December 31, 2024 • 10 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, find out how Barry Levinson went from arguing cases in front of the Supreme Court to operating the largest museum dedicated to mustard in the world.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is our American stories, and our next story is
about a condiment.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
All of us know and use, mustard.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
In Middleton, Wisconsin, there's a museum dedicated to this stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Here to tell the story is.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
The founder of that museum, Barry Levinson.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Take it away, Barry.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
I don't know if you know. According to the National
Continent Research Council annual report, ketchup is now the leading
cause of childhood stupidity in America. Just telling you hi,
my name is Barry Levinson, and I am the founder
and curator of the National Mustard Museum in Middleton, Wisconsin.
(00:52):
And this was not what I planned on doing when
I was much younger. I actually was a lawyer at
one time, head of the Criminal Appeals Division for the
state of Wisconsin. But the curse that I had upon
me was that I'm originally from Massachusetts, which means, of course,
I am a diehard Red Sox fan. I grew up
(01:16):
having my heart broken year after year. Nineteen sixty seven
they made it to the World Series. I remember it clearly.
They lost in seven games. Nineteen seventy five, they also
went to the World Series, lost in seven games. Then
came nineteen eighty six, and at the time I was
here in Wisconsin doing criminal appellate work, and the Red
(01:37):
Sox were in the World Series, and I told my friends,
this is the year. There's no doubt that they had
Roger Clemens. They had oh my gosh, I think they
must have had. They had some great players. Then and
there was Game six. The Red Sox were ahead by
two runs. Victory steamed assured, but of course they lost
(01:58):
one thing led to another. I was devastated. But there
was still game seven, and Game seven came, and of
course they lost me. I was so depressed I couldn't sleep.
So I went to an all night grocery store at
all night supermarket, just to walk. And I had no
idea why I was there. It was two thirty in
(02:20):
the morning, and I was pushing an empty cart up
and down the aisle. Suddenly I was in front of
the condiments. I remember going past the pickles and the olives,
that relishes, the mayonnaises, the ketchups, nothing. I was in
front of the mustards, and I heard a voice that said,
if you collect us, they will come. That's how I
(02:42):
began my journey collecting jars of mustard. I think that
night that morning. I think I bought about ten or
eleven different mustards. I remember, I think I bought Frenches mustard.
I definitely, I think the first one was Plockman's mustard.
There were, you know, maybe ten or eleven that I got,
(03:03):
and I said, I'll never be lonely again, because I
will meet up with all the other mustard collectors in
the world. Little did I know there weren't any, but
that didn't deter me. So that's when I began collecting
jars of mustard. It was nineteen eighty six, but I
still had a little bit of common sense, so I
didn't quit my job because I figured I needed another sign,
(03:25):
and I got it. I got another sign about six
months later. It was actually April twentieth, nineteen eighty seven.
I was arguing a case at the United States Supreme Court.
You could look it up, Griffin versus Wisconsin. And on
the way over to the court, leaving my room at
the Hyatt, I saw a discarded room service tray and
(03:47):
on it was a little jar of mustard and it
was unopened. And I saw it and I said, Aha,
I don't recognize it. And I'm thinking, okay, would it
be theft? For me to take this jar of mustard
that could be reused by the hotel, but one which
the hotel was not really expecting to get back. So
(04:10):
I think I did what every good lawyer would have done.
I took it right, and I brought it with me
to the United States Supreme Court and argued that case
with that jar of mustard in my left hants pocket.
This was a case that all of my colleagues said,
there's no way you're going to win this. Well, I
(04:30):
won five to four. I'm sure there was the mustard
that made a difference. And it was at that time
that I knew I needed to plot and plan my
exit from law, and one day I would found the
National Mustard Museum, which I did, and it opened in
let's see, it would have been April of nineteen ninety two,
(04:53):
and it's been growing ever since, and we have over
six thousand different mustards. We have a lot of I think,
pieces of great mustard art, old mustard tins, old mustard pots,
old mustard advertisements, because mustard goes back centuries. And if
you know that mustard before antibiotics and aspirin was probably
(05:20):
the most popular prescribed medicine that doctors used, and I
think if you're looking for the origin of what we
know as mustard, go back to about the twelfth or
thirteenth century, where you will find the monks of the
old Burgundian town of Dijon. Get it Dijon, but the
(05:40):
monks were making what we know as mustard. Curiously, there
are no Dijon factories within the city limits of dijonre
One of the things we do at the Mustard Museum
is we coordinate the International Worldwide Mustard Competition. It's held
every year. We've been doing it for about twenty years,
(06:03):
and mustards arrive from all over the world. Because you
mustard is universal. It's something that almost every culture knows
about and uses. And every year you're about three hundred
different mustards that are judge blind in seventeen different categories,
because that's the beauty of mustard. There's sweet mustards, there's
(06:27):
Dijon mustards, there's grainy mustards, there's herb mustards, there's fruit mustards,
there's exotic mustards. There's a specific category for deli mustards
and we taste those with the pastrami. There's so many
different flavors, curry mustards, we have tasted chocolate mustards. That's
I think the beauty of it. And you can find
different uses, of course for all of them. Now, one
(06:51):
of the things though that we have found here in
the US is that it's sometimes difficult to get children
to eat mustard. And you know, in France it has
never been a problem. Children grow up eating you know,
good strong mustard. But I don't know if it's this
thing about people just like sweet, mild things. That's a
(07:13):
real problem. And probably the number one selling condiment is salsa.
Ketchup I think comes in number two mustard, and of
course you have to remember a serving of mustard. It
doesn't take a lot of mustard to give a lot
of flavors, so you're not gonna need as much. I mean,
you need a lot more ketchup. And I don't understand
why here in this country people insist on dipping French
(07:37):
fries in ketchup. It's just it makes no sense. And
there are people who, believe it or not, will put
mayonnaise on a corn beef or pastrami sandwich, you know,
And I mean that to me should be illegal. Also,
people who put ketchup on hot dogs and brought worset. No,
(07:58):
you just don't do that. You know, for example, in Chicago,
you know which is famous for the Chicago hot dog,
which has yellow mustard, not brown mustard, neon, green, relish,
sport peppers, celery, salt, maybe a little wedge of tomato,
a pickle. It's really one of the great taste treats
of Chicago. There are many hot dog stands in Chicago.
(08:22):
If you go into them and you ask for ketchup,
they will refuse to serve you. Good for them, Good
for them. One of the things that we've done that
I've done is I've written a children's book called Mustard
on a Pickle, and it's about a little boy who
(08:42):
loves mustard so much that he puts it on everything.
I'll give you a little taste of it. Is that. Okay, okay,
I like mustard on my toast. I like mustard on
a roast. But what I really like the most is
mustard dribbled on a ghost. Can you be trusted without mustard?
I don't think so. Oh you would stink, So don't
get flustered. Eat your mustard. I like mustard on a pickle.
(09:06):
I would even pay a nickel for just a teeny
tiny squirt of mustard on my uncle's shirt. Everything tastes
good with mustard, even plums and frozen custard. I like
mustard in the air, and mustard at the county fair.
Putting dijon on a bond, slurping yellow in the sun.
(09:27):
That's mustard on a pickle. So this is what I do.
It's just kind of an exciting thing to do. And
I love just being at the museum with all my mustards.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
And what a great piece of work by Monty Montgomery,
our producer from Hillsdale College, by the way, a graduate
of Hillsdale College, and find such great quirky stories for us.
My goodness, this was a really good one. From going
and arguing cases in the US Supreme Court and by
the way, attributing a winning argument to the mustard in
(10:00):
his pocket, to founding the National Mustard Museum in Middleton, Wisconsin.
We're talking about Barry Levinton and we thank him or
telling his story.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
About his love affair with mustard.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
By the way, my mom was a huge collector of
these old purses made of metal, and they were beautiful,
and she collected thousands of them. And we've done the
salt and Pepper Shaker Museum, a mother and daughter combo
who went around the country finding salt and pepper Shaker combos. Also,
we've done the Mascot Hall of Fame, the story of
the National Mustard Museum.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Here on our American Stories.
This is our American stories, and our next story is
about a condiment.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
All of us know and use, mustard.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
In Middleton, Wisconsin, there's a museum dedicated to this stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
Here to tell the story is.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
The founder of that museum, Barry Levinson.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Take it away, Barry.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
I don't know if you know. According to the National
Continent Research Council annual report, ketchup is now the leading
cause of childhood stupidity in America. Just telling you hi,
my name is Barry Levinson, and I am the founder
and curator of the National Mustard Museum in Middleton, Wisconsin.
(00:52):
And this was not what I planned on doing when
I was much younger. I actually was a lawyer at
one time, head of the Criminal Appeals Division for the
state of Wisconsin. But the curse that I had upon
me was that I'm originally from Massachusetts, which means, of course,
I am a diehard Red Sox fan. I grew up
(01:16):
having my heart broken year after year. Nineteen sixty seven
they made it to the World Series. I remember it clearly.
They lost in seven games. Nineteen seventy five, they also
went to the World Series, lost in seven games. Then
came nineteen eighty six, and at the time I was
here in Wisconsin doing criminal appellate work, and the Red
(01:37):
Sox were in the World Series, and I told my friends,
this is the year. There's no doubt that they had
Roger Clemens. They had oh my gosh, I think they
must have had. They had some great players. Then and
there was Game six. The Red Sox were ahead by
two runs. Victory steamed assured, but of course they lost
(01:58):
one thing led to another. I was devastated. But there
was still game seven, and Game seven came, and of
course they lost me. I was so depressed I couldn't sleep.
So I went to an all night grocery store at
all night supermarket, just to walk. And I had no
idea why I was there. It was two thirty in
(02:20):
the morning, and I was pushing an empty cart up
and down the aisle. Suddenly I was in front of
the condiments. I remember going past the pickles and the olives,
that relishes, the mayonnaises, the ketchups, nothing. I was in
front of the mustards, and I heard a voice that said,
if you collect us, they will come. That's how I
(02:42):
began my journey collecting jars of mustard. I think that
night that morning. I think I bought about ten or
eleven different mustards. I remember, I think I bought Frenches mustard.
I definitely, I think the first one was Plockman's mustard.
There were, you know, maybe ten or eleven that I got,
(03:03):
and I said, I'll never be lonely again, because I
will meet up with all the other mustard collectors in
the world. Little did I know there weren't any, but
that didn't deter me. So that's when I began collecting
jars of mustard. It was nineteen eighty six, but I
still had a little bit of common sense, so I
didn't quit my job because I figured I needed another sign,
(03:25):
and I got it. I got another sign about six
months later. It was actually April twentieth, nineteen eighty seven.
I was arguing a case at the United States Supreme Court.
You could look it up, Griffin versus Wisconsin. And on
the way over to the court, leaving my room at
the Hyatt, I saw a discarded room service tray and
(03:47):
on it was a little jar of mustard and it
was unopened. And I saw it and I said, Aha,
I don't recognize it. And I'm thinking, okay, would it
be theft? For me to take this jar of mustard
that could be reused by the hotel, but one which
the hotel was not really expecting to get back. So
(04:10):
I think I did what every good lawyer would have done.
I took it right, and I brought it with me
to the United States Supreme Court and argued that case
with that jar of mustard in my left hants pocket.
This was a case that all of my colleagues said,
there's no way you're going to win this. Well, I
(04:30):
won five to four. I'm sure there was the mustard
that made a difference. And it was at that time
that I knew I needed to plot and plan my
exit from law, and one day I would found the
National Mustard Museum, which I did, and it opened in
let's see, it would have been April of nineteen ninety two,
(04:53):
and it's been growing ever since, and we have over
six thousand different mustards. We have a lot of I think,
pieces of great mustard art, old mustard tins, old mustard pots,
old mustard advertisements, because mustard goes back centuries. And if
you know that mustard before antibiotics and aspirin was probably
(05:20):
the most popular prescribed medicine that doctors used, and I
think if you're looking for the origin of what we
know as mustard, go back to about the twelfth or
thirteenth century, where you will find the monks of the
old Burgundian town of Dijon. Get it Dijon, but the
(05:40):
monks were making what we know as mustard. Curiously, there
are no Dijon factories within the city limits of dijonre
One of the things we do at the Mustard Museum
is we coordinate the International Worldwide Mustard Competition. It's held
every year. We've been doing it for about twenty years,
(06:03):
and mustards arrive from all over the world. Because you
mustard is universal. It's something that almost every culture knows
about and uses. And every year you're about three hundred
different mustards that are judge blind in seventeen different categories,
because that's the beauty of mustard. There's sweet mustards, there's
(06:27):
Dijon mustards, there's grainy mustards, there's herb mustards, there's fruit mustards,
there's exotic mustards. There's a specific category for deli mustards
and we taste those with the pastrami. There's so many
different flavors, curry mustards, we have tasted chocolate mustards. That's
I think the beauty of it. And you can find
different uses, of course for all of them. Now, one
(06:51):
of the things though that we have found here in
the US is that it's sometimes difficult to get children
to eat mustard. And you know, in France it has
never been a problem. Children grow up eating you know,
good strong mustard. But I don't know if it's this
thing about people just like sweet, mild things. That's a
(07:13):
real problem. And probably the number one selling condiment is salsa.
Ketchup I think comes in number two mustard, and of
course you have to remember a serving of mustard. It
doesn't take a lot of mustard to give a lot
of flavors, so you're not gonna need as much. I mean,
you need a lot more ketchup. And I don't understand
why here in this country people insist on dipping French
(07:37):
fries in ketchup. It's just it makes no sense. And
there are people who, believe it or not, will put
mayonnaise on a corn beef or pastrami sandwich, you know,
And I mean that to me should be illegal. Also,
people who put ketchup on hot dogs and brought worset. No,
(07:58):
you just don't do that. You know, for example, in Chicago,
you know which is famous for the Chicago hot dog,
which has yellow mustard, not brown mustard, neon, green, relish,
sport peppers, celery, salt, maybe a little wedge of tomato,
a pickle. It's really one of the great taste treats
of Chicago. There are many hot dog stands in Chicago.
(08:22):
If you go into them and you ask for ketchup,
they will refuse to serve you. Good for them, Good
for them. One of the things that we've done that
I've done is I've written a children's book called Mustard
on a Pickle, and it's about a little boy who
(08:42):
loves mustard so much that he puts it on everything.
I'll give you a little taste of it. Is that. Okay, okay,
I like mustard on my toast. I like mustard on
a roast. But what I really like the most is
mustard dribbled on a ghost. Can you be trusted without mustard?
I don't think so. Oh you would stink, So don't
get flustered. Eat your mustard. I like mustard on a pickle.
(09:06):
I would even pay a nickel for just a teeny
tiny squirt of mustard on my uncle's shirt. Everything tastes
good with mustard, even plums and frozen custard. I like
mustard in the air, and mustard at the county fair.
Putting dijon on a bond, slurping yellow in the sun.
(09:27):
That's mustard on a pickle. So this is what I do.
It's just kind of an exciting thing to do. And
I love just being at the museum with all my mustards.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
And what a great piece of work by Monty Montgomery,
our producer from Hillsdale College, by the way, a graduate
of Hillsdale College, and find such great quirky stories for us.
My goodness, this was a really good one. From going
and arguing cases in the US Supreme Court and by
the way, attributing a winning argument to the mustard in
(10:00):
his pocket, to founding the National Mustard Museum in Middleton, Wisconsin.
We're talking about Barry Levinton and we thank him or
telling his story.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
About his love affair with mustard.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
By the way, my mom was a huge collector of
these old purses made of metal, and they were beautiful,
and she collected thousands of them. And we've done the
salt and Pepper Shaker Museum, a mother and daughter combo
who went around the country finding salt and pepper Shaker combos. Also,
we've done the Mascot Hall of Fame, the story of
the National Mustard Museum.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Here on our American Stories.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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