Wake Up and Smell the Coffee: The Spatial and Cultural Diffusion of an Industry

Wake Up and Smell the Coffee: The Spatial and Cultural Diffusion of an Industry Presented by Joe Ramirez and Rosemary Morrow Austin ISD Social Studies Curriculum Department and Texas Education Agency, Austin, Texas

Concept: Spatial and Cultural Diffusion • Spatial and cultural diffusion are promoted around the world through products such as coffee.

Guiding Questions: • How has coffee spread cultural and economic values to different areas of the world? • How do people’s lives change when they experience a new product? • How do different primary sources illustrate the spread of coffee around the world? • What has been the global impact of the coffee industry?

1200 Years of Coffee Talk: Mapping the World of Coffee National Geographic Society

ETHIOPIA: The Birthplace of Coffee • circa 850 First known discovery of coffee berries was in Ethiopia. Legend has it that a goat herder named Kaldi noticed goats were friskier after eating red berries of a local shrub. He experimented with the berries himself and began to feel happier than before.

ETHIOPIA TO YEMEN: Diffusion Takes Place for the First Time • c. 1100 The first coffee trees were cultivated on the Arabian peninsula (Yemen). Coffee was first roasted and boiled by Arabs making "qahwa" --- a beverage made from plants. • Coffee later was exported from the port of Mochain Yemen.

Coffee in Arabia • The Arabs were the first people to cultivate coffee and begin its trade. • It's popularity was perhaps partially due to the fact that many Muslims, forbidden by the Qur’an to drink alcohol, found coffee's energizing properties to be an acceptable substitute.

Coffee in Arabia • Coffee houses -- called qahveh khaneh -- quickly became important centers for the exchange of information that they were often referred to as 'Schools of the Wise.'

From Arabia to Turkey • The first coffee house opened in Constantinople in 1475. • It was in Turkey that the seeds were roasted and mashed and mixed with water.

Examining A Primary Source • Ibrahim Peçevi, Ottoman Historian, 1635: “These [coffee] shops became meeting places of pleasure seekers, idlers, and of some wits among the men of letters…. The imams and muezzins…said people have become addicts of the coffeehouse and no one comes to mosque.”

Discussion Questions • How have people’s lives and values changed with the introduction of coffee to their societies? • To what extent has the consumption of coffee been beneficial or harmful to a specific society?

Escape from Arabia • Expansionist policies of the Ottoman Empire spread coffee into North Africa, Europe and South Asia. • Pilgrim, Baba Budan, smuggled fertile coffee seeds from Mecca to India in 1600. These were the first coffee seeds to sprout outside of Africa or Arabia.

Coffee Comes To Europe • Coffee first arrived in Venice in 1615. • Clergy opposed to it because it was seen as Satan’s “bitter invention.” • Pope Clement VII had to intervene and blessed coffee after tasting it. “This beverage is so delicious that it would be a sin to let only misbelievers drink it.”

Europe catches the “buzz” • Coffeehouses spread and became the centers of social activity throughout England, Austria, France, Germany and Holland. • In England, coffeehouses were called “penny universities” where one could pay a penny for a cup of coffee and stimulating conversation.

Coffee in Europe • Edwin Lloyd’s Coffeehouse developed into Lloyd’s of London. • In 1713, sugar was first used as an additive in the Court of King Louis XIV of France.

Coffee Customs in Europe • In 1688, the word “tips” is coined in an English coffeehouse. A sign reading: “To insure prompt service” was placed by a cup. Patrons got prompt seating and service by placing a coin in the cup.

Bach and The Coffee Cantata, 1729 • Bach pokes fun at both the coffee drinkers and their critics in Leipzig, Germany. • What would possess Bach to write a cantata about a secular and banal topic such as coffee?

Examining Two Primary Sources • Public Notice posted at Garway’s Coffee House in London, 1657: “The drink of coffee is declared to be most wholesome, preserving perfect health until extreme old age. It makes the body active and lusty…. It overcomes superfluous sleep and prevents sleepiness…so that…whole nights may be spent in study without hurt to the body.”

Examining Two Primary Sources • Louis Sebastien Mercier, French food critic and travel expert, in The Tables of Paris, 1780: “The workers regard drinking coffee with milk as cheaper, more invigorating and having more flavor than any other breakfast dish….[T]hey drink it in near unbelievable quantities. They say that itnearly lasts them until evening, and so they need to take only two other meals.”

A Dutch Treat • The Dutch brought the first coffee plants to Europe in 1616. • In the middle 1600s, the Dutch introduced coffee to America by taking it to New Amsterdam • In 1696, the first European coffee estates were founded on Java in Indonesia.

Spread to Latin America • In 1714, the Dutch gave Louis XIV a coffee tree. • French Naval Officer Gabriel Mathieu de Clieu smuggled out coffee clippings to take to Martinique in the Caribbean. • De Clieu’s sprout was the ancestor to approximately 18 million trees in the West Indies which became the suppliers for Latin America.

Coffee Arrives in Brazil • Coffee arrived in Brazil in 1727, after it was smuggled from French Guiana by Lt. Col. Francisco de Melo Palheta. • Palheta received a bouquet of roses spiked with coffee seedlings. • These seedlings were the beginnings for the world’s largest producer of coffee.

Coffee Arrives in Central America • In the 1790s, Costa Rica was the first Central American country to establish coffee as an industry. • In 1820, coffee was exported to Colombia.

Examining A Primary Source • Pierre Denis, notes from his travels in Brazil, 1911, Italian Immigrant Labor Contract for Coffee Pickers, Sao Paulo: • Article1: Transportation and Housing • Article 2: Worker Expectations • Article 3: Worker Bonuses • Article 5: Worker Negligence • Article 11: Worker Debt • Article 15: Compensation

Coffee in the United States • After the Boston Tea Party in 1773, drinking coffee became patriotic. • During the American Civil War, Union troops were issued eight pounds of ground, roasted coffee and ten pounds of green coffee beans. • Citizens of New Orleans began using chicory as a substitute during the Civil War.

Coffee in the United States • The first coffee break took place in 1902 at the Barcolo Manufacturing Company in Buffalo, New York (now Barcalounger)

Coffee Goes Hawaiian • Coffee trees came to Hawaii from Brazil in the early 1800s. • A scale insect wiped out the coffee plantations in 1858. • By the 1930s, coffee was established again in Kona as a major crop. • Annual production today is 6–7 million pounds of green coffee beans.

Innovations in the Coffee Industry • In 1822, the first espresso machine was made in France. • In 1865, the coffee percolator was invented by James Mason. • In 1901, instant coffee was developed was Satori Kato, a Japanese American. • In 1908, a German housewife, Melitta Bentz, invented the first coffee filter, using her son’s blotting paper from school.

Examining A Primary Source • Annual Coffee Consumption: Kilograms Per Person • What conclusions can be made about coffee consumption in different parts of the world?

Annual Coffee Consumption: 1997 (Kilograms Per Person); World Resources Institute Table ERC.5, Resource Consumption

Coffee Consumption • Coffee is the world’s most popular beverage, with more than 400 billion cups consumed each year. It is second only to oil as a world commodity.

Fair Trade in the Coffee Industry • Fair Trade: minimum price of $1.26 per pound, providing credit and technical assistance to farmers.

Examining A Primary Source Felipe Rodriguez, spokesman for the Coffee Cooperatives of Costa Rica, letter to Margaret Bau, U.S. Department of Agriculture, 2001: • “All workers involved in harvesting and milling, regardless of national origin or legal status, are guaranteed a minimum wage. The Ministry of Labor strictly enforces fair labor conditions by conducting unannounced on-site inspections…By organizing into coops, farmers are able to benefit from services such as coop-run grocery stores, offering discount prices, reduce cost on agricultural supplies and the availability of loans.”

Coffee Impacts Advertising • Coffee issecond largest import to the U.S. • U.S. consumers drink 1/5 of the world’s coffee. • 1920s: Rise in coffee sales due to Prohibition. • 1926: First major slogan: Maxwell House “Good to the last drop.” http://www.roadode.com/drink_1.shtml

Examining a Primary Source • For what audience was the document written? • What are three things the advertiser wrote that you think are important? • What does this document tell you about the impact of coffee on society?

Examining A Primary Source: Coffee Sacks • Describe the material from which the coffee sack is made. • Describe how it looks and feels: shape, color, texture, size, weight, movable parts, anything printed, stamped or written on it. • What does the artifact tell us about the coffee industry in this country?

Wake Up and Smell the Coffee: The Spatial Diffusion of an Industry • How does the study of “coffee” support the concept of spatial and cultural diffusion of an industry? • In what ways can this lesson be replicated for other products or resources?

Wake Up and Smell the Coffee: The Spatial and Cultural Diffusion of an Industry