Canned food is a ubiquitous part of our society. Grocery aisles are stocked with all manner of canned goods and the average cupboard or pantry also has an assortment of the items. They last a long time and the canning process is reliable and safe but long term food preservation is a fairly recent phenomenon.

During the Napoleonic Wars in the early 19^th century, a reward was offered by a French newspaper to any inventor who could come up with an affordable inexpensive way to preserve large quantities of food. Large armies required a lot of food but the lack of preserved food generally kept the military engagements confined to the summer and fall months. In 1809, Nicolas Appert noticed the food cooked in jars was preserved if the seals did not leak. There was no understanding of what caused food to spoil and it would be another 50 years before Louis Pasteur figured out that food spoiled due to microbial action.

The glass jars were too fragile for regular travel and during the 1810 work of Peter Durand, cylindrical cans made of tin or iron became popular. The cans were cheaper and easy to make but tin openers were thirty years away. Soldiers had to smash open the can or cut them with bayonets. The process of canning and transportation was slow so it was not successfully introduced in the mass amounts needed by the French army of the time.

Durand sold his patent in 1811 to Bryan Donkin and John Hall who developed a method of sealing the cans. In the beginning the process was slow and very laborious. The cans were handmade and took hours to cook which made them expensive to the average person so the Army and Navy was the primary customer base. Several explorers took canned food on expeditions during the 19^th century. One of the cans found in 1857 was opened in 1939 and was edible. Early canning methods used lead solder which led to poisoning of many people.

Increasing population and the industrial manufacturing capability led to high demand for canned food. The time to process and cook the canned food had made dramatic leaps. The military demand for the items during various wars led to expanded factory production of canned meats, vegetables, and fruit. This led to a decrease in the price so it was affordable by the average citizen when military demand decreased. The people loved canned food because they could keep quantities of it on hand and go shopping less often.

The demand for the items skyrocketed as WWI rolled around and trench warfare demanded food that could withstand the harsh conditions. The canned food was ideal and became a fixture of military and civilian life over the ensuing years as the availability increased and the cost decreased. So, the next time you are buying canned items at the grocery store remember the history of the product and don’t take it for granted.

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Tags: 1800s, 1810, 1811, 1857, 1939, 19th century explorers, Bryan Donkin, canned food, early 19th century, food for military, food in jars, food preservation history, glass jars as food preserver, history of canned food, increased population and food preservation, industrial manufacturing and food preservation, John Hall, lead poisoning, Louis Pasteur, military demand for canned food, Napoleonic Wars, Peter Durand, world war 1, world war i, world war I and canned food, ww1