Chapter Four

Native Americans

American Cheddars

The first American Cheddar was made soon after 1620 around Plymouth by Pilgrim fathers who brought along not only cheese from the homeland but a live cow to continue the supply.  Proof of our ability to manufacture Cheddar of our own lies in the fact that by 1790 we were exporting it back to England.

It was called Cheddar after the English original named for the village of Cheddar near Bristol.  More than a century ago it made a new name for itself, Herkimer County cheese, from the section of New York State where it was first made best.  Herkimer still equals its several distinguished competitors, Coon, Colorado Blackie, California Jack, Pineapple, Sage, Vermont Colby and Wisconsin Longhorn.

The English called our imitation Yankee, or American, Cheddar, while here at home it was popularly known as yellow or store cheese from its prominent position in every country store; also apple-pie cheese because of its affinity for the all-American dessert.

The first Cheddar factory was founded by Jesse Williams in Rome, New York, just over a century ago and, with Herkimer County Cheddar already widely known, this established “New York” as the preferred “store-boughten” cheese.

An account of New York’s cheese business in the pioneer Wooden Nutmeg Era is found in Ernest Elmo Calkins’ interesting book, They Broke the Prairies.  A Yankee named Silvanus Ferris, “the most successful dairyman of Herkimer County,” in the first decades of the 1800’s teamed up with Robert Nesbit, “the old Quaker Cheese Buyer.”  They bought from farmers in the region and sold in New York City.  And “according to the business ethics of the times,” Nesbit went ahead to cheapen the cheese offered by deprecating its quality, hinting at a bad market and departing without buying.  Later when Ferris arrived in a more optimistic mood, offering a slightly better price, the seller, unaware they were partners, and ignorant of the market price, snapped up the offer.

Similar sharp-trade tactics put too much green cheese on the market, so those honestly aged from a minimum of eight months up to two years fetched higher prices.  They were called “old,” such as Old Herkimer, Old Wisconsin Longhorn, and Old California Jack.

Although the established Cheddar ages are three, fresh, medium-cured, and cured or aged, commercially they are divided into two and described as mild and sharp.  The most popular are named for their states:  Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, New York, Ohio, Vermont and Wisconsin.  Two New York Staters are called and named separately, Coon and Herkimer County.  Tillamook goes by its own name with no mention of Oregon.  Pineapple, Monterey Jack and Sage are seldom listed as Cheddars at all, although they are basically that.

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