THE HISTORY OF THE PINEAPPLEThe pineapple—fierce on the outside,
sweet on the inside—was given its English name for its
resemblance to a pine cone. Christopher Columbus brought this
native of South America back to Europe as one of the exotic
prizes of the New World. In later centuries, sailors brought the
pineapple home to New England, where a fresh pineapple displayed
on the porch meant that the sailor was home from foreign ports
and ready to welcome visitors. Pineapples were the crowning
glory of lavish American banquets, and were considered the
height of extravagant hospitality. Even George Washington grew
them in his Mount Vernon hothouse. No one knows when the first
pineapple (“halakahiki,” or foreign fruit, in Hawaiian) arrived
in Hawai‘i. Francisco de Paula Marin, a Spanish adventurer who
became a trusted advisor to King Kamehameha the Great,
successfully raised pineapples in the early 1800s. A sailor,
Captain John Kidwell, is credited with founding Hawaii’s
pineapple industry, importing and testing a