¡Sí se puede! Two hundred years before the first Obama presidential campaign, a determined French chef and confectioner, Nicolas Appert, might have been telling himself, I know there's a way to preserve food.

It took him sixteen years, but with the lure of a heavy prize purse in the offing, he figured out, through countless trials, that hermetically sealed food submerged in a hot-water bath could be preserved.

It was half-a-century later when Louis Pasteur figured out the bacterial science behind fermentation and food spoilage, but that didn't stop a bevy of Food Disruptors throughout the 19th century from innovating new canning methodologies, new ways of manufacturing cans and glass bottles, new ways of sealing them, and, especially in the United States, new ways of marketing this remarkable new food category.

America was on the move, and canned food fed explorers, pioneers, and upper-middle-class households, because back in the day, canned food was high-status.