# Did anything like the "Freedom Fries" incident happen before? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 7, 2006, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772 "2006-06-07T18:11:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2006, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/21 "2006-06-07T22:19:13Z")
During the three years between its release in 1972 and the withdrawal of US forces from Vietnam in 1975, the state-run socialist media of most countries of Europe outlawed Don McLean’s _American Pie_, unless the word “American” was dubbed (usually very badly, I might add) with the word “Revolutionary”. Despite this intrusion, the song reached number 1 in the hit parade of all countries but Finland, where it was pipped to the top spot by Pekka and Bekka performing the somewhat less memorable _Che Guevara Bingy Bang Bong_. Disclaimer: this entire post is a complete lie. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2006, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/22 "2006-06-07T22:34:27Z")
British royals freedom-fried _themselves_ back in 1917. Seems there were all sort of interrelationships among aristocrats (if I remember right, the Kaiser was Queen Victoria’s nephew), so to placate anti-German sentiment British royals went from being Saxe-Coburg-Gothas to Windsors. And the Battenberg branch of royals became Mountbattens. According to [this site](http://www.answers.com/topic/mountbatten), Prince Philip was originally a Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksberg before the surname was changed to Mountbatten, though historians have speculated that the real reason for the alteration was to save money on personalized stationery. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2006, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/23 "2006-06-07T22:53:59Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > And the Battenberg branch of royals became Mountbattens. They can take our aristos, but they’ll never take our [cake](http://www.nicecupofteaandasitdown.com/book/battenburg.jpg)! > [@](#): > > the real reason for the alteration was to save money on personalized stationery. 😃 I had no idea his name was so bonkers. He’s a lot of Greek, too, but that never go into the name it seems. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2006, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/24 "2006-06-07T23:01:12Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > British royals freedom-fried _themselves_ back in 1917. Seems there were all sort of interrelationships among aristocrats (if I remember right, the Kaiser was Queen Victoria’s nephew), so to placate anti-German sentiment British royals went from being Saxe-Coburg-Gothas to Windsors. And the Battenberg branch of royals became Mountbattens. About which, [The Master speaks](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_136.html) ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2006, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/25 "2006-06-07T23:02:49Z")
Until WWII the Green Hornet’s faithful companion Kato, was of Japanese ancestry. After December 7, 1941 his ancestry was never mentioned. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/26 "2006-06-08T01:02:15Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > What we now call “French Toast” was “German Toast” until WWI. As **anson2995** said, that’s not correct. The terms were used pretty much equally for the same food from the 1870’s until WWI. In my searching of newspaper cites, it would appear that the term _French toast_ was probably being used more frequently in the years preceding 1914. But during WWI, certainly _German toast_ lost out to \* French toast\*. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/27 "2006-06-08T01:38:07Z")
As a note of no particular interest, the French call French bread “pain perdu”, or “lost bread”; in other words, a dish made from a baguette that’s over the hill. ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/28 "2006-06-08T01:51:02Z")
> [@Bill Door](#): > > Until WWII the Green Hornet’s faithful companion Kato, was of Japanese ancestry. After December 7, 1941 his ancestry was never mentioned. Snopes says this is false. [http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/kato.htm](http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/kato.htm) ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/29 "2006-06-08T01:52:17Z")
samclem & anson, I’ll bow to your research that indicates that it was called French toast before WWI, but my point is still correct in that the term German toast, which was also used before then, was (as you note) pretty much abandoned afterward. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/30 "2006-06-08T02:18:17Z")
> [@OldGuy](#): > > Snopes says this is false. > > [http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/kato.htm](http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/kato.htm) What Snopes says is false, is false. Kato was always a Filipino of Japanese ancestry. After Pearl Harbor they just stopped talking about it. They didn’t change his origin, they just ignored it. ---
**Author:** ![Rico](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rico/32/3582_2.png) [@Rico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rico)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/31 "2006-06-08T02:28:51Z")
American Ace of Aces in WW1 [Eddie Rickenbacker](http://www.lib.auburn.edu/archive/flyhy/101/eddie.htm)’s name at birth was Rickenbacher. He changed it during the war by writing a letter to a friend back home, and signing it “Eddie Rickenbac[k]er.” The friend, who was a newspaper columnist, headlined his next column with “Eddie Rickenbacker has taken the Hun out of his name!” (“Hun” being a common term in the war years referring to a German.) ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/32 "2006-06-08T02:47:22Z")
> [@Belrix](#): > > Saurkraut as “Victory Cabbage” in WWII. (I know you meant WWI-sc] This is another urban legend. I had always thought so, but decided to test my theory now that we have newspaper databases to search myriad newspapers for this kind of oft-repeated anecdote. It **just ain’t true**! I am only talking about searching US average newspaper for the time. Perhaps the UK might be different. If you use the term “sauerkraut” and search the newspapers in _Newspaperarchive_ from 1890-1913, you get over 5,000 hits. If you again search for “sauerkraut” using 1914-1918 as your base, you get 2,700 hits. If you use “victory cabbage” for a search term from 1914-1918, you get 18 hits. Does this give you a clue that this was NOT a term used to replace “sauerkraut” during WWI? In using ProQuest to search the 6 major US newspapers, I get 2 hits during WWII for “victory cabbage” but none during WWI. Another factoid repeated on the web that is NOT true. ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/33 "2006-06-08T03:26:32Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > (I know you meant WWI-sc] > > This is another urban legend. I had always thought so, but decided to test my theory now that we have newspaper databases to search myriad newspapers for this kind of oft-repeated anecdote. > > It **just ain’t true**! > > I am only talking about searching US average newspaper for the time. Perhaps the UK might be different. > > If you use the term “sauerkraut” and search the newspapers in _Newspaperarchive_ from 1890-1913, you get over 5,000 hits. If you again search for “sauerkraut” using 1914-1918 as your base, you get 2,700 hits. > > If you use “victory cabbage” for a search term from 1914-1918, you get 18 hits. > > Does this give you a clue that this was NOT a term used to replace “sauerkraut” during WWI? > > In using ProQuest to search the 6 major US newspapers, I get 2 hits during WWII for “victory cabbage” but none during WWI. > > Another factoid repeated on the web that is NOT true. On the other hand, I used “liberty cabbage” and got 368 hits in NewspaperArchive. Since I’m not a member, I can’t vouch for the year; but it’s hardly a UL. (As I understand it, “liberty” was a WWI term; a bit of cynicism appears to have set in between the wars, and during WWII we settled for “victory” instead.) ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/34 "2006-06-08T03:45:55Z")
Sam, Well, not that many people actually asked for Freedom Fries at the counter of our local fast food places either. Just because the average American didn’t fall for it, doesn’t mean that the philosophical predecessors of the morons who wanted freedom fries didn’t have their moment in the sun. And their Islamic half brothers are just as real. Tris ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/35 "2006-06-08T03:52:29Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > “victory cabbage” Try “liberty cabbage.” There appears to have been something called [The Committee on Public Information (CPI), also known as the Creel Committee](http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Committee_on_Public_Information) back in 1917 that did a _lot_ of psyops. This review of the [Prager case](http://www.riverweb.uiuc.edu/IBEX/vignettes/prager_case.htm), of which I admittedly know nothing, mentions cabbage: > [@](#): > > Under pressure, the German language disappeared from schools, churches, and newspapers. The Belleville Turnverein became the Belleville Turners. Mobs attacked German carnival bands; in Staunton a school superintendent called secret service agents to investigate a family whose son failed to salute the American flag during a school ceremony. By decree of the Committee on Public Information sauerkraut became “liberty cabbage.” The editor of the Collinsville Herald on Feb. 28, 1917, wrote, "The mass public sentiment in Collinsville at present is in no humor to listen calmly to light or insinuating remarks about America or the war. Also, the [Joe Gilbert Story](http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/lhbum:@field(DOCID+@lit(lhbum14988div21))) > [@](#): > > Altogether, about twenty cases were brought against Nonpartisan League men under the State’s Sedition Law, most of them during the 1918 political campaign. In those hysterical days of “liberty measles” and “liberty cabbage,” it was easy to send American citizens to jail, convicted of disloyalty for commenting critically on training-camp food, for urging the government to finance the Red Cross by direct taxation, or for making such statements as these: The term ‘liberty cabbage’ may well have been out there, but with even less national impact than ‘freedom fries’. Incidentally, they had ‘victory gardens’ during WWI, but it seems the term [Victory/Liberty garden](http://www.militarysheetmusic.com/victory-garden-song.htm) was popular. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/36 "2006-06-08T03:56:25Z")
Damn you **OttoDaFe**. May you be [burned as a heretic!](http://www.webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?va=auto-da-fe) 😉 ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/37 "2006-06-08T04:07:58Z")
> [@OttoDaFe](#): > > On the other hand, I used “liberty cabbage” and got 368 hits in NewspaperArchive. Since I’m not a member, I can’t vouch for the year; but it’s hardly a UL. > > (As I understand it, “liberty” was a WWI term; a bit of cynicism appears to have set in between the wars, and during WWII we settled for “victory” instead.) Thanks for the tip. But I don’t think it changes much. Searching Newspaperarchive between 1914-1918, we find “liberty cabbage” 73 hits “sauerkraut” 2700 hits. Evidently hundreds of Americans didn’t get the message that the term should be banned. Why did they hate America? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/38 "2006-06-08T04:25:27Z")
Using Newspaperarchive for only the years 1917-1918(which would have been an important time for Americans), indeed the term “Liberty measles” seems to have been a term that was important as opposed to “German measles.” “German measles” was twice as frequently cited as “Liberty measles” in 1917-18 but that’s not terribly significant using my database. Probably. So that one might be true. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/39 "2006-06-08T04:53:12Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#): > > During WWI dachshunds became liberty pups. They were also beaten in the streets and pet owners were sometimes encouraged to euthanize them . Sounds like an urban legend. I’d look for a reliable source on that. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2006, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772/40 "2006-06-08T05:33:16Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > Sounds like an urban legend. I’d look for a reliable source on that. Creel, G. 1920. How We Advertised America. New York: **Harper and Brothers** might describe the source for a lot of this. Gutenberg doesn’t appear to have it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-anything-like-the-freedom-fries-incident-happen-before/359772.md?page=3)