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History on the Half Shell
Ballantine
March 2006
320 pages
ISBN: 0345476387
Hardcover
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Historical
Before New York City was the Big Apple, it could have been called the Big Oyster. Now award-winning author Mark Kurlansky tells the remarkable story of New York by following the trajectory of one of its most fascinating inhabitantsΓ―ΒΏΒ½the oyster, whose influence on the great metropolis remains unparalleled. For centuries New York was famous for its oysters, which until the early 1900s played such a dominant a role in the cityΓ―ΒΏΒ½s economy, gastronomy, and ecology that the abundant bivalves were GothamΓ―ΒΏΒ½s most celebrated export, a staple food for the wealthy, the poor, and tourists alike, and the primary natural defense against pollution for the cityΓ―ΒΏΒ½s congested waterways. Filled with cultural, historical, and culinary insightΓ―ΒΏΒ½along with historic recipes, maps, drawings, and photosΓ―ΒΏΒ½this dynamic narrative sweeps readers from the island hunting ground of the Lenape Indians to the death of the oyster beds and the rise of AmericaΓ―ΒΏΒ½s environmentalist movement, from the oyster cellars of the rough-and-tumble Five Points slums to ManhattanΓ―ΒΏΒ½s Gilded Age dining chambers. Kurlansky brings characters vividly to life while recounting dramatic incidents that changed the course of New York history. Here are the stories behind Peter StuyvesantΓ―ΒΏΒ½s peg leg and Robert FultonΓ―ΒΏΒ½s Γ―ΒΏΒ½FollyΓ―ΒΏΒ½; the oyster merchant and pioneering African American leader Thomas Downing; the birth of the business lunch at DelmonicoΓ―ΒΏΒ½s; early feminist Fanny Fern, one of the highest-paid newspaper writers in the city; even Γ―ΒΏΒ½DiamondΓ―ΒΏΒ½ Jim Brady, who we discover was not the gourmand of popular legend. With The Big Oyster, Mark Kurlansky serves up history at its most engrossing, entertaining, and delicious.
 Media BuzzWeekend Edition Sunday - April 9, 2006
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