Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS)

[Eva Elisabeth]

To me it looks like a sweet pepino (solanum muricatum-as I'm not sure if the translation is correct), which is most likely a native of the Andes (of Colombia, Peru and Chile). To see if this could be possible, I checked the fruit's distribution "history" as it hadn't been cultivated in Europe before the end of the 20th century. But the US are much closer to the origin, and indeed in the US the fruit is known to have been grown in San Diego before 1889 and in Santa Barbara by 1897. Thus if the photo was taken in the 1960ies, I think it could be a sweet pepino. However, I second Laurie and Betty that it looks like something naturally grown.