You’ll Never Guess Which Fruit Was First Grown In Iowa

Fall and all things apple and pumpkin-flavored and scented are appearing on store shelves everywhere,

And with all the fall flare, our eyes catch the bright colors of orange, yellow, and red.

With all those fall red apples we'll soon be seeing, would you have ever guessed they were first grown in the state of Iowa?

Get our free mobile app

The Red Delicious apple was first grown in the Hawkeye state and was rightfully named the Hawkeye after where it was first grown according to the Des Moines Register.

"In 1856, 10 years after Iowa attained statehood, a Quaker from Indiana named Jesse Hiatt settled near the town of Peru in Madison County and planted an apple orchard. One day, the story goes, he noticed a chance seedling growing between the neat rows of trees. He tried repeatedly to kill the maverick sprout, but after two years gave up and let it grow. The stubborn sapling thrived and eventually produced a shapely, flavorful new strain of apple that Hiatt named the Hawkeye in honor of his new state"-Des Moines Register.

In 1893, Hiatt won a national apple contest with the Hawkeye apple but then later sold the marketing rights for the apple to Stark Brothers Nursery in Missouri.

It was at this time that the apple name was then changed to the name we know it today as the Delicious or Red Delicious as some also referred to the bright red fruit as.

The Starks then spent a lot of money promoting the newly named apple through traveling salesmen, and an exhibition at the 1904 Worlds Fair.

By the year 1919, the Hiatt homestead in Madison County had become famous and the orchard where the first Red Delicious apple tree grew, soon became a destination hot spot.

Source: Des Moines Register