70 



1916 ANNUAL REPORT 



Recently I was asked by the Hotel World, of Chicago, to contribute 

 some information on the avocado. It needs publicity, and this oppor- 

 tunity was accepted. I thought it well to embody questions one and 

 four in the article, suggesting that they might evoke discussion, and 

 so help along the coming of the avocado. It is too soon to expect 

 results, but I shall be glad to report them. 



Few hotels have adopted the name avocado. I don't blame them 

 if they do seem slow in the matter. The word suggests lawyer. I 

 couldn't swallow it myself, until I came down south to Monrovia, and 

 smoothed my throat with a 30 per cent oil avocado that is grown there. 

 They are still called alligator pears, in the front of the house, and are 

 nick-named 'gators, in the back of the house, and in the supply houses 

 and markets. Interest in changing has not yet been awakened. There 

 is encouragement, however, in the personal opinion of one of the mas- 

 ters in the humane art of preparing food, Victor Hirtzler, chef of the 

 Hotel St. Francis, San Francisco, who enthusiastically tells me: "I love 

 the California avocado, and I think Avocado is the proper name." 



In further consideration of this question, I might quote from the 

 aforementioned article: 



"Avocado is the name; not alligator pear! 



Both are misnomers and are misleading, but the former is euphon- 

 ious, and is backed by authority and recommendation of the United 

 States Department of Agriculture, the University of California, all 

 recent writers, and the growers of Florida and California; having been 

 selected from a list of forty-three different names under which it has 

 been a foreigner to us. Henceforth, Brother Boniface, Avhen thinking of 

 a thing so altogether lovely as the avocado, banish the ugly alligator! 

 Hotelmen, you caterers to creature comfort, who well know that the 

 short cut to the guest's purse is down through Ailment Avenue, take 

 an interest in spreading the kindly gospel of the avocado, that the 

 present generation may yet enjoy much of this food delight before 

 they go hence. You've taught 'em to eat the ripe olive; few persons 

 will have to eat the magic three before comes the craving, and then 

 the avocado habit takes a hold, like unto that of John Barleycorn! — 

 Witness the poor victims standing up before the unblushing fruiterer and 

 forking over a dollar for a lone one pound shell of palate tickle! 

 Don't be discouraged should some beginner get balky and buck and 

 kick at your table when you attempt to "put one over on him." It 

 was always a source of amusement, the facial and verbal expressions of 

 the tenderfoot when he would first meet one of these alligators. He 

 sometimes acted as through it was a crocodile. He'd "deny the alle- 

 gation and defy the alligator", but, eventually, he seldom failed to get 

 the habit, and often would take some back east for the home folks." 



The avocado is happily constituted for universal consumption. It 

 is food for both the mighty eater and the modest vegetarian. How 

 many of "us poor humans" are under doctors' orders: "Don't eat 

 sugar." Don't eat salt." "Cut out meat." Just here the bland avocado 

 comes forward, a real neutral in the war. It contains but a shadow of 

 sugar and salt, and it takes the place of animal flesh. 



