The Potato: A Brief History

March brings with it St. Patrick’s Day and the old gardening adage that suggests potatoes should be planted on St. Patty’s Day. I’m sure that somewhere in the United States this adage represents a realistic goal for planting this valuable crop but in Missouri it is more of a curiosity. Why the association between the potato and the Irish to the point that a more accurate and frequently-used common name of Solanum tuberosum is not potato but Irish potato?

The potato is native to the Andean region of South America and was known to be cultivated by the Incas as many as 4000 years ago. The Incas grew, ate and even worshiped the potato. They were known to hoard them in case of war or famine, dry them as a source of food for journeys and even bury them with their dead. Then, as now, natives of that area of South America refer to the potato as papas, although the first potato was far from what we know it to be today. There are more than 150 wild species of potato most of which contain significant levels of glycoalkaloids, a bitter-tasting toxic compound associated with the Solananceae, or Nightshade, family. Early native Americans selected for species that were low in glycoalkaloids for obvious reasons. The first cultivated potatoes were thought to have purple skin and yellowish flesh. Additionally, they undoubtedly were diploids-- having (as do most plants grown from seed) two sets of chromosomes. Almost all potatoes today are tetraploids (having four sets of chromosomes) which naturally descended from diploids and, because of their high degree of sterility, must be vegetatively propagated.

The Spanish explorer de Leon was probably the first European to see the potato and wrote about it in his Chronicles of Peru, published in 1540, while his counterpart, de Quesada, is credited with introducing the potato to Spain from the New World. The Spanish thought potatoes were a type of truffle and called them tartuffo. Although the potato thrived under Spanish conditions, it was put to limited use as a food source and mainly used to feed hospital inmates. It was introduced to England and Italy in 1585; to Belgium, Germany and Austria around 1887, and to France around the turn of the 17th century. Wherever it went it was slow to be accepted as a food source because of its association with the underprivileged and the fear that it might be poisonous or cause diseases such as leprosy. The latter fear was so strong that in France an early law was passed that forbad planting of potatoes.

The potato is said to have found its way to Ireland thanks to a Spanish ship that wrecked off the Irish coast in 1588. Although most Spaniards did not like the potato, they did find it a convenient way to provide food for long journeys at sea and to help prevent scurvy. The British explorer Sir Walter Raleigh is credited with growing potatoes at his Irish estate near Cork, Ireland. Legend has it that Sir Walter made a gift of potatoes to Queen Elizabeth I. The local aristocracy were invited to a lavish banquet every course of which featured potatoes. Unfortunately, the royal chefs were unfamiliar with potato and discarded the edible tubers in favor of the leaves and stems which they prepared in various ways. Everyone at the feast promptly became severely ill because of the toxicity of the plant, and potatoes were immediately banned from the royal court.

It would be over a century before the potato gained prominence in Europe as a food source. Potatoes represented an abundant source of nutritious food for countries such as Ireland that were struggling to feed their masses. In Ireland it gained popularity from the bottom up on the social ladder, and its acceptance by the masses is credited as one of the reasons for the population explosion that occurred in that country in the early 19th century. The Irish became greatly dependent on the potato and usually consumed it at every meal. In the poorer parts of the country it was the sole source of food and it was estimated that an average Irish laborer ate 14 pounds of potatoes daily. This dependence on a single source of food was a primary reason for the Great Potato Famine and resultant starvation that occurred in the 1840s. At that time, a unusual set of environmental conditions suddenly existed that caused the fungus Phytophthora infestans to become virulent as it had never been before. Crop failures had occurred before but they were regional and short-lived. The Great Famine was nation-wide and lasted for several years. Relief efforts by the British government were illconceived and ineffective. It is estimated that Ireland lost one and one-half million people to starvation and related illness during the famine, most of them being children and elderly, and cut the population in half through starvation and emigration.

The potato has long been associated with war because of its importance as a food source. When neither side could win a decisive victory, combatants usually resorted to starving the enemy by consuming their food. A particular conflict between Austria and Prussia in 1778 became known as the Potato War because of this tactic. During the Napoleonic Wars of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the British were unable to import needed food because of Napoleon’s efforts. The British were forced to grow more of their own food and since one can grow five times the amount of food on an acre of land with potatoes rather than wheat, potatoes became very popular.

The potato was first introduced into the United States when Captain Nathaniel Butler of Bermuda sent some tubers to Nathaniel Butler, governor of Virginia in 1621. It was introduced on several other occasions throughout the 17th century but was slow to gain acceptance. Indeed, as late as mid-1800, most people considered potatoes more fit for animal than human consumption. A quote from the Farmer’s Manual at that time stated that potatoes should "be grown near the hog pens as a convenience towards feeding the hogs." The potato became more accepted as a food source toward the latter half of the 19th century, and it was during that period that vast improvements in potatoes were made in both productivity and table quality. The introduction of the Russet Burbank potato in 1872 marked the beginning of the Idaho potato industry. In spite of improvement efforts on the potato since that time, Russet Burbank still accounts for nearly all of the potatoes grown in that state.

Today the potato is so commonplace that we nearly take it for granted. We bake, boil, slice, dice, deep-fry, puree and perform about every imaginable culinary manipulation on it to give it a new look or taste. The result often is a dish laden with calories with the reputation of being fattening. The potato in and of itself is anything but that. High in carbohydrates but low in fat, it contains significant amounts of vitamin C and other essential nutrients to the point that a diet consisting solely of potatoes and milk, while bland, would be sufficient to sustain human life.

As you contemplate when to plant potatoes this spring, give a little thought to the fact this native American plant had to travel thousands of miles abroad before returning home to be one of our most valuable food crops.

David Trinklein
Assoc. Professor of Horticulture