RENDERED 36: Root Beer

*Special Art Zine Edition*

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From the RENDERED Archives

• I wrote about imaginary food in a 2-part series: Part I is a TIDBITS narrated essay (for paid subscribers only), and Part II is a RENDERED essay, available to all here.

• Like so many natural resources in the so-called “New World,” European scientists extracted indigenous plants and ancestral knowledge from the Americas, rebranding and co-opting them for profit and prestige. For another such story, see my essay on sunflowers.

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Bibliography

Davidson, Alan and Tom Jaine, ed. The Oxford Companion to Food, Third Edition. Oxford University Press, 2014. P. 688-9, 715.

“History.” Dr Pepper Museum.

Hutchens, Alma R. A Handbook of Native American Herbs. Shambhala Publications, Inc, 1992. p. 168-9.

Kobets T, Smith BPC, Williams GM. Food-Borne Chemical Carcinogens and the Evidence for Human Cancer Risk. Foods. 2022 Sep 13;11(18):2828. doi: 10.3390/foods11182828. PMID: 36140952; PMCID: PMC9497933.

Magnaghi, R. M. (1997). Sassafras and its Role in Early America, 1562–1662. Terrae Incognitae, 29(1), 10–21.

Manning, Charles, and Merrill Moore. “Sassafras and Syphilis.” The New England Quarterly, vol. 9, no. 3, 1936, pp. 473–75. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/360282. Accessed 19 June 2025.

Marsh, Hector Charles. Bibliography of sassafras variifolium (salisbury) o. Diss. 1923.

Martin, Roland. “Root Beer.” Britannica, Updated 17 May 2025..

McGee, Harold. On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen. Scribner, 2004. P. 408-9.

Robinson, Dave Lowell. “Sassafras (Sassafras albidum).” Bellarmine University, November 2005.

Yates, Don. "Charles E. Hires Company 1870–Present Philadelphia, Pennsylvania." Bottles and Extras, summer (2005).