Delightful little monstrosities of the vegetable kingdom, conjoined fruits share a single bud-point and are otherwise fully independent systems. Siamese Twin fruits prove to the world that teratology can be delicious. In olden days, numerous theories were proposed as to the origins of mutant fruit. A popular waltz from the 1870's celebrates the 'Siamese Twin Tomatoes' discovered by one Peter Haney, a New Jersey farmer, suggesting that the tomatoes owed their form to having been ingested and excreted by the original Siamese Twins, Chang and Eng.

The term 'Siamese Twin' owes its origins to Chang and Eng, conjoined twins from Siam brought to America and displayed by P.T. Barnum. These plaster replicas of conjoined tomatoes and strawberries were created from molds cast from the original fruits by your curators, early August 2002. Now evoking little more than a chuckle or a modicum of interest, conjoined fruit once struck abject fear in their viewers. Illuminated manuscripts from the 16th Century document an English village driven mad by the sight of a conjoined watermelon: the potentate called for a burning of the fields, which spread to a nearby stable; horses with flaming mains ran through the apple orchard, igniting everything in their path; the catastrophe was attributed to the devilwork of the watermelon; water itself became subject to a meticulous trial for witchcraft; villagers perished from dehydration through abstaining from ingestion of liquids. Hopefully, such superstitions no longer surround Siamese Twin fruits and their replicas.

Popular Handbills from the 1870's.