The Orange, the California Ambassador

As an English major, one of the classes I took at the University of California was on the history of the English language. Etymologies of English words are often fascinating, watching the words pass from one language to the next. It's said that nothing rhymes with orange, and part of the reason for that is the word comes to English with a Persian origin.

The citrus fruit we know as orange is the sweet variety (there's also a bitter orange), and it's an ancient hybrid of a Pomelo and a Mandarin. The orange was originated in Southeast Asia, and are believed to have been cultivated in China in 2500 BC. In many languages it's known as the Chinese Apple, but the English refer to it by Persian name.

Many English words for food come from Old French, because when the Normans invaded England in 1066 they made French the language of the court and the words they used for food became the dominant word in English. The English were still the ones raising the food, which is why we have disparities like cow/beef, pig/pork, deer/mutton.

The Persian word for orange is narang, just like naranja in Spanish. This makes sense considering most of Spain was occupied by Arabian Muslums from the 8th to the 15th centuries. Before the word enters English, it gained a from vowel in Old Occitan, spoken in Catalonia and Southern France. They called it auranja, which became aurange or orrange in Northern France and Southern England.

Valencia, Spain was in Muslim occupied Spain and became known for its sweet oranges. Orange trees are ubiquitous in the region, and the industrial center on the coast is known as the Orange Blossom Coast.

William Wolfskill acquired land from the Mexican government in 1831, and started planing grapevines. Wolfskill also sold lemons and oranges to gold miners, beginning Southern California's vine and citrus industries almost singlehandedly.

He owned farmland all over the southland, and is credited with coming up with the Valencia Orange varietal (named for the city in Spain) on his farm in Santa Ana. The hybrid was later sold to the Irvine Ranch, who made it's cultivation a top priority.

Orange Crate Label

Oranges, and their association with sunshine and health became part of the myth used to sell Southern California as the area prepared for a real estate boom. In the late 1880s, many of the orange growers formed cooperatives (cooperatives are common in farming so everyone gets a fair price for their product) as seen on this label for the Redland Cooperative Fruit Association.

Higher levels of organization would mean better bargaining power, and as such the Southern California Fruit Exchange was founded in Claremont.

Nice to see a little color on the blog for a change, no? The navel orange was the other big variety grown in the area. The navel orange had been imported into the United States in 1870 from Bahia, Brazil. The Portuguese import was categorized by the department of agriculture, then sent to California and Florida. Navels are more common as a table fruit, whereas Valencias are juicers.

Claremont was identified mostly as a college town even back then, and you can see the building on the label is labeled College Heights Orange and Lemon association. From there to Southern California Fruit Exchange. By 1905, it represented 45% of the California citrus industry, and dropped Southern from it's name. In 1908 it became Sunkist Growers, Inc.

You can see the orange wrapped in cellophane labeled Sunkist on both the labels. Sunkist became an umbrella for these collected exchanges. Sunny Heights grown in Redlands and packed by the Redlands fruit co-op. College Heights "Washington" Navels, packed in the Claremont, California packing house and sold by the San Antonio Fruit Exchange. Let's check out one of these packing plants.

Citrus packing house in Covina. Photo credit LAPL

They don't look particularly happy, but at least there's plenty of natural light. All the female packers have their own crate, and they're stuffing them with oranges off the line. The label says Florencia, and the crate is stamped with Sunkist Oranges. A closer look at the label, since they're such fun works of art.

Valencia oranges, Damerel-Allison Association, in Covina, California. 

The name Sunkist was a version of sun-kissed, but made unique so it's easier to copyright. Much like the Sci-Fi channel becoming Syfy. This bit of branding was done by the ad agency Lord & Thomas founded in 1873 in Chicago which is still in business today.

Sunkist had to find new ways to get people to buy oranges year round. One such way was the heavy promotion of orange juice, which became the second most purchased drink at soda fountains only to Coca-Cola. Here's one of their early magazine ads, informing readers to look for the official Sunkist juicer at their local soda fountain.

Ads asked consumers to take the daily orange, eaten or drank, and went heavy on the vitamin content and health benefits. Lemon juice was promoted as a hair tonic. Lemonade was healthy! Have an orange before bed! California had a ton of oranges, and a great orange packaging machine. Now it just needed the rest of the country to by them by the ton.

When Walt Disney opened Disneyland in 1955, there were two places inside where visitors could buy Sunkist orange juice. There was the Sunkist Citus House on Main Street serving fresh squeezed orange juice and lemonade, as well as Sunkist, I presume in Adventureland.

The Sunkist Citrus House lasted until 1997, when it became the Gibson Girl Ice Cream Parlor. Sunkist, I Presume became the Bengal Barbecue in 1990. The Citrus House also featured orange cheesecake and lemon meringue pies. All the orange juice was freshly squeeze in front of the guests with one of the machines featured in the ad, which did most of the squeezing work but still had to be fed one at a time by hand. The lemonade came from concentrate, too easy to have a bad batch when you're making lemonade.

Most kids today know Sunkist for the soda bottled by 7-Up/RC Cola. Thanks to aggressive marketing around the turn of the century through to the 50s, oranges were as closely associated with California as movies. Florida has taken over the orange crown, but the orange was California's main game too once upon a time. It created jobs for thousands, it gave us something to ship from that new port in San Pedro, and it cemented orange juice's association with health and vitality.

And because the orange and California were so closely linked, California became associated with health and vitality. Millions moved out west on that promise of a healthier lifestyle. All because of good marketing.