Records show that in the 1800's peanuts were grown commercially
in South Carolina and used for oil, food and a cocoa substitute.
However, peanuts were regarded as food for livestock and the poor.
They also were difficult to grow and harvest, so they were not
widely grown in the United States.
The first notable increase in USA peanut consumption came in
1860 with the outbreak of the Civil War. Soldiers on both sides
turned to peanuts for food. They took their taste for peanuts home
with them and peanuts were sold freshly roasted by street vendors
and at baseball games and circuses. While peanut production rose
during this time, peanuts were still harvested by hand, leaving
stems and trash in the peanuts. Thus, poor quality and lack of
uniformity kept down the demand for peanuts.
Around 1900, labor-saving equipment was invented for planting,
cultivating, harvesting and picking peanuts from the plants, as
well as for shelling and cleaning the kernels. With these
mechanical aids, peanuts rapidly came into demand for oil, roasted
and salted nuts, peanut butter and candy.
In 1903, George Washington Carver began his research at Tuskegee
Institute. While peanut butter had been developed by then, Carver
developed more than 300 other uses for peanuts and improved peanut
horticulture so much that he is considered by many to be the
"father of the peanut industry." The botanist recognized the value
of peanuts as a cash crop and proposed that peanuts be planted as a
rotation crop in the Southeast cotton-growing areas where the boll
weevil insect threatened the region's agricultural base.
The cache is a small screw top container. You will need to get
down on your knees to look for this one. Watch for muggles and
broken glass. I suggest you only look for this one during daylight
hours.