This Collector's guide is a modest attempt to catalogue the array of designs found on tissue wrappers used in the British Columbia tree fruit industry. As far as possible, all of the Okanagan's public collections have been examined and many private collectors have also been helpful.

To this point there appear to be few publications or articles on tissue wrappers in general and none on their use in British Columbia. So this is a starting point. With your help, we can add more designs to this catalogue and, thereby, document our history more completely.

Fruit wrappers have been in use in the Okanagan since prior to World War I; in Washington State they were used as early as 1907. Initially, it seems their purpose was threefold. First, they provided some cushioning for the fruit when it was in transit. Second, if fruit went bad during shipment, the wrappers offered some way of containing the spoilage. Third, when imprinted, the wrappers were a form of advertising.

The first major advance in the "science" of fruit wrappers came in 1923 when the United States Department of Agriculture discovered that, when impregnated with 15% mineral oil, fruit wrappers would protect against storage scald. This was a particular problem when cold storage came into wide use in the 1920s. Some varieties--Red Delicious, Common Delicious, Newtown, Grimes Golden and others--are particularly susceptible to storage scald. More important, almost all apples are susceptible to it if they are picked slightly immature. Oiled wraps were (and still are) used for pears. Dry wraps were used for varieties such as MacInstosh, which suffered less from this problem.

In 1963 American scientists discovered that scald could be controlled by dipping apples in diphenylamine (DPA). This finding coincided with another technological change--the move to corrugated cardboard boxes in which fruit was separated by formed paper trays. From that time, fruit wrap use has diminished. Today they are still used on some pear packs and for the top layer of some apple packs.

Fruit wraps come in a number of sizes including 8" x 8" ; 8" x 9"; 9" x 9"; 10" x 10"; 11" x 11" and 12" x 12". Although many wraps vary as much as 1/2", the dimensions given here are for the standard sizes. For the most part, they were cream or white-coloured paper, although pink, blue and purple were also used. For much of the industry's history, the wraps came from British Columbia coastal paper mills. Some wraps have a small "PM" imprinted on them, designating Pacific Mills; other mill letters include "W"(perhaps Westminster Mills), "N" (perhaps New Zealand). For the last few years much of the Okanagan fruit industry has been buying wraps from Claxton Paper in New Zealand.

Designs used on the wraps are part of a wider advertising tradition. A quick survey of the British Columbia samples seems to indicate the designs were more a kind of "seal of approval" than following any established design rationale. There are, however, exceptions to this and Big Chief, Pyramid, OK and OP brand are cases in point. The bulk of the designs are printed in blue ink.

So here we have a preliminary work. We all must start somewhere, and this effort has been aided by Messrs. Don Fisher, John Lingor, Ernie Cripps, Gordon Ferguson, Gordon Heltman, Phil Johnson, Mark Wickens and Mrs Edna Field. Ehmann Printing Limited provided the photo mechanical transfers (PMTs) and Vern Klukas of Inkspot Productions (OK) did the design, typesetting and layout.

Wayne Wilson, Curator
British Columbia Orchard Industry Museum
(a satellite facility of Kelowna Museum)
1996

British Columbia Fruit Wrappers            
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