The Demands For Cans Past and Present

The Demands For Cans Past and Present
In 1861 the American Civil War began. Marching armies and wounded soldiers had to be fed. Canned foods provided healthy meals for thousands.

Weary soldiers drew strength from canned pork and beans, oysters, stew, fruit and milk. Soldiers and sailors were grateful for Appert’s invention. But other people were too. Canned food saved a lot of time and trouble.

Before canning was invented, people had to preserve their own food. Families killed pigs and cows and salted the meat.

They also dried and smoked meat over a fire. Preserved meat hung from barn rafters. Some people rubbed the meat with pepper to keep away nibbling bats.

Families dried harvest of peaches, apples, beans, and corn. Milk, which soured quickly, was churned into butter or made into cheese.

Canning not only saved work and time but it also provided a more interesting diet. Winter no longer meant just dried meat and fruit. People could choose from juicy peaches and savory stews.

Canned foods could travel across oceans and continents. In the midst of grassy prairies, far from oceans, families could feast on seafood. In cold regions, people could enjoy sweet pineapple from balmy lands.

For modern consumers, bottle and canned foods are a regular part of life. But they are important in emergencies too.

After hurricanes or floods, canned food quickly feed many people. Relief workers also send cans of healthful foods to people in poor nations.
The Demands For Cans Past and Present

Thomas Kensett: United States inventor for tin can

An English engraver, Thomas Kensett (1786-1829), who came to the U.S. in 1812, is responsible for the huge tin can industry.  He learned the art in England before his immigration to this country.

When Nicholas Appert invented a method of preserving sterilized food in air-tight bottles, Kensett visualized the possibilities of food in cans.

In 1815, Kensett and his father in-law Ezra Daggert were the first in record canning salmon, lobster and oyster on a site near what is now Battery Park in New York City.

In 1825 they applied for a tin canning patent, the first in United States, and set up a factory, sold canned food to masters of sailing ships. His cans really were of tin; but today, though the name has clung, they are 98 1/2% steel with a thin coating of tin.

Kensett was the first to break away from home kitchen methods and deserves credit for developing the first canned product oysters to receive wide distribution.

True commercial canning operation however was achieved in 1844 when Dragget and Kensett started caning oysters in big volume.

Owing to many adverse conditions the industry was of comparatively small importance until about 1850. During the next few years the development was very rapid and the variety of goods packed increased and included fruits, vegetables, oysters, fish, and meats.
Thomas Kensett: United States inventor for tin can

French 1st fish cannery by Joseph Colin

In the Middles Ages, the Nantes area was famous for its sardines preserved in vinegar, in the local melted butter or in imported olive oil.

They were packed in the large jars of Berry earthenware called oules and sent off to the rest of France.

In 1822 a confectioner of Nantes called Joseph Colin who in the early years of the nineteenth century first saw the possibilities of applying to the local method of preserving sardines the tinning process then being developed by ex-colleague, Francois Appert.

The French canned sardine industry developed from 1824 when Joseph Colin opened the first fish cannery in the rue des Salorges at Nantes.

By 1836 he was producing 100,000 cans, and the industry spread along the coast of Brittany.

By 1880 50 million tons of sardines were packed annually on the west coast of France, three million of which were exported to Britain. There were a number of others in the region who were to copy Colin and set up their own establishments. A restaurateur in Nantes called Millet covered his restaurant which was situated in the center of the town, into a sardine canning  factory,

For nearly fifty years sardine canning remained a French monopoly. It was not until the 1880s, that competition from Spanish and inferior grades of fish which were often not even true sardines, began to hit the French producers.
French 1st fish cannery by Joseph Colin

Peter Durand of food canning process

The use of canned food dates back to Napoleonic days when a French candy maker, Nicolas Appert, conducted food preservation experiments by canning soups and vegetables in champagne bottles.

In the year 1810 Peter Durand, an English merchant secured a patent from the English Government for the preservation of fruits, vegetables and fish in airtight, tin-plated, wrought iron cans. Durand also obtained a patent on metal containers. The latter gave rose to the term tin can.

He did not claim to be the discoverer of the process, but it was an ‘invention communicated to me by a certain foreigner’.

Peter Durand was himself from a Huguenot family with relations on both sides of the Channel who dealt in food and wine, and there could have been plenty of opportunity for Durand to communicate with Appert and other French client inventors.

In 1811, Durand sold the patent engineer Bryan Donkin for £1,000 and new owners soon were making the first ‘tin cans’ at the phenomenal rate of ten cans per man per day.

With the tin mines in England, tin plated steel was soon being produced in commercial quantities.
Peter Durant of food canning process

Pineapple Canning in History

Pineapple canning began in Hawaii in 1892 and in Malaya at about the same time. From then on, production rose dramatically, creating employment and money for many people in the tropics.

The earliest recorded planting of pineapple in Hawaii was in 1813 by Francisco de Paula Marin.

The need to preserve pineapples for distant consumers was the original idea of canning the fruit.

The US canning industry grew during the nineteenth century often East Coast and its primary stimulus was food spoilage and the time required for transportation from the site of production to the marketplace.

J. D. Ackerman and E. Muller attempted the first commercial canning in 1882 at Kona but abandoned the venture due to lack of market response.

More successful was John Emmeluth from Cincinnati, who began canning pineapples in 1889 on Oahu and shipping them to Victoria, British Columbia, New York and Boston.

The modern pineapple industry dates from 1900, when a group of Californian farmers formed a colony at Wahiawa Oahu and under leadership of Byron O. Clark began raising a number of crops, including pineapples.

In 1906, James Dole built a new canning facility with warehouse in Honolulu and his company invented machines to streamline the pineapples canning, including feeder and slicer to cut fruit into uniform shapes and sizes.

Pineapple canning, which had became the territory’s second largest industry by 1920. In 1922, James Dole purchased nearly the entire island of Lanai, making it the largest pineapple plantation in the world.
Pineapple Canning in History

Self-Heating and Self-Cooling Cans

Self-Heating and Self-Cooling Cans
During World War II (1939-1945), some food cans had wicks on them, like candles have. The wicks were attached to an inside tube. When soldiers lit the wick, the tube heated the food.

Self heating cans actually started around 1900 for the use by mountaineers and explorers.

Newer self heating cans are easier to use. Just push a button. The button breaks a seal inside a heating cone.

Water and limestone combine in the cone, releasing heat. Three minutes later your food or drink is hot.

Self-cooling cans were harder to develop. They came along about fifty years after the self heating kind.

Astronaut were the first to use them in 1998. In one model, water evaporates inside a compartment in the can.

The evaporating water draws heat from the beverages. In two to three minutes, the drink is chilled.
Self-Heating and Self-Cooling Cans

Canned Food

Canned Food
In 1861, the American Civil War began. Marching armies and wounded soldiers had to be fed. Canned foods provided healthy meals for thousands.

Weary soldiers drew strength from canned pork and beams oysters stew, fruit and milk.

Soldiers and sailors were grateful for Appert’s invention But other people were too. Canned food saved a lot of time and trouble.

Before canning was invented, people had to preserve their own food. Families killed pigs and cows and salted the meat.

They also dried and smoked meat over a fire. Preserved meat hung down from barn rafter. Some people rubbed the meat with pepper to keep away nibbling bars.

Milk, which soured quickly, was churned into butter or made into cheese.

Canning not only saved work and time, but it also provided a more interesting diet. Winter no longer meant just dried meat and fruit. People could choose from juicy peaches and savory stews.

Canned foods could travel across oceans and continents. In the midst of grassy prairies, far from oceans, families could feast on seafood.

In cold region, people could enjoy sweet pineapple form balmy lands.

For modern customers, bottled and canned foods are a regular part of life. But they are important in emergencies too. After hurricane or floods canned food quickly feed many people.

Relief workers also send cans of healthful foods to people in poor nations.

Appert’s preservation method was great gift to the world. The French honored Appert as a “Benefactor of Humanity” and presented him with a gold medal.

Appert had discovered that food sealed and heated in airtight containers did not spoil.
Canned Food

Food preservation: Canning

Food preservation: Canning
In the early nineteenth century, when France and Britain were at war with each other more soldiers and sailors died from disease than from battle.

Both the French and Britain government realized something important. Finding a new way to preserve food (keep it from spoilage) would prevent soldiers and sailors from dying. A larger, healthier fighting force would bring a greater advantage in battle. In 1795, the French government took action. It offered a prize of 12,000 francs. The money would go to the inventor of the best preserved food. The food had to be healthy, easily carried and not too expensive.

In 1803 a French chef named Nicolas Appert invented a new technique for preserving food. He prepared and preserved soup, beef with gravy, beans and peas. The French navy stored it for three months. Then they tried it. The food was delicious and safe to eat.

For the next few years, Appert provided the French fleet with preserved foods such as stew, milk and juice. This preservation technique proved successful. In 1810 the French government gave Appert the prize.

In this process, Appert filled the glass bottles with food and closed the bottles with cork stoppers. He then tight down the stoppers with the wire and sealed them with a thick, waxy coating called pitch. As a final step, Appert boiled the sealed bottles in water. Food heated in the airtight bottles did not spoil.

In 1821 an Englishman named William Underwood brought Appert’s invention to the United States. Underwood set up a factory in Boston, Massachusetts, to bottle lobster and salmon. Later the factory switched from glass bottles to metal canister. The word “can” was first used in Boston for these metal containers. Appert’s preservation method became known as “canning’ whether bottles or cans were used.
Food preservation: Canning