Our Taste For Turtle Soup Nearly Wiped Out Terrapins. Then Prohibition Saved Them
In the mid-19th century, Americans developed a frenzied culinary affair with turtle. Almost overnight, the Diamondback Terrapin — a small coastal turtle found from Cape Cod to the Gulf Coast — went from subsistence food to luxury cuisine, showing up on menus from the White House to Gold Rush-era San Francisco.
The consequences were savage. By the turn of the 20th century, overharvesting had left the terrapin population teetering on the brink. Once available for a few dollars a dozen, the cost of the now hard-to-find terrapin skyrocketed. The future looked bleak for the Diamondback Terrapin. Then came the unlikeliest of heroes: Prohibition.
"Prohibition impacted the terrapin industry in the entire country in 1919 with the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution," says Maria Cathell,
