North Carolina’s Tom Brown has made it his full-time passion to track down and preserve heirloom apple varieties in the South. Just as is the case today with cemeteries, battlefields and other places of historic interest, apple orchards are quickly losing ground to suburban sprawl and development. His web site is http://www.applesearch.org/ , and through it, you can submit pictures of mysterious apples for identification, learn about newly rediscovered apples, get great Southern apple recipes and more.

Many heirloom apples have odd shapes and/or coloring, but have luscious flavor and fun names. Tom Brown has helped save the Greasy Skin, the Lady Washington, Hog Pen, Stump the World and Tobacco Sweet.

Brown recommends as the Bible of apple identification, 'Old Southern Apples' by Creighton Lee Calhoun.