Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 March 1903 — PAWPAW IS DISAPPEARING. [ARTICLE]

PAWPAW IS DISAPPEARING.

Luscious Fruit Passing Away with the ’Possum. Soon nothing will remain from the good old times. A Missouri writer is lamenting the gradual disappearance of the pawpaw. "The persimmon is left,” he says, "though it is becoming scarcer with each succeeding year. There are 'possums jet to be found, and quail may be seen in smaller flocks thatrformerly. The typical fruit of Missouri, the luscious pawpaw, is fast disappearing, along with buffalo. There are some pawpaw bushes in obscure places, where the rude band of the iconoclast has not reached, and there are some cultivated pawpaws to be found in gardens here aud there. But, speaking generally, the Missouri pawpaw is becoming a thing of yesterday. “As a State, we have gone from the pawpaw to the banana stage. We buy our fruit at street stands instead of wandering out in the wild wood in the fall time aud finding it. We have reached the breakfast food stage of civilization. We eat soft stuff with a spoon, instead of scrambling over the hills and through the briars in search of the forest fruits. What will become of a generation thus brought up, instead of one fed upon persimmons and pawpaws? We fear It will lack iron in its blood, strength lu Its muscles and the ability to stand up alone underneath the blue sky. The pawpaw and the persimmon period passing takes with it the days of the pioneer who wbrked long hours and played hard, who knew nature and man. The banana age brings tn leisure hours and flabby morals and soft silken ways. Alas, that the pawpaw should perish from the earth.”