Big Apple Facts, and Small Ones Too

You shared the old custom from colonial New England of trying to peel an apple in a single unbroken strip, then throwing it over your shoulder to see what letter formed on the floor, as it was believed to determine the initial of your future

husband. My mother did this in the 1920s and passed the custom along to me. I did it with my friends in the 1960s and showed my daughters how to do it. (Of course, we did it just for fun!)

—Janet Tedesco Oakland, New Jersey