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New York Times

A Memoir of Family Dysfunction Awash in Liquor and Leafy Greens

THE SPINACH KING: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty, by John Seabrook When he was 14, John Seabrook's father — he shared the author's name but went by 'Jack' — was made the 'grader' at the family's enormous, industrialized farm in southern New Jersey. It was 1931 and Jack's own indomitable father, C.F., having failed at a contracting business, had returned to farming, his original profession, and had enlisted his offspring in the work; Jack's task was to determine the value of the company's peas, string beans and spinach. The job demanded discernment. While peas and string beans could be graded using calipers, the hearty green leaves of the spinach plant required an eye capable of judging 'color and crispness' and sensitive hands to feel how 'clean the crop was.' This anecdote sticks in the mind, anchoring one of two central figures in Seabrook's keen, sophisticated and appealing new book, 'The Spinach King: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty.' A longtime New Yorker staff writer, Seabrook has been circling the book's central concerns — social class, various kinds of capital and aesthetic value — his entire career. His previous works, 'The Song Machine,' 'Flash of Genius,' 'Nobrow' and 'Deeper,' delve into the worlds of technology, music and science, but a through line remains visible. Here, Seabrook brings the ease and command of New Yorker-style reportage to bear on his own family. It's a shocking but juicy story, one he tells by harnessing his gift for quietly observing details that lesser writers would miss and then deploying them with the energy of a man who has skin in the game. The Seabrook family's saga in America (they are not the South Carolina Seabrooks) began in 1867, when the author's great-great-grandfather purchased 13 highly leveraged acres of 'scrubby wilderness' in Vineland, N.J. This was the start of the Seabrook farming enterprise, and by the early 20th century, the family had become a noted local purveyor of dairy, meat, and a broad assortment of fruits and vegetables. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.