Nuts About A Legume! National Peanut Month

March 27, 2025

I LOVE peanut butter, I like peanuts. I grew up a typical 80s/90s kid consuming peanut butter and jelly or peanut butter and marshmallow fluff (fluffernutter) sandwiches regularly. I always took enjoying peanuts for granted until my nephew was born with a severe peanut allergy which also became an allergy for my sister. While I forego my enjoyment of the treat when they’re going to be around, I still get to consume it from time to time. My sister, on the other hand, really misses it. To celebrate National Peanut Month let’s look at some of the imagery in our collections that feature the legume.

Interior of the Planters Peanut Shop in Terre Haute, 1943; Store window of the Planters Peanut Shop in Terre Haute with shop employees, 1944. Martin Collection, IHS.

I’m fascinated by the Planters Peanut Shop images from our Martin Collection. In the 1943 interior shot, it shows the walls are lined with peanut shells. I have so many questions! Did this cause rodent or bug issues? Are they just the shells or are the peanuts still inside? How are they affixed to the wall? While I’ll not likely be able to find an answer to these questions, I do wish that I could purchase peanuts for the $0.75 for 3 pounds that I could have spent in 1944.

The A&P store Christmas candy and snack display, Terre Haute, 1953. Martin Photo Shop, IHS.

Peanuts often feature in candies and other treats. At the A&P store in Terre Haute in 1953, peanut brittle was on display along with many other candies. Additionally, a couple of three packs of Planters cocktail peanuts are randomly stacked with the other items.

Quaker Maid’s Sultana Peanut Butter Line, Terre Haute, 1941; Hill’s Snappy Service restaurant’s “P” Nut Butter creations, Indianapolis, 1943. Martin Photo Shop, IHS (cropped); IHS, P0569 (cropped).

As noted, I love peanut butter. However, I am glad for the evolution of the product’s packaging from glass jars like those shown above on the Sultana Peanut Butter line. I’m a bit of a klutz and the idea of losing any of the product due to a broken jar makes me sad. And while I enjoy a good peanut butter sandwich, I have very little interest in most of the ‘creations’ available at Hill’s Snappy Service in 1943.

It’s interesting to note that most of the images found in our digital collection featuring the legume date from the 1940s. Peanut Butter was introduced widely to those at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis, so it had been around a while by the time most of our images are dated. The timing of our images is probably not surprising given the Army’s use of peanut butter in its rations during WWI and WWII. These last few historical facts are courtesy of the National Peanut Board.

Amy Vedra is the director of reference services. She is currently reading her way through the Great American Reads list.

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