The Development of Beet Sugar The severest blow to West Indian sugar was the development of an alternative to the sugar cane that could grow in northern climates. In 1747, a Prussian chemist, Andreas Marggraf, showed that by using brandy to extract the juice of the white beet (Beta vulgaris, var. altissima), a common European
vegetable, he could isolate crystals that were identical to those purified from sugar cane, and in comparable quantities. Marggraf foresaw a kind of cottage industry
by which individual farmers could sat