Remembering Spiced Ham (Spam)

Tommy Towery

LHS '64

When writing about baloney last week, a couple of our classmates brought up a fellow meat, "Spam."

According to Wikipedia, Hormel introduced Spam on July 5, 1937, as “Spiced Ham." The next year it was renamed Spam. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America states that the product was intended to increase the sale of pork shoulder, a cut that did not sell well. Ken Daigneau, the brother of a company executive, won a $100 prize that year in a competition to name the new item. Hormel states that the meaning of the name "is known by only a small circle of former Hormel Foods executives," but a popular belief is that the name is a contraction of "spiced ham." It has also been speculated to be an acronym for "Shoulder of Pork And Ham.

Spam (stylized as SPAM) is a brand of processed canned pork and ham made by Hormel Foods Corporation. It was introduced in 1937 and gained popularity worldwide after its use during World War II. Spam's main ingredients are pork shoulder and ham, with salt, water, modified potato starch (as a binder), sugar, and sodium nitrite (as a preservative). Natural gelatin is formed during cooking in its tins on the production line. Spam is precooked, making it safe and edible to eat straight from the can, but it is often cooked further for taste.

The difficulty of delivering fresh meat to the front during World War II saw Spam become a ubiquitous part of the U.S. soldier's diet. Over 150 million pounds (75,000 short tons) of Spam were purchased by the military before the war's end. Despite this disparagement, throughout the war, countries ravaged by the conflict and faced with strict food rations came to appreciate Spam. During World War II and the occupations that followed, Spam was introduced into Guam, Hawaii, Okinawa, the Philippines, and other islands in the Pacific. Immediately absorbed into native diets, it has become a unique part of the history and effects of U.S. influence in the Pacific islands.

Domestically, Spam's chief advantages were affordability, accessibility, and extended shelf life. Statistics from the 1990s say that 3.8 cans of Spam were consumed every second in the United States, totaling nearly 122 million cans annually. It became part of the diet of almost 30% of American households, perceived differently in various regions of the country. It is also sometimes associated with economic hardship because of its relatively low cost. 

Residents of the state of Hawaii have the highest per capita consumption in the United States, bringing in sales of 7 million cans of Spam per year. A local dish in Hawaii is Spam Musubi, in which cooked Spam is placed on top of rice and wrapped in a band of nori, a form of onigiri or riceball. Hawaiian Burger King restaurants began serving Spam in 2007 to compete with the local McDonald's chains (which also serve Spam). In Guam, the average per capita consumption is 16 tins (cans) per year. It is also found on McDonald's menus there.

In the Philippines, Spam (currently distributed by the Purefoods-Hormel Company Inc.) is a popular food item seen as a cultural symbol. Spam reached the islands similarly as it did other former US colonies such as Hawaii and Guam: as a result of World War II rationing. Spam is commonly eaten with rice (usually garlic fried rice) and a sunny-side-up egg for breakfast.

The Music of January 1960

The music chart in the USA on January 15, 1960 is the list of the most popular songs across all genres for the week January 11th and January 17th. It included the following Top 5 songs:

Marty Robbins - El Paso

Frankie Avalon - Why

Freddie Cannon - Way Down Yonder In New Orleans

Johnny Preston - Running Bear

Miss Toni Fisher - The Big Hurt

We've covered El Paso in the past so I thought you might be interested in the hit which was Number 3 on this list. It was Freddie "Boom-Boom" Cannon's rocked-up version of a 1922 song that became a gold record and reached No. 3 in the pop charts in both the US and the UK, where it was the biggest of his hits. It sold over one million copies.  Dick Clark brought him national exposure through his numerous appearances on his television program, American Bandstand - a record of 110 appearances in total. According to Dick Biondi, Freddy Cannon's 1959 version became the first record in the rock era to have a full brass section. It reached Number 3 on the Billboard chart in early 1960. Those of us who skated at Carter's Skateland are very familiar with Freddie Cannon's "Way Down Yonder In New Orleans" since it was one of the few fast songs we were allowed to fast skate to. I for one never realized the song was a remake of a much earlier song. First, let's look back at Freddie Cannon's version:

What I did not know, and expect most of you did not know either, is how long that song had been a part of American music. "Way Down Yonder in New Orleans" is a song with music by John Turner Layton Jr. and lyrics by Henry Creamer. First published in 1922, it was advertised by Creamer and Layton as "A Southern Song, without A Mammy, A Mule, Or A Moon", a dig at some of the Tin Pan Alley clichés of the era. It was performed at The Winter Garden Theater in New York in Act 2 of the Broadway musical production Spice of 1922. Early successful recordings of the song were by the Peerless Quartet, Blossom Seeley and Paul Whiteman.

An early vocal version was made popular by Al Jolson. I imagine it was done in his blackface genre.

As I have stated in the past, I have made many trips to Hawaii since I retired, (18 in fact) and I have also been to Guam. During my time in Guam I was not aware of the popularity of Spam. However, it was one of the first things I saw in Hawaii since the Burger King on Hickam Air Force Base featured Spam on its menu. I also treated myself to Spam Musubi at the Dole Pineapple Plantation on Oahu. I do remember eating it occasionally when I was growing up, but I seem to think even though it was classified as cheap meant, it was expensive for my family's budget. I invite some of the rest of you to recall some of your own Spam experiences - and I am not talking about internet Spam. Wikipedia reports the term spam is derived from the 1970 "Spam" sketch of the BBC sketch comedy television series Monty Python's Flying Circus. The sketch, set in a cafe, has a waitress reading out a menu where every item but one includes the Spam canned luncheon meat. As the waitress recites the Spam-filled menu, a chorus of Viking patrons drown out all conversations with a song, repeating "Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam… Lovely Spam! Wonderful Spam!".