Solanaceae, a family that keeps you on your toes

I've read that when our country was founded, most folks believed tomatoes were poisonous, and that Thomas Jefferson, who knew otherwise, once ate a tomato on the steps of the US Capitol to prove their safety. I grew up hearing that the "eyes" of potatoes were poisonous, that green skin on immature potatoes was poisonous, and that tobacco was bad, bad, bad.... Turns out all of these things are at least partly true. All the plants mentioned, as well as eggplant and all sorts of peppers, are in the same family as the poisonous nightshade (above left), and parts of all the edible plants mentioned are poisonous, as are the fruits when not ripe. Note the similarity of the nightshade flower to that of the domestic tomato (above right). In fact, the flowers of all these plants are similar. I once wrote a poem titled "Solanaceae" in which I marveled at this family's variety of useful, edible, and harmful plants. If I can find the poem, it will be in my next post.