Ganske Fruit Crate Label Collection

This particular collection of fruit and vegetable crate labels was collected by Gary Ganske during an unknown span of years between his birth in 1943 and his passing in 2017. Gankse graduated from Portland State College and was a mathematics professor at Whitworth University and Northwest Nazarene University. The collection was donated by his wife Karen Ganske, formerly known as Karen Dawson.

The labels were collected from various online dealers in Washington and California. The source of many labels is unknown, however some were obtained from Dwayne Rodgers who began selling crate labels under his company, The Label Man in 1994 following a seasonal career in agriculture with the California department of agriculture as a shipping point inspector. Other labels in Ganske’s collection were obtained through additional online dealers in the Pacific Northwest and personal travels to museums and packing houses. Ganske visited over ten packing houses identified in the papers of his collection.

This collection also includes articles gathered by Ganske pertaining to the produce companies from which many of the labels were manufactured. This information was obtained by Ganske online, via articles written by Ron Marlow of Payette Idaho, who after graduating from Boise State University and Idaho State University, joined the Air Force and proceeded to write articles to preserve Payette’s history, three of which exist in Ganske’s collection.

Ganske also collected information obtained online via the Idaho Horticultural Society on the history of Idaho’s fruit industry and information pertaining to Fox Creek Farm in Oregon obtained through an excerpt from geographic historian Lewis A. McArthur’s book titled Oregon Geographic Names. Ganske also collected information pertaining to prominent pioneer fruit grower and shipper, Frank H. Hogue.