The Evolution Of The American Ice Cream: A Summary In Chocolate Strawberry And Vanilla

The evolution of the American Ice Cream is a story that is filled with myths, legends, and uncertainty. Anne Cooper Funderburg, author of the book Chocolate, Strawberry, and Vanilla, captures this fact vividly in her discussion of the invention of the ice cream soda and the ice cream cone. Noting that there are numerous conflicting accounts surrounding the invention, commercialisation, and spread of these crucial innovations in America’s consumption of ice cream, she outlines each of the stories that she finds credible and provides her judgement of their plausibility. From the perspective of the study of history, however, the fact that the author elected to include conflicting accounts within her historical narrative raises interesting questions: why did the author choose to include

Before dissecting the purpose and motivation behind the inclusion of these conflicting stories, we should first analyse characteristics and similarity of these legends. Upon closer reading, the similarity between both sets of legends, as well as the individual stories themselves, are rather apparent. All of these stories involve individuals who started out in life running small businesses at the periphery of society: concessionaires, immigrants, and newsboys. The origin of the invention tends to come from unexpected places, whether it is reflexive responses to emergency situations of running out of sweet cream and ice cream plates, a spark of unexpected inspiration to combine two unlike foods, or the power of a child’s imagination while attempting to have fun. Most of the individuals then choose to capitalise upon their discovery, improving their invention, selling their ideas to large corporations, or building their own factory and becoming prosperous business owners. Many of them struggle through business and political intrigue as they became increasingly important and wealthy - for example, fending off imitators and competitors,