Transcript

6.5.25 · Smithsonian Magazine

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Speaker 1: Welcome. This is Rebecca Shore for Radio Eye and to
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day I will be reading the Smithsonian Magazine dated June
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twenty twenty five. As a reminder, Radio Eye is a
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reading service intended for people who are blind or of
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other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.
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Please join me now for the article titled the bitter
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Sweet beginnings of vanilla cultivation can be traced back to
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the far flung isle of Rayugnon. A journey to the
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remote Indian Ocean island reveals the story behind the fragrant, delicious,
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ubiquitous spice and the enslaved youth who made it a
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commercial success. By J. Cheschey's a flight from Paris to
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the island of Rayugnon, a French overseas department in the
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Indian Ocean, takes eleven hours, skirting the smoldering crater of
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the Picton de la Fournees volcano before landing just shy
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of the water, but after disembarking at Roland Garos airport.
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The pioneering French aviator was from Reignon. You find yourself
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in a tropical paradise with all the trappings of its motherland,
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with French wine and cheeses in its supermarkets and a
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boulagerie around every corner. Four hundred miles east of Madagascar,
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Yugnon is a sort of Brancophone Hawaii. It's a magnet
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for adrenaline junkies, known for its six hundred miles of
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marked hiking trails, its zipline and whitewater rafting adventures, its
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lava tube expeditions, and perfectly cresting surfing waves, as well
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as the dubious distinction from a few years ago of
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registering the most fatal shark attacks in the world per capita.
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But beyond the plunging waterfalls and palm tree lined lagoons
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hides another story about this far flung former colonial outposts
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agricultural history in the beginnings of all things of the
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modern trade in vanilla, the supremely fragrant bean that is
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among spices second only to saffron in value on the
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global market. In fact, the vanilla plant's natural habitat is
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the tropical forests of Mexico, where native bees fertilize the
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big blooming white orchids. The aspects who considered the plant
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sacred mixed its dried seed pods into a cold cocoa
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drink chocolato, as Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes discovered when he
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arrived at Tanachetitlan in the early sixteenth century. European aristocrats
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developed a taste for vanilla after it arrived from Spain's
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colonies in the New World on ships loaded with looted
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gold and silver. Eventually, a variation on the Aztec's cocoa drink,
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now served hot with added sugar and milk, took off
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across the continent, soon spreading to the distant corners of
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the French Empire. I came to Reillugnon to explore the
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roots of Vanilla's ensuing global commercial success. I arrived at
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the beginning of the island's southern hemisphere winter, after the
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torrential rains had subsided, and before the July and August
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vacation rush. Fresh off the plain, I met Eric Jennings,
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an author and historian specializing in French colonial history, for lunch.
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The arrival of vanilla beans and their consumption is tied
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to Europeans basically duplicating indigenous drinks from Central America. Sennings
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told me the French felt particularly hard for vanilla Jennings explained,
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mixing it into a growing variety of sweets, including a
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frozen custard that are known today as ice cream, that
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had been introduced by Catherine de Medici, according to legend,
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when she married the future King Henry the Second of
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France in fifteen thirty three. In seventeen eighty nine, Thomas
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Jefferson returned home from his stint as the second U.
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S Ambassador to France with such a love for vanilla
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ice cream that he had it served at what would
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later become the White House. Surferson's handwritten recipe, based on
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that of French butler Adrianne Petti, is among his official
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papers in the library of Congress. Sames, whose new book Vanilla,
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The History of an Extraordinary Being will be published this summer,
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was visiting Raignon for the fifth International Vanilla Congress, a
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semi regular gathering drawing botanists, agricultural engineers, plant geneticists, and
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vanilla growers and porters and distributors from around the world.
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Talks focused on subjects such as climate change, the vanilla genome,
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and vanilla market volatility. In one presentation, a Ugandan vanilla
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grower showcased novel sustainable farming methods. In another the French
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Agricultural research and International Development organization CYRAD led discussions on
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a hybrid strain of vanilla that is resistant to Fusarium oxisporum,
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the most common fungal blight threatening much of the world's
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commercial crop. An historian at the University of Toronto who
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spent a decade researching vanilla's cultural history and its global
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economics spread, was one of the conference's keynote speakers. This
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is not the first history of vanilla, but it is
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the most academically rigorous, and at its center is an
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unlikely hero whose story, although well known in the industry,
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remains broadly overlooked. Born on Reigno to enslaved parents in
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eighteen twenty nine, a child whose mother died while giving
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birth was known simply as Edmund. Landowners didn't give last
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names to those they enslaved. Edmund grew up on a
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small plantation bellevue above the town of Sainte Suzan on
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the island's north coast. The island was uninhabited when the
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Portuguese first set foot on it in the early sixteenth century.
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In sixteen forty two, the French claimed the island for
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Louis the thirteenth Worked by enslaved captives transported from Africa, Madagascar,
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and South Asia, dense forests soon became thriving coffee and
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sugar plantations. Later, indentured workers from India and China took
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over the grueling cultivation. The melting pot, Creole cuisine and
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Creole language found on the island today are a legacy
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of these successive waves of forced labor, a cultural mix
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four hundred years in the minds. By the early nineteenth century,
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enslaved people made up seventy percent of the island's population.
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This was Edmond's childhood world. At Bellevue, the plantation's owner,
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Fereo Bellier Beaumont was said to have treated him more
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like a son than a slave. According to a letter
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written by Bellier Beaumont's friend, a local official and botanist
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named Auguste Lazier le Pervanche. Bellier Beaumont himself wrote of
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his affection for Edmund and an eighteen sixty one letter
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to the Sans Suzan Justice of the Peace. He was
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my favorite and always at my side. Bellier Beaumont was
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a horticulturist with a passion for rare plants, and he
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taught Edmond from a young age the scientific names for
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the trees and plants he grew on the property, though
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he never taught him to read or write. In Bellevue
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Garden was a single vine of vanilla planifolia native to
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Mexico that Jennings believes descended from one of the first
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vanilla saplings to survive on the island after a shipment
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arrived from Paris in eighteen twenty two. By then, the
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French had been struggling for years to break the Spanish
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monopoly on what had become a licrative spice planting vanilla
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in the tropical outposts of their own empire, but with
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no natural pollinators, every attempt to produce beans had failed.
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At Bellevue, Bellier Beaumonts vanilla vine grew beautiful flowers, but
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it never bore fruit. That all changed one day in
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eighteen forty one, when Edmund, then twelve years old, approached
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a blooming vanilla orchid and nimbly peeled back the lip
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of the flower to reveal the pollen inside with the
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help of a needle or a sliver of wood. The
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historical record is unclear he nudged back the rostelle, with
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thin membrane separating the male anther from the female stigma.
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Hooking around further, he pressed the two parts together. Months later,
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Bellier Beaumont, accompanied by Edmond, was surprised to discover a
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green vanilla bean dangling from the spot where that flower
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had been. Walking with my faithful companion, I noticed on
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the only vanilla plant I still had a well tied bean,
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Bellier Beaumont wrote years later. I was astonished and told
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him so. He said it was he who had pollinated
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the flower. Bellier Beaumont was incredulous, but two or three
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days later he noticed another bean on the vine. Edmond
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now showed him what he'd done. Vanilla in that period
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was only cultivated in a few amateur gardens as a
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plant of pure curiosity. Mezier Le Parvont wrote, Edmund, with
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the sagacity only a botanist can appreciate, was able to
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distinguish in the abnormal flower of the vanilla plant the
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organs of fertilization that are different from those of flowers
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in general, and noticed very judiciously that the failure of
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the ovary resulted from the fact that the sexual organs
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were separated by a veil, and he had the idea
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to lift it. Today, the vast majority of the world's
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commercially cultivated vanilla plants are hand pollinated using Edmond's pioneering technique.
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Le Jesse des Mond Edmund's gesture as they took to
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calling it on Raignon. A skilled grower can pollinate fifteen
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hundred flowers in a day using his method. The process
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has yet to be mechanized. After Edmund shared his discovery,
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Bellier Beaumont paraded him proudly around the island, offering demonstrations
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to uthers their plantation owners. I have no way of
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proving it, Jennings told me, But I've wondered many times
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if Bellier Beaumont didn't charge attendance at these tours. Edmond
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gets all this attention projected on him and becomes a
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bit of a local star. Edmund's technique was quickly adopted,
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enabling a new industry to take root. Soon, two growers
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Ernest Lupi and Davie de Florie developed a system for
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more efficiently processing fresh green vanilla beans, rather than simply
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leaving them out in the sun to dry, as was
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traditional in Mexico, they sped up the process by scalding
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fresh beans and hot water to prevent them from ripening
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further before drying them. Within twenty five years of Edmund's innovation,
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Jennings said, Rayugnon becomes the global leader in vanilla. But
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with increased production, Rayugnon's vanilla output more than tripled between
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eighteen sixty and eighteen eighty, land and labor costs rose too,
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and with a huge new market emerging in the United
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States following the introduction of soft drinks Coca Cola debuted
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in eighteen eighty six and ice cream cones invented in
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New York City in eighteen ninety six, Yugnon's vanilla producers
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began looking to Madagascar, the much larger and less developed
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French colony next door, as an alternative growing site. Madagascar's
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u vanilla growers found great success in the lush, humid
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northeast coast of the island, where the vines attached their
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aerial roots to shaded tree trunks and climbed toward the canopy.
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It didn't take long for Madagascar to surpass Reillugnon as
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the new world capital of vanilla, a position it's held
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since the early twentieth century, and despite periods of political
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instability in Madagascar, which gained independence from France in nineteen sixty,
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as well as natural disasters, boom and bust growing cycles
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tied to market speculation and competition from artificial vanilla. The
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lab made iteration of vanilla's main flavor component, first identified
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by a French scientist in eighteen fifty eight. Some eighty
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percent of the world's vanilla is still grown in Madagascar today.
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Back on Reiugnon, Edmund's story became the stuff of legend today.
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Multiple streets bear his name, as well as several schools
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on the island in Sans Dusanne, where he grew up.
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Two memorials commemorate his contribution to botanical history. Novels in
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a children's comic book have embellished the details of his life.
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Of Bellevue itself, However, where Edmund pollinated that first vanilla orchid,
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nothing remained, the property largely reclaimed by the forest. Only
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a rudimentary monument on the side of a road stands
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to mark the site. To get a sense of what
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Bellevue might have looked like, I spent an afternoon visiting
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villel one of the island's best preserved historic plantations, which
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operates as a museum and memorial to slavery. The main
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plantation house, completed in seventeen eighty eight, was home to
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the Pannont, de Vasse and Vllel families wops. The house
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sits perched on a hill above the sea, with cream
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trim blue shutters and a manicured garden. It's a place
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of memory where four hundred and seventy slaves died, not
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from gunshots but exhaustion, said my guide Patrick Kuchen himself
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descended from enslaved workers en re Lugnon. On a wall
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in the entryway hung an enormous framed Dabasset family tree
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extending across the centuries facing lines in Reiugnon and France.
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The work of a slave was from three in the
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morning until nine at night, Hukan continued. The only vacation
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was when they slept farther inside. Among antique furniture, Chinese
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porcelain and Baccarat crystal, candelabras, iron shackles, and framed plans
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for a transport ship, the Lea Brooks were displayed. The
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biggest cemetery of blacks of slaves, Where is that? Houkin asks,
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the ocean, the seas of the world. The tour continued,
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leading around a corner. Above the Dbasse's dining room table,
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hung a portrait of Edmund as an adult, posing in
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a white dinner jacket and bow tie, a vanilla vine
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in one hand. The image, completed in eighteen sixty five three,
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is a reproduction of a lithograph by a local artist,
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Antoine Roussein, the inventor of the pollination of the vanilla
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flower cocaine, said, pausing in front of the portrait, plenty
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filled their pockets from his invention. Though published reports claimed
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that Bellier Beaumont rewarded Edmond for his discovery by granting
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his freedom, Jennings insists that never happened. Instead, he told
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me Edmund remained in his master's charge until December twentieth,
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eighteen forty eight, when abolition arrived. Reading the island's sixty
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two thousand enslaved people. Edmund emancipated at nineteen, took a
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last name for the first time, becoming Edmund Albius. Albus
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is Latin for white, like the vanilla orchid. He had
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hoped to secure a job as a cook on a
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ship bound for France, but instead he went to work
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in the home of a navy captain, earning fifteen francs
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per month and ten pints of rice per week. According
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to archival documents, one day in eighteen fifty one, items
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were taken from his employer's home. On August nineteenth, Edmund
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was arrested. According to official records from the time, Edmund
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confessed to stealing a pair of silver bracelets out of
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a Chinese casket, a small wallet, and a silver chain.
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The public records don't include other incriminating evidence, making it
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impossible to know definitively whether Edmund was guilty. He was
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sentenced to five years of hard labor and forced to
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pay the costs of his trial. Bellier Beaumont seated for leniency,
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baraging the legal authorities with letters defending Edmund's character. The
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frayed yelling letters are now in the partmental Archives in
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Saint Denis. Edmond certainly has indisputable rights to public gratitude
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and government clemency, he wrote in one letter sent to
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the Prosecutor General in eighteen fifty five. The country is
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indebted to him for a new branch of industry, though
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Bellier Beaumont succeeded in getting Edmund released that year after
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three years in prison. Edmund never benefited from the fortunes
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his innovation produced. He moved back to San Suzan, working
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odd jobs in agriculture and as a stonemason and a cook.
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He never returned to vanilla production. In eighteen seventy one,
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he married, but he was widowed five years later. He
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died alone in eighteen eighty at the age of fifty one.
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The very man who, at great profit to this colony,
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discovered how to pollinate vanilla flowers has died, and the
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public hospital at Saint Susan read his perfunctory obituary in
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the local Rayugnon newspaper. It was a destitute and miserable end.
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Raignon today is home to about one hundred and fifty
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vanilla growers, a dramatic drop since the nineteen thirties when
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several thousand black blanketed the island. Each operates outside the
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global market, unable to keep pace with Madagascar and other
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fruitful vanilla producing regions. Instead, Rayugnon growers almost exclusively serve
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a local and tourist clientele, marketing their pods as luxury goods.
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Late one morning on the edge of Sanusan, I met
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Bertrand Combe, one such producer and an outspoken champion of
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Yugnon vanilla. A native of the mountainous Boge region of France,
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Combe came to Reyugnon as an agronomy student in nineteen
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eighty seven, completing a thesis on vanilla blights, and never left.
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I fell in love with vanilla, he said, I fell
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in love with Rayugnon. The vanilla industry was already in
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crisis when he arrived. After Rayugnon's co operative of vanilla
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growers for which he initially worked failed in nineteen ninety five,
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he helped create its replacement, Provania, becoming its director. Today,
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Provenia operates as a sort of central processing facility, transforming
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green vanilla from local farmers into cured black beans. In
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two thousand nine, Combe opened his own picturesque vanilla business,
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Le Vanillere, a tourist attraction on a historic estate, Le
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Grand Azier, dating back to the sixteen seventies and still
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active as a sugar plantation. Old quarters that housed in
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slaved workers now used as offices for a local agricultural
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organization lying the edge of the property. In front of
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the old plantation house, newly restored but not yet open
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to visitors, come planted vanilla vines on neat rows of
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trees facing the sea, where ruined stables, also restored had been.
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He built a gift shop selling vanilla beans, vanilla infused
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jams and RUMs, and housemade vanilla ice cream for consuming
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on the property. Given the price and potency of vanilla beans,
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no Reyugnon producers offer tastings of pure vanilla on site.
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Apart from one small yearly shipment to a boutique spice
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business in France. Home sells all of his vanilla around
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three hundred thousand dried beans annually here in his shop.
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In twenty twenty four he received forty five thousand visitors,
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plenty enough to sell out, particularly in a challenging growing
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year when heavy rains and unusually high temperatures brought crop
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yields way down. I had to close for a month
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because I didn't have enough vanilla, he said. Home processes
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his own vanilla, along with beans from some twenty five
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other small growers across the island when the fresh green
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beams come into his curing facility, open to visitors next
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door to the gift shop. Comb plunges them into one
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hundred and forty five degree water for three minutes to
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kill them. The eshohdaje, or a scalding part of the process,
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then wraps them in towels to steam for a day.
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From there, they are laid outside in wood racks to
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try in the sun for two weeks, then transferred to
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wire racks inside, where they continue to dry out for
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a couple more months. Finally, they're sealed up antique trunks
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for another year or so to finish developing the aroma.
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Comb explained, every batch is regularly checked and sorted to
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ensure no mold has developed. Vanilla is not a lazy job. Unusually,
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Comb marks the particular provenance of his vanilla beans, the
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location on the island where each batch was grown, which
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he sells at a premium in his shop at twenty
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euros for a tube of three beans. Just as winemakers
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talk of terroir, how the soil and location of the
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grapevines affect a wine's flavor, Comb is convinced vanilla has
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similar nuances. The notion is novel and controversial. Combe told
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me when I was at Provenieux. All the growers were
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against it. They said, if I have bad terroar, my
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vanilla isn't going to sell as well. I'll have to
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charge less. Home hopes to back up his theories with science.
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He's enlisted a graduate student from the Serbonne in Paris
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to analyze the aromatic molecules in vanilla grown in different
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French territories in Rayugnon, New Caledonia, Tahiti, and Guadeloupe in
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the Caribbean. His research is just beginning. The aroma of
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vanilla has one hundred and eighty different molecules, Combe said,
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the most important being Vanillan, but there are plenty of others.
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Is this diversity that accounts for its particular taste. Home
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is not alone among Raygnon's producers in striving to find
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and sell vanilla's distinctive, if as yet unrecognized qualities. Louis
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Leiitnig is a veteran vanilla grower whose family has been
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on the island since the eighteenth century. One afternoon, we
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climbed into his pick up truck for an off road
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excursion to his ancestral lands, which hug the Pictonne de
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la Fournees. Volcano near the commune of San Phelipe. Looks
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like a character out of a rugged kipling story, with
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an unruly white beard and a machette and a pith
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helmet woven from dried screw pine leaves, a local handicraft material.
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He grows his vines deep in the forest among wild
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citrus and leechy trees. This is an old plantation, he said,
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as we dug through the bush. The forest floor a
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knotted tangle of roots all around us. Vanilla vines drenched
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in light rain, climbed up palm trees. With a long stick.
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He pulled a vine off a tree, whooping it back
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on itself before tying it to the tree again, a
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process known as bauflage. We're stressing the plant, he said.
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It wants to climb up there to reach the light.
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Here it's humid. It will flower on these vines we
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brought down and then with pollinate them to have beans.
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More than thirty years ago, when he started processing green vanilla,
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hearing techniques were closely guarded by a few dominant players.
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It was almost colonial, he said. We didn't have a
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recipe to day like nig specializes in ultra premium vanilla,
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a distinctive range of dried beans made with his own
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proprietary curing techniques. For example, he sells fresh beans, a
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style he helped pioneer that are only partially dried, the
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additional water content making them extra plump. But his real
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focus is frosted vanilla gibret in French, with such a
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high concentration of vanillon that big white crystals, sparkling like snowflakes,
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form along the outside of the bean as it dries.
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The crystals are a natural phenomenon, feering unpredictably during the
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curing process, but Leipnig has mastered a technique, his own
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trade secret for bringing them out every time. We also
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buy with our eyes, he explained. Frosted vanillas aromas were intense,
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the appearance quite striking, and Leichnig described its flavors when
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used in cooking as elegant and complex. The whole history
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of vanilla comes from Reugnon and it continues. He said.
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It's expensive to produce vanilla these days. We're not competitive,
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so we're forced to deliver a different product, a product
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of quality. This concludes readings from the Smithsonian Magazine for
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to Day, your reader has been Rebecca Shore, thank you
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for listening and have a great day.