In 2010 when lifelong Pateros residents Philip and Joan Brownlee sat for an interview with the “Gathering our Voice” project through the Intermountain AmeriCorps, Joan stated it best when talking about the early apple varieties grown in Pateros (11):
“And some of the apples they planted were Common Delicious, Winesaps and Jonathans, and also Yellow Newtowns and Spitzenbergers which you don’t hear a lot of…them anymore but they were good apples, back then.”
It is telling that the interviewer interjected at one point before Joan had finished to laugh and state that they have, “never heard of them,” before! That is because in the 100 years between ~1910 and 2010, the types and varieties of apples grown in the Methow Valley changed significantly.
Several historical records from Pateros and the Methow Valley highlight the unique diversity of – now – heirloom apple varieties grown during the early-to-mid 1900s. The Pateros town history noted that Jonathans, Winesaps and Spitzenbergers were good “keepers”, meaning that they kept well (i.e., did not spoil) over the winter since it was often difficult to both store fruit over the winter and ship fruit out by horse or stern-wheeler during that season (6). Arrival of the railroad certainly changed this, but the region continued to produce a variety of apples in these early years. Along with Common Delicious, Winesaps, Jonathans, Yellow Newtons, and Spitzenbergers, apples grown in Pateros and the Methow Valley also included Wolfe River, Big Red, Golden Delicious, Rome Beauties, Yellow Bellflower, Golden Russet, Walbridge, Wagener (also spelled Wagner), Ben Davis, Gano, Transparent, and numerous others (3). Wentachee’s 1910 commercial booklet on the Methow described that, “the long keepers, such as the Spitzenburg, Jonathan, Winter Banana, Stayman Winesap, Delicious and Rome Beauty,” all grew well here.
W.Z. Cooper’s apples displayed in the Methow Valley News Twisp office in 1903 provide a good example of what these now-rare apples were like, in this case his large Wolfe River apples:
“The apples on our desk are beauties. They are rich red, striped with white, and measure precisely 13 ¾ quarter inches in circumference. A.L. Brown, who has recently returned from the place, says the trees are loaded to breaking down, with the fruit, many of the limbs touching on the ground. Mr. Cooper has the trees arranged so that the fruit from the tallest limb can be gathered while standing on the ground.”
Some growers were even specially known for their apple varieties in Pateros. An article in the August 9, 1930, The Packer newspaper from Chicago was titled, “John Larrabee Again Tops Market With his Winesap Apples” (12). Here, the paper explained that Larrabee’s orchard, just a few miles up the Methow River from Pateros, had consistently produced the record for highest quality and highest price paid in eastern markets for Pacific Northwest Winesap apples.
A State College of Washington (now Washington State University) survey report from 1939 titled, “Fruit Trees in the Wenatchee-Okanogan District, Washington,” indicated that by 1938 the “Lower Okanogan” Subdistrict (including Methow, Pateros, and Brewster) had 171,568 apple trees planted and growing throughout the region (13). These trees were comprised of the following varieties:
44.5% – Common Delicious
21.6% – Red Delicious
17.7% – Winesap
5.6% – Jonathan
4.2% – Rome Beauty
6.4% – All others
The report also stated that the shift towards fewer, more standardized varieties occurred because these apple types produced “high yields of superior quality fruit” (13). A related report from 1949 further supported this shift, listing the key apples grown in Okanogan County being Winesap, Standard (Common) Delicious, Red Delicious, Golden Delicious, Jonathan, and Rome Beauty (14). By the mid-20th century, consumers enjoyed the large Common and Red Delicious apples, but growers often kept a wider diversity of apples in their own orchards, both for pollination purposes and for at-home consumption.
Historian Amanda Van Lanen has recently written (15) extensively on this subject, describing that in the late-19th century growers planted numerous varieties throughout the Pacific Northwest, including, “Red Astrachan, Blue Pearmain, Gloria Mundi, Rambo, Yellow Bellflower, Yellow Transparent, Waxen, Limber Twig, Seek-No-Further, and Twenty Ounce.” This broad diversity shifted to a few key varieties, including Ben Davis and Wagner apples, during the 1910s because they, “matured faster than other varieties, giving growers earlier profits.” But, since apples needed to be stored for long periods of time and remain hardy while keeping their fresh appearance, varieties eventually shifted towards Winesap, Spitzenbergers, Yellow Newton, Rome Beauty, Grimes Golden, Jonathan, Ben Davis, and then later to the smaller group of Winesap, Delicious, Jonathan and Rome Beauty apples by the 1930s and later (15).
Today, several heirloom apple orchards still plant and grow some of these now rare varieties in the Pacific Northwest. Washington State University points towards the Feil Pioneer Orchard, established in East Wenatchee in 1908, as a source of these heirloom varieties today.
If you have any suggested revisions or additions, please email: cylerc [at] gmail [dot] com
Pateros-Methow Apple History 