Ben Davis (apple)

Ben Davis is an apple cultivar. Typical size: width 74-80 mm, height 63-75 mm, stalk 19-23 mm.^[2][3][4]

Malus domestica Ben Davis
Cultivar	Ben Davis
Origin	unknown, USA, approx. 1800[1]

History

During the 19th century and early 20th century it was a popular commercial apple^[1] due to the ruggedness and keeping qualities of the fruit. As packing and transportation techniques improved, the cultivar fell out of favor, replaced by others considered to have better flavor.^[5] It was known to fruit growers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a "mortgage lifter" because it was a reliable producer and the fruit would not drop from the trees until very late in the season.

Stark Nurseries held a competition in 1892 to find an apple to replace the Ben Davis apple.^[6] The winner was a red and yellow striped apple sent by Jesse Hiatt, a farmer in Peru, Iowa, who called it "Hawkeye" in honor of his home state.^[7] Stark Nurseries bought the rights from Hiatt, renamed the variety "Stark Delicious", and began propagating it. Another apple tree, later named the 'Golden Delicious', was also marketed by Stark Nurseries after it was purchased from a farmer in Clay County, West Virginia.^[8] In 1914, the 'Delicious' became the 'Red Delicious' as a retronym.^[9]

By mid-twentieth century the Ben Davis was mostly used as a process apple rather than a table apple, and orchards were replacing it with more popular varieties.

The cultivar is now very rare to nonexistent in the commercial trade. It is still grown in parts of California, Maine, and Pennsylvania.

Related apples

The Ben Davis was crossbred with the 'McIntosh' to create the Cortland, which has been a very successful pie apple.

Similar cultivars known as Gano or Black Ben Davis (a.k.a. Black Ben) appeared in parts of the American South (notably Arkansas and Virginia) in the 1880s. They are said to be either seedlings of, or bud-mutation of Ben Davis, but the exact relationship is unknown.^[1][10]

Gallery

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  Ben Davis
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  Black Ben Davis
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  Gano