May 17 is National Walnut Day
Today is National Walnut Day, created in 1949 by the Walnut Marketing Board, now known as the California Walnut Board. Supposedly, in March of 1958, Senator William Knowland proposed the holiday, which President Dwight D. Eisenhower later affirmed.
I spent an hour trying to confirm that. I found no such proclamation or proposal beyond publication in the Congressional Record of remarks Knowland gave on March 21, 1958. It has nothing to do with walnuts. (You could check it out for yourself, but I don’t recommend it.)
It looks like a feat of marketing by the Board that has paid dividends in the pages of Google results that parrot the story as truth. But it gets better: the California Walnut Board cites a holiday blog as the source of its information. It’s the circle of life online: an ourobouros of unreliable sources forever (happily) eating its own tail. But I digress.
Most walnuts come from the Persian or English tree, Juglans regia, originally grown in Asia and now cultivated around the world. The lesser-known eastern black walnut tree, Juglans nigra, and butternut or white walnut tree, Juglans cinerea, are native to eastern North America.
According to A Latin Dictionary, the genus gets its name from the Latin word for walnut tree, jūglans, which is a contraction of Jōvis glans, which translates to “nut of [the god] Jupiter.” Perhaps that explains why many sites claim the arginine found in walnuts dilates blood vessels and increases blood flow, causing erections. (Don’t munch a handful before a business meeting.)
Black walnut has been hailed by some as a miracle cure because of its alleged ability to kill a parasite that is supposedly responsible for cancer. No word on whether it works: We can’t get anyone who used it to answer our calls.
In China, walnuts are prized for a different reason. In 2012, Reuters reported that a secondary market in “cultural playthings” had emerged as a result of weak or negative returns in the traditional stock market.
Once the toys of China’s imperial court, walnuts have become popular among the wealthy, who see them as a status symbol as well as an investment. They are collected in pairs and rotated in one’s hand to improve circulation.
Collector Kou Baojun in Beijing told Reuters that the larger, older, and more symmetrical the walnuts are, the more highly they are valued and can cost tens of thousands of dollars. He owns more than 30 pairs, most of which are over a century old and have become burnished from years of being polished in the palm.
“Look how well these have aged,” Kou said. “Playing with these kinds of walnuts isn’t for ordinary people.”
Grab a pair and have a happy National Walnut Day!