Robert Hutchings
Graduate Student, Carnegie Mellon University
Current Project
My dissertation is tracing the transition in the Florida orange industry from an orientation towards the fresh fruit market to one centered around frozen concentrated orange juice. FCOJ, as it is mostly commonly referred to as in the industry, was first developed in 1945 and became commercially available on a significant scale in 1948. From the beginning it was enormously popular with consumers, and over the course of two decades became less and less a part of the Florida orange industry and more and more the Florida orange industry. This relatively abrupt shift in emphasis after 80-plus years of near-exclusive focus on the fresh fruit market completely reconfigured all phases of the industry. From agricultural practices and perceptions of the environment to labor and laborers, from cooperative activity and advertising campaigns to packing and shipping, and from family-owned and -operated groves to agribusiness and absentee owners, the Florida orange industry in 1965 looked almost nothing like it had in 1945.
Best Place for an Agricultural History Conference
Anywhere there are oranges!
Hobbies
Sherlock Holmes, classic literature, playing bridge, old movies, and seeing something of the world.
Favorite Historical Figure
John Adams
Favorite Agricultural/Rural Movie
The Defiant Ones, with Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier. Or, perhaps In the Heat of the Night, with Poitier and Rod Steiger.