Episode 14 Pumpkins and Squash - What's the Difference?

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Listen to "014 Pumpkins and Squash - What's the Difference?" on Spreaker.

Link to the Episode:

Episode 14 Pumpkins and Squash - What's the Difference?

Variety squash... and pumpkins! 

The Platonic ideal pumpkins

This was a fun episode to research - there's my whole history with pumpkins, being a mother when it comes to pumpkins and getting to rewatch some Charlie Brown holiday specials.  I was excited to find a  whole book just about the history of Pumpkins!  And then there were the 16th and 17th century engravings... and really getting in to how useful contemporary still lifes are.

For me - Barbara Tuchman was the first historian I read who introduced me to the use of art to go back and spy on history.  And then the books by Will and Ariel Durant - while largely Western facing - made good use of art as a window into time.  And they were very good at pointing out that paintings are largely symbolic, rather than literal, but mundane details can give the modern viewer a useful sense of the everyday.  Sure, they were looking in one direction, but their encouragement taught me to look harder.  It's not just a pile of food... it is the Instagram feed of the time. 

Craziest thing - Ott was both the author of my main book - and a scale used to measure giant pumpkins!

OTT Pumpkin Weight Tables

Related Media:

Ott, Cindy. Pumpkin: The Curious History of an American Icon. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 2012

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966) & A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (1973) - based on the comic strip Peanuts by Charles Schulz.
(Currently lost to the public airwaves, but streamable on Apple + - in the US) And available from ever shifting online sources. 

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