pesticides
and chemicals sprayed on the bananas. It really isn't good
for the workers health. And there's really no such thing
as an organic banana on the market today, but there
is some hope. There are these amazing labs in Belgium
and other places where they've been stockpiling cuttings and trying
(35:52):
to graft together a stronger banana, and there's some ideas.
Does this apple banana called goldfinger that doesn't brown at all,
but it also isn't as sweet. It's this banana that
sort of meets a lot of needs and it's hardy,
but it's hard to see it as this pure replacement
for the Caven Dish. Scientists have also decoded the banana's genome,
which helps, but no one's confident that the Cavendish can
(36:14):
be saved, and at the same time, no one's slowing
down on eating bananas either. There's there's also this much
sweeter banana that comes out of the Philippines that some
scientists are hopeful about. It's way more fragile. But if
the banana industry could switch from just piling gross michelles
on boats to boxing bananas to transport the caven dish,
maybe they can adapt to this Philippine and banana. It's
(36:36):
it's a big question mark though, And and I want
to end this on a happy note. So what's something
you can tell me about the banana that's fun? Well? Um,
you know, for one, there's this great passage in Dan
Copple's book about how the bananas used in Uganda, and
he talks about how it's used this currency, I mean,
sometimes by farmers to pay back loans, and how there
are songs sung about bananas, and and not in a
(36:57):
kitchy way, but almost this epic history pull him kind
of way. He mentions this Red Cross report that documented
that if faminine war are connected, the fact that bananas
are so plentiful in Uganda have helped the country avoid both.
But here's the part that I really love, and it's
it's how much the banana is part of the culture.
Let me just read this passage from it says, um,
(37:19):
there's a special breed of banana that's consumed when twins
are born. Another type marks the passing of a relative.
Families are guaranteed prosperity if the mother buries her after
birth under a banana tree. There's a banana that, when eaton,
helps return a straying spouse. One breed represents the lion
and is said to improve male potency. And at the
center of it all is matoki, the word that's used
(37:41):
interchangeably for both food and banana. So for Uganda's nothing
says welcome home more than this comfort food served on
a banana leaf saucer. I love that. But you know
what else I love the part time genius fact off?
Is it already time? All right? Well, let's do it,
m M So do you know that bananas will glow
(38:11):
bright blue under a black light? They light up like
fosse breasts and jellyfish, I mean, except their bananas. But
the weird part is green bananas don't glow, only the
yellow ones do. So I know you said Indians love
their bananas, but per person, Uganda has them beat the
country grows eleven million tons of fruit, which bears out
to five hundred pounds per person annually. I mean this
(38:35):
is according to Dan Copple's research, and he says that
in remote villages where there's little else they eat, it
can be up to nine hundred and seventy pounds per person.
That's insane. So here's a quick one. Did you know
that the strands in the banana are called the flow,
him or flam. I'm clearly not good at pronouncing things. Now,
you're really not all right. Here's something fun for people
(38:55):
who love comics. The first Miss Chiquita was drawn by
Dick Brown, who also created Hagar the Horrible cartoon, and
when the character was revamped, it was done by Oscar Grilloh,
who drew the pink panther. Here's a gross one. In
uh in Bombay, a first time thiefs stole a gold
chain and as he was chased and cornered by police,
he swallowed it and to get it out of the system,
(39:17):
they force fed him forty eight bananas. God, I'm not
sure why they knew forty eight was the right number,
but apparently it worked. It is my favorite number, but
I don't think I'm gonna eat that many bananas. But
all right, this is kind of amazing. And it comes
from Pittsburgh, which is also the supposed home of the
banana split. But you know how ethlene is used to
ripe in bananas, right, Well, it's also combustible, and according
(39:38):
to The New York Times, a mishap with the gas
caused the Pittsburgh Banana Company building to explode and rain
bananas down on the city. Oh man, So I don't
love explosions, but I do love that you said Pittsburgh
Banana Company building. And I also love the idea of
just like plucking bananas from the heavens. So I'm gonna
give it to you. But before we go, I I
(40:00):
just want to give a special thanks to Nolan Brown,
who helped with the research this week. Yeah, and we
should also give a shout out to Dan Copple's book Banana,
The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World. And
and before we go, what episodes. We've got a couple
of great episodes coming up at the end of this week.
We've got one that we've been working on on super Fans, right, Yeah,
I'm hoping we can cover a lot about the faneloes.
(40:20):
Those are very Mantel fans, yeah, as well as Harry
Potter big football fans. All kinds of fun stuff there.
And then we've got another very different one coming up
next week on how big is the U. S Military
and how is the money spent there? So that should
be really interesting to be awesome as well. But we
love hearing from so many of you, don't forget. You
can reach out to us part Time Genius at how
stuff Works dot com or on our seven fact hotline
(40:44):
one eight four four pt Genius. We've heard from so
many of you telling your friends about the show. Please
keep doing that and if you get a chance, feel
free to write us review on Apple Podcast. But thanks
so much for listening. Yea, thanks again for listening. Part
(41:11):
Time Genius is a production of How Stuff Works and
wouldn't be possible without several brilliant people who do the
important things we couldn't even begin to understand. Tristan McNeil
does the editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song
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the exact producer thing. Gave Louesier is our lead researcher
with support from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan
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(41:33):
show to your ears. Good job, Eves. If you like
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who
Guess what will? What's that mango? So this is embarrassing
to admit, but I had no idea. There was a
giant exhibition in eighteen seventy six celebrating america Centennial. I mean,
I had heard of the eighteen seventy six World's Fair,
but I didn't realize it was also called the Philadelphia
Centennial Exposition. And for the little I've read about it,
it sounds amazing. It does take a big man to
(00:22):
admit that you had not heard of that. But but
what do you mean, like, what was so amazing about it? Well,
first of all, the attendance was staggering, Like ten million
people showed up and that was one fifth of the
US population at the time. Wow, I had no idea. Yeah,
And and there were tons of incredible things on display.
So like the arm and torch for the future Statue
of Liberty was there, it was just out sitting on
a long The first automatic dishwasher was there on display,
(00:46):
along with like sewing machines and typewriters, a mechanical pencil
for people to gak at. There was also this new
fangled thing called hinz ketchup. You may have heard of it. Yeah,
people could testify dunking pieces of sausage in it. But
the two things that got the most type the telephone,
as demonstrated by Alexander Graham Bell, which people were in
total of. I mean, this is a lot of amazing
(01:07):
stuff in one place, all right. And so so what
was the other thing? The banana? Of course, the banana. Yeah,
so according to this amazing book Banana by Dan Copple,
the fruit was unveiled as this healthy and cheap alternative
to the apple. Before the bananas were the status symbol,
almost like caviare, but all of a sudden they were
being marketed to everyone. Actually, let let me read you
(01:28):
a quote from one of the admirers there. To my
young and impressionable mind, this was the most romantic of
all the innumerable things I had seen that any of
the vast buildings. It was the tangible, living and expressive
symbol of the far distant and mysterious tropics. And to
be clear, we're talking about a banana here, right. So
that that was from Frederick Upham Adams. He was the
(01:50):
inventor who would go on to streamline the locomotive, and
of all those incredible inventions, it was the banana that
captivated him and also the rest of America. But why
are banana's cheap when they come from so far away?
And how did fruit get so popular? And is the
banana actually going extinct? That's what today's episode is all about.
Why don't we dive in? Yea? Hey there, podcast listeners,
(02:29):
Welcome to Parttime Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as always
I'm joined by my good friend man guest ticket, and
sitting behind the soundproof glass boarding a banana rama sweatshirt
is our pal and producer Tristan McNeil. My sweatshirt, Tristan, So,
I know you've been wanting to talk about the banana
and whether it's actually going extinct, you know, for a
while now. But before we get into that, why don't
we tackle a little outstanding business from our coal a
(02:51):
Wars episode from last week. I guess it was right
all right? Well, first off, we we wanted to have
the Soda Jerks on for a quiz, but unfortunately it
didn't work out because of timing. So we want to
let you know about these guys. The Soda Jerks have
a wonderful soda review site and they you know, taste
and review all sorts of sodas from Crazy Delicious kinds,
the one that tastes like ranch dressing. Yeah, that that
(03:14):
ranch soda review is so great. But when we realized
we couldn't have them on, they told us, make sure
you talk about Crystal Pepsi and how TAB tried to
sabotage it. Actually hadn't heard the story before they mentioned it,
but now we absolutely have to share it. Definitely. So
when Crystal Pepsi came out, it was obviously making this
huge splash, and Coke wanted to take the wind out
of Pepsi's sales, but they didn't want to release a
(03:35):
clear cooke because they thought that could be damaging for
their coke brand. Yeah, that's right. So instead they did
something super devious. Coke took the brand from their stable
they knew wasn't popular, which was TAB, and they released
a clear version to compete with Pepsi. It. Did you
even remember clear TAB? I can't say that I didn't.
And they didn't put that much effort to it, and
I'm not sure how much they worked on the formula,
(03:56):
but they didn't even put the product in a clear
bottle to show that it was clear. They just put
Tab clear on the can, and like, customers assumed that
it was clear, right, And as the soda jerks pointed out,
this was totally genius, like evil genius. Yeah, and you know,
and because Tab was a diet drink, people just assumed
Crystal Pepsi was diet too, and it turned off a
large percentage of the market. And years later, co insiders
(04:20):
admitted that the effort was to kama kaze the brand.
I mean that's their wording. They said, that's what the
plan was all along. And basically they knew their Crystal
Tab would fail, but they hoped it would take down
Crystal Pepsi with it, and it did. Yeah, it's a
funny bit of history from the Cola Wars that we
totally would have missed. And you can find the soda
jerks that the soda jerks dot net. And for those
(04:41):
of you who wrote in with brands we should have mentioned,
from Iron Brew to Doc Brown Cellarray, we promised we'll
give them a taste and sneak those into future soda
episodes down the line. Alright, so I guess we gotta
get back to banana here. So Mango. I know this
is on air, but I've got to say, I was
watching you in the office this week and I saw
you pick up a banana, look around, and then you
quickly flipped it around and peeled it. But you weirdly
(05:05):
look so embarrassed doing it. It was kind of like
you were doing something sneaky that you weren't supposed to
be doing. I know, because eating banana backwards feels so wrong.
So for those of you don't know, and I'm guessing
that's most of you, a few years ago I changed
the way I peeled my bananas. Before I'd always just
used the stem part as the pool tab, kind of
a way everyone's trained. It's actually kind of a clunky
(05:26):
way to do it because it never actually pulls easily.
But then I saw this life act that if you
just turned the banana upside down, not only does that
stem become a convenient banana handle, but it's actually way
easier to peel. Plus you don't get any of those
annoying strands stuck to your banana, Like how much thought
you'd put into this, but that actually that's how monkeys
eat them, right, Yeah, So so for me that was
(05:46):
the kicker, right, Like, when I read that, I was
like humans, You idiots, Why don't you just eat the
way monkeys have been doing it forever? Monkeys are so smart,
smart type like monkeys, we should I know everything. But
but then this week I read this article on Business
Insider where Catherine Milton, who studies primate diets, went off. Here,
I'm going to read you this quote. I'm not sure
(06:08):
where the myth that monkeys eat bananas started. I personally
suspect curious George, but it's time for it to stop.
Wild monkeys don't eat them exclamation point. The whole wild
monkey banana connection is a total fabrication. She sounds pretty
ticked off. So but let me get this right. So
monkeys don't eat bananas. No, they do eat bananas. Her
point was just that monkeys only started eating bananas after
(06:30):
humans cultivated them, and that bananas are actually too sugary
for monkeys and can give them toothaches and diabetes. But
when she was pressed on the topic, she gave my
favorite quote in the article. Quote, of course monkeys and
apes aren't stupid, they're relish eating bananas once they're exposed
to them. All right, So, just to recap on this,
wild monkeys don't eat bananas, but civilized monkeys who have
(06:52):
been exposed to the finer things do eat bananas, but
they shouldn't eat them because of diabetes. Yeah, bingo, Okay,
I'm glad we've settled that. All right. So, I know
we've got a lot to say about the banana. And
obviously the big question we're asking today is our bananas
going extinct. But what's kind of strange is that if
that happens, this will actually be the second time a
top banana has gone extinct. Yeah, so, so you're right.
(07:14):
Basically the banana that everyone fell in love with from
the eighteen seventies until the mid nineteen hundreds, and that's
the one that started the banana craze. It was called
the Gross Michelle or for those of you who want
English translation from the French, Big Mike. I never know
that fairly Big Mike was not to be the perfect banana,
and the flavor was completely different from what we know
(07:34):
speaking of. I actually went to this pop up magazine
show a while ago. Have you have you gone? I
like how we've been in for like fifteen seconds and
you're already on a tanta here. But no, I actually
have not been to one but I know you've said
they're they're pretty great. Yeah you should go. So for
those of you don't know, Pop Up Magazine tours the
country performing a live magazine curating like twelve or thirteen
different writers to speak in a night, and they have
this live orchestra that actually scores the stories, and sometimes
(07:57):
they include shadow puppets or video or these scents. Three experiences,
I honestly tell everyone about them. Yeah, but when I
was at one in New York, they had a chef
who handed out two types of marshmallows to the crowd,
and as she talked about cinnamon in wartime, she had
his taste one marshmallow and then the other, and it
was crazy. So the first one was like a cinnamon
(08:18):
sprig flavor you all know it was. It was pretty tasty.
And then the second was the cinnamon that used to
be available from Vietnam in the nineteen fifties but was
discontinued in the US after the war started. It had
this really like sweet and juicy and big red flavor.
It was almost like two cartoonish to seem like a
natural flavor, and you kind of realized cinnamon gum was
(08:38):
meant to resemble the Saigon version of cinnamon, not the
milder one we've grown accustomed to. And that's kind of
the same with the banana. Like the gross Michelle was
the sweeter, more custody, and really more delicious banana. It
was actually so delicious that when there was a blight
in the nineteen fifties and the crops started going extinct,
banana companies assumed people would revolt if they switched banana
(09:01):
styles on them, which is exactly what they eventually had
to do. Well, And to be clear, Big Mike was
just one of over I don't know, like a thousand
banana species in the world, right, but but a number
of them have seeds so hard they'd actually like break
your teeth if you've been to them. So some are
more like plantains and less sweet. Some are totally inedible.
But the gross Michelle banana was considered like the perfect banana.
(09:23):
It didn't often have seeds, it didn't bruise easily, so
you could just pile them on a boat without boxes.
Its flavor was never off like the bananas you get
in the stores today. It grew year round, and it
was hardy and resistant to most things. At least until
this mysterious Panama disease started wiping it out in something
like a decade. It basically took out all the gross
Michelles with it, all right. And so just just to
(09:45):
tie this up here, that the Caven Dish, which was
the inferior banana both in taste and how it bruised,
that was picked as the replacement, partially because it looked
like the Big Mike, but also because it was resistant
to this Panama disease. Is that right? Well? You know,
I was looking up styles of bananas because reading about
the Big Mike made me curious what other flavors you
(10:05):
can get from a banana. And here are a few
of the ones I really want to try. You know,
I love lists of like strange fruit. So what's in
your top three? All right, I'm just gonna read off
my list here. So so first, the one that I
really want to try is called the apple banana. It's
actually so sweet. It sometimes called the candy apple banana.
It's slightly pinkish and more juicy than a regular banana,
(10:26):
and also sweet, and it doesn't really ever brown. And
you can find this in Hawaii. It's so funny, like
you say all these words like juicy and candy apple,
and I actually can't imagine how good it is. But
what I know is I really want to try one.
I know, So what else you got? All right, there's
something called the ice cream banana. Speaking ones that we
should try. It almost sounds like I'm just making these up.
This one is real. Also called the blue java banana.
(10:48):
It's this strong plant that's hardy enough to survive monsoons,
but it's also got a vanilla flavor to it, and
the flesh is kind of pudding like, which I can't
decide if that sounds delicious or gross, but but in fact,
a lot of people actually eat this with a spoon. Yes,
so I think I've seen monkeys eat those with a spoon,
but not wild monkeys, definitely not wild monkeys. Well, a
(11:09):
lot of people call it the tastiest banana. And then
there's also the red banana, which is short and sticky
and also really sweet, and I don't know, you get
lost in all these banana descriptions that I almost want
a banana kind of sort of walk me through each
of these things. But the fact that the bananas that
come to the States are cavendish makes you crave these
so much more so I definitely want to talk more
(11:32):
about the Cavendish and I feel like the way it's
talked about in these books, it's almost like this mediocre,
flavorless garbage fruit. But even mediocre bananas are good well,
and Americans certainly do love them. I was reading this
New York Times article on the Secret Life of the
City Banana. So there are twenty million bananas distributed around
New York City every week, every single week. That's eighty
(11:54):
million a month and seven twenty million bananas a year.
Like I did the map on that so quick, and
that's just in New York City. That's crazy. But as
much of America loves bananas, apparently India loves them even
more so. According to a two thousand fifteen article in
The Hindu, the country producest of the world's bananas, but
basically exports none of it. Like their entire economies in
(12:16):
Central and South America built exclusively on banana exports, and
India turns down all of that money. They only send
out one percent of their bananas and they hoard the
rest for themselves. And i'mlike, in the US, you can
find tons of varieties of bananas there, but that isn't
the tangent I wanted to take you on. I wanted
to tell you about the weirdest fact I learned this week,
and that's that the forbidden fruit in the Bible might
(12:37):
actually be a banana. I like how you have a
tangent from a hand to it. All right, this does
sound interesting, though, so so what do you mean by this?
So couple is out this amazing argument that the banana
might actually be what he took a bite out of,
and he's got all sorts of evidence for it. So
you start with the fact that the banana is, well,
you know, this pretty suggestive looking fruit, and you can
(12:58):
see what it might be thought of as racy or forbidden.
And as you and I have both read before, the
Bible never actually like specifically mentions what the fruit is,
but it is described in the Koran, and their Copple
says it's talked about as a tree whose quote fruits
piled one above another in long extended shade, whose season
is not limited, and whose supply will not be cut off.
(13:20):
And you know, as any New Englander will tell you,
there's a very clear apple season. But that description as
Copple points out, really describes the bunches upon bunches of
bananas growing multigenerationally and in continuous rings on the plant,
and then he backs this up with talk of climate.
So basically, when scientists looked at the description for the
Garden of Eden and this idea of a place that's
(13:40):
bound by four rivers, they were already thinking that two
of the rivers with the tigers and the euphrates, but
then they found evidence of two rivers that used to
exist near them, and that land wasn't aspitable to apples.
It's prime banana growing territory. That's pretty wild. And so
are there other people who also believe this? Yeah, apparently
there were a number of scholars whople leave this, including
(14:01):
car Linnas you know he's that taxonomist. In fact, the
scientific name he gave bananas was Musa paradisiaca, or wise
fruit of paradise. And uh. Copple has one other bit
of evidence. Apparently bananas used to be mistaken for figs
before they were well known, maybe because they had seeds
and we're stickier. But but Alexander the Great, when he
(14:23):
tried to banana and in India, reportedly thought it was
a fig and in Hebrew translations, Copple points out that
the fruits, often translated as the fig of eve plus
fig leaves make like a lot more sense as something
that they could use to cover off their body when
you realize they're banana leaves, something people actually used to
use to cover up their bodies in history, right right, Well,
you know the description of the bananas foal, it comes
(14:45):
up a lot and I actually read that in Victorian
times bananas were cut up and sold and foil and
that was because the idea of buying or eating a
banana hole would offend these you know, delicate Victorian sensibilities,
which is kind of funny to read about. But you
know what's so funny about this whole forbidden root thing
is that the banana is basically a sexless plant. I mean,
bananas are all clones of one another, grown from clippings
(15:06):
and not seeds. It's how all cavendish tastes so uniform.
But also while those big mics died off and they
all have the exact same vulnerability. But beyond that, for
all this talk about the male anatomy the fruit of
the banana that we eat, it's actually the female part
of the bananas anatomy. That's crazy, And I mean, the
banana is all contradictions how so, so I was actually
(15:28):
thinking about this earlier. But like almost everything good you
say about it has an opposite. So, like the plant
has devastated countries and economies, you think about banana republics
or whatever, but it's also kept nations in Africa fed
and out of wars. It's considered the perfect package fruit
because it's portable and transports so well without getting the
fruit itself dirty. But the peels were also easy to litter,
(15:49):
and once up our time, they were considered the bane
of society. It's sold for super cheap in the US,
and it's almost considered this simple fruit of the people.
But to get it here, tons of people are exploited it.
And and also all these fancy technologies from the cold
chain to railroads to radio systems, they all had to
be innovated. Yeah, and there's a ton to cover there,
(16:09):
and and I definitely want to start by how the
banana got to the US. But quickly before we do,
why don't we take a break, So mango, it's pretty
rare that we have a guest that aligns so perfectly
with the topic. But today we've got Ken Banister TV
on the program. And now now Ken's the founder of
(16:30):
the International Banana Club. Did you ever think you'd be
speaking with the founder of the International Banana Club? And
and in case you were wondering, the TV after his
name stands for top Banana of course, Ken Banister. Welcome
to Part Time Genius. Thank you my pleasure. Hey, so, Ken, um,
would you tell us a little about the International Banana
Club and why do you decide to celebrate the banana
(16:52):
in the first place. Well, this is a fun bunch.
I started back in nineteen seventy two, and uh, it
all came about as my secretarious husband, who was a
Steve Adore unloading bananas in Long Beach, California, gave me
a role of ten thousand banana stickers. So, as the
president of a manufacturing firm making Reflectus all products, I
(17:15):
took that roll of stickers to a trade show in Atlanta, Georgia,
and started handing out banana stickers to people to affix
to their I D badges, And I assured them that
everybody would smile if they saw that banana sticker. One two,
they would get a discount tree, it would improve their attitude,
(17:39):
and it would remind them to stay in good health
and consume one finger or one banana every morning. So
what I did to get people excited motivated about the
banana turned into a club. I had a card made
and decided that I would offer b M's Banana merits
(18:02):
and to degrees in Banana Street for sending things to
do with banana is in good taste. Nothing with cruder
lestibous would be accepted. So that's how the collection got started.
This was clear back in nineteen seventy two. What kind
of benefits do you get as a member of the club.
And is it true that Ronald Reagan was a member? Well,
(18:25):
yes he was. I I inducted him. His title was
PB President Banana. Everybody gets the title of their choice.
I told him he should probably select the PB, and
he said, you know that's fine. Man. We've had lots
of of celebrities playing this bunch over the years because
of the purpose, which is to keep people smiling, their
(18:47):
spirits up and give him a chance to get some recognition.
That's pretty terrific. Now, what's the best response you've gotten
from presenting your membership card to someone to get a discount. Well,
the best response and for me, has been getting out
of about six different speeding tickets by the California Highway Patrol.
(19:11):
I'm not kidney. We get upgrades and hotels by simply
showing the membership card and saying, well we we usually
get an upgrade at no charge. But I held it
up in the window as the police officer walked up
and said driver's license and insurance proof, and I said, oh, officer,
(19:32):
with a smile on my face, very enthusiastically, no tickets please.
It's been Anta Club. I've had several dozen members report
success in getting discounts at restaurants, special favors at hotels,
(19:53):
and you name it. If you ask, you know, if
you're not afraid to ask, you'll you'll get something if
you're pleasant about it. I love how all of these
benefits have nothing to do with like getting more bananas.
It's just that these are even better than that though.
It's pretty great. Now. You you were on the you
were on the Tonight Show a few years back, and
on the show you were showing some alternate uses for bananas.
(20:14):
So can you tell us a little bit about that? Yes,
every morning, I have one finger one banana, that's the
term for one banana. And uh. Then I take the
peel and I rub it across my teeth and it
will if you know to do this on a regular basis,
it will help whiten your teeth. Then uh, if I
(20:37):
have any kind of a bite from an insect, I
will rub the inside of the peel on that bite.
It also serves as believe it or not, a treatment
for your hair, your shoes. You can shine your shoes
with the inside of the peel. And I take I
take those banana peels in the morning and I plant
(20:59):
those peels at the roots of the rose bushes. What's
that do? Well, that's it serves. It's like fertilizer. You
can't waste anything these days, you know. And you know
they all come in the shape of a smile, those
bright yellow, elongated edible fingers. They they're just I have
I've been eaten one hand a week for over well. Gosh,
(21:24):
I'm seventy eight years old, so I think I started
eating bananas when I was about five or six. But
isn't it funny that that banana role of banana stick
has got us started and we've got an international club
with over fifty five thousand card carrying members around the
world's great and I must answer a hundred or more
(21:48):
emails every day trying to keep people's spirits up, especially
when things go wrong like this morning, and we have
to keep smiling. We have to keep our spirits up,
we have to be positive, and we have to support
the team. And that's what the Banana Club is all about.
So I did want to talk to us for a
second about the International Banana Museum. It's actually in the
(22:10):
Guinness Book of World Records for most items devoted to
anyone fruit. And when I was online, I saw some
really funny things. I saw this portrait of of a
bride who was holding a bouquet of bananas. I saw
the banana putter that that you've handed out to various
celebrities like Bob Hope and stuff over the years. But
(22:31):
what is your favorite thing in the International Banana Museum. Well,
it was, and still is and will always be the
petrified banana that a girl when I was giving a
lecture back in Wisconsin raised her hands and ken bananas.
I've got something for you. I've got a petrified banana
that I found in my closet. It has been in
her closet, I guess a year or so. And she
(22:54):
I said, well, if you send that to me, I'll
give you a hundred banana merrits and a degree and
Dana Anistry a master's degree. And she did. And I
had it on the wall of the museum for almost
twenty five years. And it's in the shape of a smile.
But it's certainly an old Gummer smile, dark dark brown
(23:17):
and hard as a rock and mounted on in a frame.
It's really something to see what people send. And of
course if somebody sends something that's off color, I send
it right back with de merits. We'll have to we'll
have to come check out the museum sometime. But for
all of our listeners, you can visit or join the
(23:38):
International Banana Club online at International Banana Club dot com.
But Ken Banister, Top Banana, thank you so much for
joining us on Part Time Genius. You bet you my pleasure.
Keep smiling. Welcome back to Part Time Genius, and we're
(24:05):
talking bananas and specifically how the bananas started migrating up
to America. So about five or six years before they
made their glorious debut in Philadelphia. This sea captain named
Lorenzo dow Baker. He bought about a hundred sixty bunches
of bananas back with him, almost on a lark, like
he'd gone to South America ferrying gold miners down there.
(24:26):
But when his when his boats started leaking, he realized
he needed to make a pit stop, so he pulled
into Jamaica where he fixed his boat, and for some
reason he loaded it up with bananas, and if the
wind hadn't been at his back, the fruit might have
gone bad on the journey. But he made it back
to New England in a quick eleven days, and he
sold the fruit for two dollars a bunch, netting him
(24:46):
about sixty dollars in today's money, and within a year
he was the biggest exporter of bananas from the Caribbean.
He even bought land in Jamaica where he started the
world's first commercial banana company. Right, but you know, I
remember reading that Baker was only so good at his job.
I mean, bananas were good business, and there are accounts
of his workers lighting cigars with five dollar bills and
(25:06):
getting them into all sorts of trouble in the Jamaican Nights,
but Baker was a seafair through and through, and along
the way he teamed up with His most enthusiastic buyer
was this gentleman named Andrew Preston, who had risen up
the ranks from a janitor at a Boston grocery store,
and when he first saw the bananas at the port,
he immediately scooped them up to wholesale, and before long
(25:27):
the two had taken on investors and started Boston Fruit,
which three or four names later would be called Chakda.
But Andrew was kind of a genius, right, I mean,
he was definitely clever and very ambitious, and he wasn't
taking any chances with his produce. Entire boatloads of the
fruit could show up at the harbor rotting if winds
were rough or if the trip, you know, took a
(25:48):
few days too long. So he really invented the cold chain,
which you know we talked about in our Inventions episode
a few weeks ago. But this was before air conditioning.
So Preston cooled as bananas the old fashion way with
giant blocks of ice, and he also ensured that bananas
kept cool along the way in storerooms and refrigerated box
cars every step of the process. As Copple puts it,
(26:12):
ice became so essential to banana profitability that at least
one banana merchant bought up every ice factory along the
Gulf coast. Has reduced no middleman cooling costs, made his
company the second biggest success story in the banana industry.
That company was called Standard Fruit or what you might
know now as Dull, and you can start to see
(26:32):
why big Banana is referred to as al palpo or
or the octopus. They started getting their tentacles into other
businesses and owning the entire supply chain. One other small
thing I read about Preston that I really liked, though,
was that he painted his fleet all white to reflect
the sun. I just thought it was so smart because
you read about it now as this technique for keeping
your house cool, but it's funny that it's been going
(26:54):
on since the nineteen hundreds. And he also marketed the
boats as cruise ships, where tourists could tag along for
a fee on the ships to Jamaica, and if they
were feeling too hot at any moment, they could open
a vent and let the chilled banana air cool them. Down.
Let's let's take a step back for a moment. It's
actually an insane thing Preston and others were doing when
you think about it, I mean they were essentially buying
(27:16):
the super perishable item, transporting it thousands of miles, and
selling it as cheap as possible. It doesn't seem like
that could work. And Preston wanted to make the banana
more popular than the apple, which sounds outrageous because the
apple is clearly the most American of fruits. But he
actually managed to do this. But the only way the
economics of something like that can work is if you
(27:37):
work on a really large scale. In by nineteen eleven,
one of the boats they were using, the six a Olah,
was big enough to carry five hundred railroad cars full
of banana. That's not the boat was half the size
of the Titanic, and it was only one small part
of Boston Fruits Great White Fleet. Actually, it's funny to
see how much has changed and how much hasn't in
(27:58):
the banana industry. So in that time spiece you were
mentioning earlier, there's this super cute part where all these
green bananas come to New Jersey and make a pit
stop to ripen and the way it's described, it's almost
like they're hanging out in tanning beds, just relaxing for
three or four days before they have to complete their journey,
and they're just focused on getting their glow on on.
(28:19):
On one hand, the banana industry is just impressive. I mean,
they came up with the tropical radio system so that
boats were alerting the laborers of the exact moment their
boats were arriving, so that fresh green bananas can meet
them at the docks and get loaded up at the
perfect moment possible. And everything was just syncd up so
exactly like this is the early nineteen hundreds. And they
(28:39):
were also incredible marketers. They put coupons and cereal boxes
for free bananas that were somehow paid for by the
serial company to make the meals healthier. But they invested
in infrastructure to like railroads. Railroads were built across South
and Central America purely for the protection and distribution of
bananas and really not at all to help the people
of those countries. But the model that banana companies established
(29:02):
was ingenious, yeah, but also evil. I mean it's essentially
the model for banana republics. So the banana company would
come in offer to build a railroad with government's help.
Then when government funding dried up, they'd offer to build
the rest for free if they got a sweetheart deal
of some sort, you know, the low taxes, free land,
little oversight. And once they had their hooks in and
(29:25):
needed the governments to bend on their whims, they'd install
a new dictator. By the way, did you know, oh,
Henry actually came up with the phrase banana republic. He
wrote it in this short story while he was fleeing
the law in Honduras, and that's amazing. So uh. But
by the way, I know, I told you I didn't
really want to talk too much about banana republics because
they are interesting and actually deserve their own show. But
(29:48):
I did want to talk a little bit about Jacobo R. Benz,
who was elected freely in Guatemala in and I wanted
to talk about it because his story is just the
most nakedly transparent of these stories. So for context, At
the time, the big banana companies were hoarding land, and
they secretly knew that this banana blight was coming in
(30:08):
a big way and that they needed as much land
to turn out as many viable bananas as possible, and
as the blight came, their plan was simply to expand
into new territories. But our bends hated the fact that
the banana companies owned all this land, I mean, supposedly
seventy of the nation's arable land, and they weren't using
any of it all right, So so he just tried
(30:30):
to take it back kind of. I mean, he was
also negotiating for workers rights, which is what Boston Fruit
was now called conceded too. But uh, but he also
wanted this unused land for peasants, and he was willing
to pay for it. He told United Fruit he gave
them six dred thousand dollars, and when they laughed and
asked where he got that sum from which they valued, uh,
(30:50):
they valued the land closer to sixteen million dollars, he
responded that he'd taken that estimate directly from the declared
value they were paying on their taxes, like United Fruit
had for year has been cheating on their taxes, and
our bends in the government just you know, accepted those
numbers at face value. But when our Ben's tried to
take their land, United Fruits basically ruined him. The next
(31:10):
terms and United Fruits negotiations were hand delivered by the U. S.
State Department. I mean, this is a business dealing. Think
about how crazy that is. And the company also funded
journalistic research on Guatemala that showed our Ben's was a Communist,
which he wasn't, but they circulated the report to eight
hundred lawmakers and staffers in d C. And in the
city plagued with rabid McCarthyism at the time. They spent
(31:33):
a year convincing Congress our Ben's was the Soviet dupe.
And they also circulated these horrible photos of our Ben's
atrocities of corpses thrown into mass graves, which were actually
photos of earthquake victims, but presented like there were casualties
of our Ben's as rule. And the fingerprints on this
are pretty damning. I mean, the U. S. Secretary of State,
John Foster Dallas, was a partner and United Fruits law firm,
(31:57):
and Dallas's brother was head of the CIA. The money
and interest they were all super entangled. And once the
congressional opinion was swayed and the banana companies had made
their case, this is about ninety three. That's when Eisenhower
authorized the CIA to get rid of our bends. And
when our bands finally resigned, he was humiliated in front
(32:17):
of the press. I mean he was stripped down to
his underwear before being escorted onto a plane. And for
the rest of this life, this man, who like tried
to do good for his country was the stateless, depressed
shell of a man who finally committed suicide. And also,
we could get cheaper bananas. And that's just one horrifying
story of El Palpo. There are dozens of them as
(32:38):
it ravaged through various countries in Central America. Yeah, I mean,
you're you're right, this is definitely depressing. I know. Um,
so I was thinking we should lighten the mood with
some banana humor. So I know you did a little
digging on why slipping on banana peels became such a
comedy trope, Like you set the stage talking about our
bends and they're like, tell some banana, all right, well
(32:59):
let me all this up here. But but looking at this,
so before it was a visual gag, the banana peel
was was kind of a hazard. I mean, people just
littered them everywhere in Virginia Scott Jenkins incredible book. It
was called Bananas An American History. She talks about how
kids at Sunday School were warned that a stray peel
could lead to an innocent person getting injured, and how
(33:19):
that injury could leave them in the poorhouse for life.
The boy Scouts were told picking up a stray peel
was a good act for the day. One scam artist,
according to The New York Times, was arrested after she
claimed she'd fallen seventeen different times on various banana peels,
all in a span of like four years or something.
But as the streets became cleaner, it found its way
(33:40):
to vaudeville, and according to the a Vy Clubs, Sliding
Billy Watson was the original. And now don't confuse sliding
Billy Watson with Billy Beef trust Watson, who was a
competing comedian at the time. So I also like what
you were talking about, Charlie Chaplin. Oh yeah, the the
gag was used by everyone, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, all
the silent film stars. But there's this conversation where a
(34:02):
film director asked, years later, how do you make the
banana gag feel fresh, and he asked, Chaplin, do you
show the banana first and then the lady or close
up on the lady and then the banana and then
have the slip, and Chaplain immediately said neither. You show
the lady approach, then the banana peel, then the two together.
Then you show the woman gingerly stepping over the peel
(34:24):
and disappearing down a manhole. I know the company's doubted
whether they could switch out the big mike and still
have people buying bananas, but they pulled off an incredible transition. Yeah,
(34:48):
that's true. We eat more bananas now than we ever
did in the Gross Michelle days. But part of it
is just that banana companies are excellent marketers. I mean,
any group that could so underhandedly like pull off those
coups us also have an incredible handle on traditional marketing
and with things like you know, the Miss Jakeda campaigns,
or how they got doctors to endorse bananas as a
(35:08):
great baby food or whatever. I mean, they quietly up
the demand. It's true, but I think we should get
back to the original question, which was what's the state
of the Cavendish today and is it going extinct? Yeah? So,
The truth is banana companies are worried. So while the
Cavendish was resistant to the Panama disease that took out
the Gross Michelle, that disease has other variations and Cavendish
(35:30):
isn't holding up well against those. There's also this airborne
virus called black cigatoca that requires a tons of pesticides
and chemicals sprayed on the bananas. It really isn't good
for the workers health. And there's really no such thing
as an organic banana on the market today, but there
is some hope. There are these amazing labs in Belgium
and other places where they've been stockpiling cuttings and trying
(35:52):
to graft together a stronger banana, and there's some ideas.
Does this apple banana called goldfinger that doesn't brown at all,
but it also isn't as sweet. It's this banana that
sort of meets a lot of needs and it's hardy,
but it's hard to see it as this pure replacement
for the Caven Dish. Scientists have also decoded the banana's genome,
which helps, but no one's confident that the Cavendish can
(36:14):
be saved, and at the same time, no one's slowing
down on eating bananas either. There's there's also this much
sweeter banana that comes out of the Philippines that some
scientists are hopeful about. It's way more fragile. But if
the banana industry could switch from just piling gross michelles
on boats to boxing bananas to transport the caven dish,
maybe they can adapt to this Philippine and banana. It's
(36:36):
it's a big question mark though, And and I want
to end this on a happy note. So what's something
you can tell me about the banana that's fun? Well? Um,
you know, for one, there's this great passage in Dan
Copple's book about how the bananas used in Uganda, and
he talks about how it's used this currency, I mean,
sometimes by farmers to pay back loans, and how there
are songs sung about bananas, and and not in a
(36:57):
kitchy way, but almost this epic history pull him kind
of way. He mentions this Red Cross report that documented
that if faminine war are connected, the fact that bananas
are so plentiful in Uganda have helped the country avoid both.
But here's the part that I really love, and it's
it's how much the banana is part of the culture.
Let me just read this passage from it says, um,
(37:19):
there's a special breed of banana that's consumed when twins
are born. Another type marks the passing of a relative.
Families are guaranteed prosperity if the mother buries her after
birth under a banana tree. There's a banana that, when eaton,
helps return a straying spouse. One breed represents the lion
and is said to improve male potency. And at the
center of it all is matoki, the word that's used
(37:41):
interchangeably for both food and banana. So for Uganda's nothing
says welcome home more than this comfort food served on
a banana leaf saucer. I love that. But you know
what else I love the part time genius fact off?
Is it already time? All right? Well, let's do it,
m M So do you know that bananas will glow
(38:11):
bright blue under a black light? They light up like
fosse breasts and jellyfish, I mean, except their bananas. But
the weird part is green bananas don't glow, only the
yellow ones do. So I know you said Indians love
their bananas, but per person, Uganda has them beat the
country grows eleven million tons of fruit, which bears out
to five hundred pounds per person annually. I mean this
(38:35):
is according to Dan Copple's research, and he says that
in remote villages where there's little else they eat, it
can be up to nine hundred and seventy pounds per person.
That's insane. So here's a quick one. Did you know
that the strands in the banana are called the flow,
him or flam. I'm clearly not good at pronouncing things. Now,
you're really not all right. Here's something fun for people
(38:55):
who love comics. The first Miss Chiquita was drawn by
Dick Brown, who also created Hagar the Horrible cartoon, and
when the character was revamped, it was done by Oscar Grilloh,
who drew the pink panther. Here's a gross one. In
uh in Bombay, a first time thiefs stole a gold
chain and as he was chased and cornered by police,
he swallowed it and to get it out of the system,
(39:17):
they force fed him forty eight bananas. God, I'm not
sure why they knew forty eight was the right number,
but apparently it worked. It is my favorite number, but
I don't think I'm gonna eat that many bananas. But
all right, this is kind of amazing. And it comes
from Pittsburgh, which is also the supposed home of the
banana split. But you know how ethlene is used to
ripe in bananas, right, Well, it's also combustible, and according
(39:38):
to The New York Times, a mishap with the gas
caused the Pittsburgh Banana Company building to explode and rain
bananas down on the city. Oh man, So I don't
love explosions, but I do love that you said Pittsburgh
Banana Company building. And I also love the idea of
just like plucking bananas from the heavens. So I'm gonna
give it to you. But before we go, I I
(40:00):
just want to give a special thanks to Nolan Brown,
who helped with the research this week. Yeah, and we
should also give a shout out to Dan Copple's book Banana,
The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World. And
and before we go, what episodes. We've got a couple
of great episodes coming up at the end of this week.
We've got one that we've been working on on super Fans, right, Yeah,
I'm hoping we can cover a lot about the faneloes.
(40:20):
Those are very Mantel fans, yeah, as well as Harry
Potter big football fans. All kinds of fun stuff there.
And then we've got another very different one coming up
next week on how big is the U. S Military
and how is the money spent there? So that should
be really interesting to be awesome as well. But we
love hearing from so many of you, don't forget. You
can reach out to us part Time Genius at how
stuff Works dot com or on our seven fact hotline
(40:44):
one eight four four pt Genius. We've heard from so
many of you telling your friends about the show. Please
keep doing that and if you get a chance, feel
free to write us review on Apple Podcast. But thanks
so much for listening. Yea, thanks again for listening. Part
(41:11):
Time Genius is a production of How Stuff Works and
wouldn't be possible without several brilliant people who do the
important things we couldn't even begin to understand. Tristan McNeil
does the editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song
and does the MIXI mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland does
the exact producer thing. Gave Louesier is our lead researcher
with support from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan
Brown and Lucas Adams, and even Jeff Cook gets the
(41:33):
show to your ears. Good job, Eves. If you like
what you heard, we hope you'll subscribe, And if you
really really like what you've heard, maybe you could leave
a good review for us. We do. We forget Jason Jason,
who
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