You know it, you love it: the Granny Smith apple. The gleaming chartreuse skin. That brilliant crunch. The perfect balance of juicy-sweet and curling tart that makes it the ideal apple to eat and cook.
But did you know that a Granny Smith really existed?
Born Maria Ann Sherwood into a farming family in the lush farming area of Sussex, England in 1799, she married Thomas Smith, a farm worker, when she was 19 years old. They settled in Beckley Parish, worked the land, and started a family.
In 1838, the Smiths were chosen by government agents looking for farmers willing to relocate to New South Wales, Australia. The British colony had been founded 50 years earlier as a penal settlement, a place to send convicts. But as more and more free settlers arrived in New South Wales, farm workers were desperately needed to feed the developing colony. Prospective emigrants were offered attractive financial incentives to move.
The Smiths seized the opportunity, packed up their five children, ages 1 to 16, and boarded the Lady Nugent. The journey from England to Australia was long and difficult, 13,000 miles on the crowded ship. The Smiths landed in Sydney in November 1838. By 1856, they owned nearly 24 acres of rich farmland in the Ryde district outside Sydney.
The Smiths were “horticulturists,” farmers who specialized in tree fruits. Maria was passionate about apples. On their land, the Smiths grew apples and pears, as well as vegetables, which they sold in the markets of Sydney. Maria was also a skilled baker, known for her fruit cakes.
It is said that one day a vendor at the markets gave Maria a box of wild Tasmanian apples to make cakes. He took the fruit home, baked his desserts, and dumped the peels and kernels into the compost heap in the garden along with the rest of the orchard garbage.
Soon, Maria found an apple seedling growing in the compost. She lovingly cared for the tiny tree until it finally bore fruit, the deliciously sour green beauties we know today. There, in her compost, Maria had unknowingly crossed the crab apple tree with the apple tree from the home garden, it is believed.
The oldest documented account of Maria Smith’s apple appeared in the June 25, 1924, issue of Farmer and settler, in an interview with Ryde area fruit grower Edwin Small. Small recalled that in 1868, Maria had invited him and his father to see an apple seedling growing by a stream on their farm. According to Small, Maria explained that the seedling had developed from the remains of some French crabapples grown in Tasmania.
At the time of her accidental discovery of the apple, the beloved Maria Smith was affectionately known to her community as “Granny.” Sadly, he died two years later, in 1870, long before the commercial success of his namesake apple. She was buried in St. Anne’s Cemetery in Ryde, where her headstone still stands.
In 1890, Grandma’s fabulous fruit first appeared as “Smith Seedling” at the Castle Hill Agricultural and Horticultural Fair. The following year, “Granny Smith’s Seedlings” earned top honors there for the best apples to cook, and farmers in the area began growing their own.
In 1895, Albert H. Benson, a fruit expert with the NSW Department of Agriculture, deemed the “Granny Smith seedling” suitable for export. In fact, the Granny apple stands out for staying firm and crisp longer than other varieties. While Benson started the first large-scale cultivation of Granny Smith, Granny’s son-in-law, James Spurway, and later his son Fred, are credited with early propagation of the apple and its expansion into Australia and export to the United States. United.
Today, Granny Smith apples are enjoyed around the world, eaten and made into delicious pies, sauces and juices. In Australia, a festival in honor of the grandmother attracts thousands of people annually. Edna Spurway, Granny Smith’s great-granddaughter, attended the 2008 event at Ryde.
So next time you take a bite out of one of those glorious green grannies, say a little “thank you” to Maria Ann Smith of New South Wales, the real Granny Smith, lover of apples to the core.
