According to Moonalice legend, August is National Inventors Month. You might think a ton of really compelling stuff was invented on each and every day of August, and you would be correct. On this day in 1904, for example, the automobile tire chain was invented. On this day in 1937, the Hemp Brownie was invented by Betty Crocker's step-sister, Aunt Jemima Moonalice, who passed the recipe to Alice B. Toklas, who made the first brownies right here in Ashland.
According to Moonalice legend, the Rogue Valley is famous for its peaches and other orchard crops. Less flashy row crops, like hemp, struggled to compete with Rogue Valley fruit until the arrival of the railroad in the middle of the 19th century. The early rail workers smoked like chimneys, but they were nothing compared to the locomotives, which were powered by hemp boilers. More than anyone else, the tribe credits Harry & David - the fruit of the month club buys - for making hemp a reality in the Rogue Valley. The huge success of Fruit of the Month Club brought so many freight trains to Ashland and Medford, that the whole Rogue Valley has been buzzed ever since.