Born: 5 October 1871, United States
Died: 11 November 1954
Country most active: United States
Also known as: NA
The following is republished from New Jersey Women’s History, in line with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Elizabeth Coleman White (1871-1954) of the Pine Barrens developed the nation’s first cultivated blueberry.
Her father was the sole executor and manager of a 600-acre cranberry farm now known as the 3,000-acre plantation of Whitesbog. She assisted researcher Frederick Coville in his studies of blueberry propagation. Once Coville moved to Whitesbog, at White’s suggestion, to continue his work. White helped locate wild blueberry bushes with desired traits; she asked woodsmen about berry size, vigor, resistance to cold and disease, flavor, texture, and time of ripening. Coville cross-fertilized bushes by hand to create new berry varieties. By 1916, the pair had created the first commercial crop of blueberries.
White helped organize the New Jersey Blueberry Cooperative Association in 1927 and by 1986 the state’s blueberry industry ranked second in the nation. She was the first female member of the American Cranberry Association and the first woman to receive the New Jersey Department of Agriculture citation.
References:
Nixon, Leticia R. Blueberry Lady: The Story of Elizabeth Coleman White 1871-1954. Bloomington: AuthorHouse: 2009.
Senske, Albertine. With Eager Hands: The Life of Elizabeth Coleman White. Galloway: South Jersey Culture & History Center, 2020.
IW note: White also publicly tried to downplay child labor on her father’s farms after a 1910 report from the National Child Labor Committee found that parents employed there were recruiting children under 14 to work 10-hour shifts, though even she admitted they were missing school during the September and October harvests.