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Johnny Alkieseed? The real “Johnny Appleseed,” John Chapman, was a folk hero of the Old American Northwest because the apples that he propagated were useful not for eating (they were worthless for that) but for making hard cider, says Michael Pollan, in The Botany of Desire. Chapman was a kind of American Dionysus, bringing the gift of intoxication to the rural folks, whose life was so hard and so boring that they needed some such sort of escape. No wonder Johnny was welcome at every pioneer’s cabin. Moreover, fresh cider was often the only safe beverage available on the frontier. Cider became so indispensable to rural life that even those who railed against the evils of alcohol made an exception for cider, and early prohibitionists succeeded mainly in switching drinkers over from grain spirits to apple spirits. -The Barnes Review