All About Apples is designed to provide education about apples, promote segments of the Apple economy including the many fine orchards and growers, and develop an online community of people passionate about apples.
 NEW! In our Apples In Print section we list the new book Appleland by John Kovach. Mr. Kovach has written an excellent entertaining children's book about two girls and their magical journey into Appleland.
What makes the book so special to us is that one of the book's characters was named after our dear friend John "Topper" Sponsel, who passed away in 2006. Those of you who knew Topper will smile when you read some of the comments the character "Professor Topper" makes in the book. We thank you John for helping to keep Topper's memory alive!
All About Apples contributor Scott Chaussee recently wrote an article titled "Medicine Cabinet in your Backyard" that was published in the 2007 publication of The Prairie Garden. There are other great articles about apples in the publication, so we invite you to pick up a copy today!
ATTENTION APPLE LOVERS!
Based on requests from some of the 500,000 viewers of our site last year, All About Apples has plans to undertake some incredible site enhancements -- and we would love the help of our fellow apple groupies! Many of the enhancements are research driven or data entry based so you won't need programming experience (although we'll take it if you have it ;).
- Are you a cider brewer? We have had many requests to expand the information in that section.
- Love our varieties list? Help us expand that list and turn it into a searchable database.
- Love our cooking section but wish there were more entries? Help us gather more of them!
- Become a "regional reporter" and let us know how the apple industry in your part of the country (or other country!) is looking next season.
- Like our forum board but wish it had more info? Become a topic moderator to answer questions and post entries that encourage more participation.
Be a part of the largest apple community on the web! Click on the Contact us link and select How to Help.
Read our new book review, "The Great American Apple Wizard: The life and times of Peter M. Gideon". All About Apples highly recommends the book to those interested in learning about a significant time in the apples history in America.
Love apples as much as we do and want to share that passion with the rest of our apple community? Contact us and let us know how you could help us in keeping the site fresh with content for our readers.
It is with deep sadness that the All About Apples.com family announces the loss of John "Topper" Sponsel who passed away February 26, 2006 at the age of 53. For over 35 years Topper operated Minnesota Harvest Orchard in Jordan, MN and was the inspiration behind All About Apples.com.
Those of you who knew Topper will remember his fun loving, rebel for a cause, excitable spirit that welcomed visitors to his orchard with open arms and a story to share. Topper developed over 20 varieties of apples (see Topper's Apples on the Minneota Harvest web site) including his own personal favorite, "Nectarapple" and my favorite "Live Music (FF-99)". In addition to working on these and other new varieties with the University of Minnesota, he also did much of the scientific and historical work for the International Apple Institute website, was a lifelong member of the Minnesota Apple Growers Association.
Topper's love of apples, his goal of promoting the growers who produced apples for all to enjoy, and his desire to educate the general public that there are different apples out there other than the ones they find in their supermarket produce section was paramount in getting All About Apples.com to its current state. Without his knowledge and influence this site would not have grown as fast as it has in such a short period of time.
Topper's drive for this site's success will be hard to live up to without him by our side. But, we know Topper would want us to continue, and, with him looking down from above guiding us onward we will do just that -- continue to grow the site to teach everyone All About Apples.
Topper, we were blessed to have you in our lives, and we will miss you dearly.
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