Archivistkira’s Week at Culinary Geek Camp

If you’re a long-time follower, I hoe you’ll forgive me for going a bit more off track than usual this week. You know that usually I would post images and commentary/history on an item from the History of Food and Drink Collection. The thing is, last week, I got to do something amazing and 100% food history related. And I really want to talk about it. I think it may give our readers more insight into some of my future hopes/dreams for the collection, and you’ll learn about my passion for food history. It’s going to a long post, but I’ll keep my comments short and I promise there are pictures.

Each summer, the Center for Historic American Visual Culture (CHAViC) at the American Antiquarian Society (AAS) hosts a week long seminar. Each year, the topic changes and you’ll never see quite the same thing again. This year, the theme was “Culinary Culture: The Politics of American Foodways, 1765-1900.” You can read more about it online.  As soon as I heard about it from a colleague who attended last year, I knew I had to go. Luckily, the faculty member leading the seminar agreed and I was accepted.

The front of the main American Antiquarian Society building, Worcester, MA.

My week was spent in the company of graduate students, faculty, and a couple of other library types from a variety of disciplines: History, Art History, English, American Studies, and Religion Studies. Led by a visiting faculty member and assisted by the staff at the AAS, we had lectures, hands-on workshops (with books, prints, ephemera, trade cards, images, and artifacts), field trips, and even time to do our own research. The archivist in me was giddy from the behind-the-scenes tour, the scholar in me was gleeful about playing in someone else’s archives, and the collection manager in me was thrilled to talk about and learn how and why people from diverse backgrounds study food and food history.

On our first day, we were shown a number of objects related to food and asked to pick one. Over the course of the week, we were supposed to keep thinking about the object, how what we talked about changed our understanding of it, and, on the last day, give a brief informal presentation about the object as an item. Some people put the object in the context of American culture at the time, others talked about how it could be used in a classroom setting to engage students, and still others used the object as a jumping off point for broader observations about what the item represented. I chose this 1759 advertisement for a merchant in Boston, printed by one Paul Revere. It was accompanied by a handwritten receipt for the items purchased by a customer, around which the ad would have been wrapped (you can still see the fold line under “Large & small Spiders” below).

1759 Advertisement for merchant Joseph Webb of Boston. Printed by Paul Revere.

Handwritten receipt from Webb to Obadiah Dickinson, 1759, accompanying the advertisement.

I could probably write a paper on what I talked about for those short 5 minutes, and I won’t linger on that today, but it won’t surprise anyone to know I focused on how this might fit in as something I would show a visiting class and what it says about culinary activities in early America.

During our daily workshops, we got to handle a wide variety of materials. The items related to the day’s theme. We spent time looking at them, then had group discussions about their significance, interest, use, etc., as they related to art, political, culinary, economic, and social/domestic history. I took lots of picture, from political cartoons to trade cards to hand-colored tea plants in a botany book. (Apologies for all the reflections, but most items were in mylar for their safety and flashes weren’t permitted. Also, I haven’t had a chance to crop and edit yet.)

A. Brown & Co. print, “Brooklyn Sanitary Fair, 1864.”

Hand-colored tea plant illustration, Ladies’ Wreath and Parlor Annual, c.1854.

Czar Baking Powder Trade Card (back). Straight out of the “baking powder wars!”

The Grocer, 1827. This tiny book contained rhymes for children relating to food, including the title piece about what a grocer does.

Of course, you don’t put a group of scholars obsessed with food together and not cook. During a trip to Old Sturbridge Village, we cooked an 1830s meal over an open hearth from scratch (stuffed and roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, carrots, rolls, greens with burnt butter dressing, lemonade, pounded cheese, and “Washington Cake” with hand-whipped cream, plus we churned and washed our own butter!). It was an eye-opening experience to actually prepare this meal and if it weren’t for 20 sets of hands, it would have taken well more than our 3 hours. We tasted and talked about hard cider, cheese and cheesemaking, and Sazeracs and other historic cocktails, and bravely sampled hardtack. On our last day together, we made gingerbread as dessert for the evening’s cook out. It was Eliza Leslie’s 1827 recipe that included a pint of molasses and four different spices. Dense as it was, it tasted amazing and I’m looking forward to making it at home for friends.

Historic Sazeracs (and yes, I got to help bartend!)

Eliza Leslie’s 1827 recipe for gingerbread, made in 2015!

Besides the fun, my pile of notes, new knowledge gained, and the chance to do research (why yes, I DID find some interesting cocktail history in manuscript form, but more on that another day), there was something even more important I learned last week and it was a large part of what I wrote about in my application essay. I wanted to meet people from different disciplines who studied food and I wanted to know why they did. I’ve worked at Virginia Tech Special Collections with the History of Food and Drink Collection for more than 6 years. One of my biggest challenges is finding ways to make it seem usable and relevant in the classroom. After a week of conversation and collaboration, I’m looking forward to reflecting on how I can broaden the way I think about our collection and its use, and how I can encourage faculty and students on campus to do the same. Hopefully, I can find some angles to entice classes in unexpected areas of study to pay us a visit.

Finally, after going on way to long, I’ll leave you with two more images (no, not me washing butter–but a picture of that DOES exist!). They are two food items vital to the history of food and culinary culture in America and abroad. If you want a bit of my experience from last week, give yourself five minutes to consider them. It might just surprise you how politically charged your morning beverage might be.

A bottle of tea whose label reads “Tea thrown into Boston Harbor Dec 16 1773.”

Unroasted coffee beans taken from the desk of General Ulysses S. Grant.

See you next week, when we’re back to our regularly scheduled programming. 🙂

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Upcoming Event

The Peacock-Harper Culinary Friends, in conjunction with the Virginia Tech Alumni Association and the Old Guard Reunion are hosting an event on May 21st at the Inn at Virginia Tech. This luncheon will feature two guest speakers and a menu with recipes from a book we’ve talked about before! If you live in the Blacksburg area and would like to attend, you can the view and print the registration form: PHCHFG May 21, 2015. Please note: Registration is due by May 15, 2015. 

Women’s History Month, Part 9: Laura Jane Harper (1914-1996)

We’re kicking off our Women’s History Month posts with a faculty member, administrator, academic dean, and author close to our hearts here at Virginia Tech: Laura Jane Harper. For those of you familiar with the History of Food and Drink Collection’s origins, the Peacock-Harper Culinary Collection, you can guess why the late Dean Emeritus Harper is even more special to us in Special Collections. Without her cookbook collection, I wouldn’t be blogging about food history today!

Laura Jane Harper

Laura Jane Harper was born in Jackson, Mississippi, and received her bachelor’s degree from Belhaven College in 1934, her Master of Science degree from the University of Tennessee in 1948, and her Ph.D. from Michigan State University in 1956.¹

Harper first joined the faculty at VPI in 1948, but took an educational leave in 1951 to pursue her doctorate. She returned in 1956 as a a full professor, resumed teaching, and completed her dissertation. During her career she taught graduate and undergraduate nutrition courses. In addition to teaching, Harper also conducted research for the Virginia Agricultural Experimental Station as director of home economics research. Her research focused on food habits, food and culture, nutrition in international development, and nutrient metabolism. In 1958, she began an interim term as the head of the Home Economics Department. When the department became a college two years later, she was the first women to serve as an academic dean at VPI and the first dean of the College of Home Economics (a position she held for twenty years, until she retired in 1980). For more about her, see the online thesis: A Fighter To The End: The Remarkable Life and Career Of Laura Jane Harper. 

Dr. Harper was also an advocate for women in higher education, as both students and teachers. Our holdings of her written materials may be few, but they are powerful. 

This is the first page of a compilation of materials. It’s primarily the text of a talk given by Dr. Harper, but also includes text of an interview with Lucy Lee Lancaster (one of the first women to attend VPI and a later a librarian), and other information on women’s history at VPI.

Forward from History of Home Economics at V.P.I., 1985

Forward from History of Home Economics at V.P.I., 1985

Table of contents from History of Home Economics at V.P.I., 1985

Table of contents from History of Home Economics at V.P.I., 1985

Table of contents from History of Home Economics at V.P.I., 1985

In honor of her work to the university, there is a dorm building on campus named after her. too. Finished in 1999, according to the resolution, Harper Hall was named as “an enduring tribute to Dean Emeritus Laura Jane Harper, a true pioneer, educator, and leader with remarkable vision who profoundly influenced the course of education at Virginia Tech, leaving a legacy of equal educational opportunity for all.”²

You can find a great deal more material related to Dr. Harper’s administrative role in the University Archives, primarily in the form of correspondence with other campus leaders:

• Records of the Office of the Vice President for Administration, Stuart K. Cassell, 1945-1975. Finding aid available online.
• Records of T. Marshall Hahn, 1962-1974. Finding aid available online.
• Records of the Office of Vice President (1963-1966) and the Office of Executive Vice President (1968-1969), Warren W. Brandt, 1958-1969. Finding aid available online.
• Records of William James McKeefery, Vice President, Virginia Polytechnic Institute, 1969-1973. Finding aid available online.

¹ https://www.hnfe.vt.edu/People/faculty/Memoriam/Harper_Laura.html
² http://spec.lib.vt.edu/archives/125th/women/harper.htm

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As with last year, this is the first in a series of four posts for women’s history month. While (I hope) I am always honoring the contributions of women to the food and drink history, this is an opportunity to look a little closer at the lives of the women, in addition to their works. Join me as we stroll through three more women of culinary history again this March. I have some interesting profiles planned, continuing next week with Mrs. Harriet Anne De Salis, a London author who also wrote a book on one of my favorite topics: cocktails!

Cora Bolton McBryde’s Cookbook

Some of our readers may know (and some of you may not) that Special Collections has a second blog. Launched in January 2014, it highlights materials from all of our collecting areas and features contributions from all our staff. Last week, our university archivist wrote a post about a handwritten cookbook we acquired last year. It was kept by Cora Bolton McBryde, the wife of Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College president (from 1891-1907), John McLaren McBryde. It’s a very interesting piece of university history AND food history. So this week, our feature comes from our other blog. You can read about the cookbook, its preservation, and a little about the McBrydes here: http://vtspecialcollections.wordpress.com/2014/07/17/cooking-for-the-president-cora-bolton-mcbrydes-cookbook/. Enjoy!

Mark Your Calendars!

There will be a new feature post this week (a little late), but in the meantime, here’s a heads up! Once again, Special Collections will be hosting a series of four (that’s right FOUR!) Open House evenings during the Fall 2013 semester. (See the flyer below.) Among the materials on display will be some more recent additions to the History of Food and Drink Collection. Who knows what we might share! Cocktail publications, handwritten receipt books, corporate pamphlets, and cooking ephemera–it’ll be a surprise! So, even if you’re joined us before, we’ll hope you will consider visiting us again.

Open House events will be on the first Tuesday of every month (September 3, October 1, November 5, and December 3) and will take place from 5pm-7pm. Special Collections is on the first floor of Newman Library, near the study cafe. 

Women’s History Month Profiles, Part 1: Maria Parloa (1843-1909)

March, as some of you may know, is Women’s History Month. While a good portion of what we talk about on this blog relates to women’s history, it seems like a good opportunity to explore the contributions of some authors, educators, and cooks (and sometimes, all three at once!). Each week this month, we’ll share a little about an influential lady from late 19th/early 20th century culinary history. They may not be household names these days (or even in their own time), but their works paved the way for modern home economics, cooking, and cookbooks.

On a side note:  if you’re in the Blacksburg area, we always invite you visit Special Collections. This month, we have two small exhibits devoted to women’s contributions to science, technology, science fiction, architecture, literature, culinary history, and more! You can also go “hands-on” with examples of items in our collection. We’ll also be profiling manuscripts, publications, and items on the Special Collections blog on Tuesdays during March.

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Maria Parloa was born in Massachusetts in 1843. Even before she entered a teacher’s school in Maine in 1871, she had experience cooking in homes and hotels in New England. In 1872, while still in enrolled at the Normal School of the Maine Central Institute in Pittsfield, she published her first cookbook, The Appledore Cookbook (ours is the later 1878 edition).

(Click on any of the images for a larger view.)

1878 edition, The Appledore Cookbook

Index from the 1878 edition, The Appledore Cookbook

Samples pages from the 1878 edition, The Appledore Cookbook

After several years of teaching in Florida, she eventually relocated to Boston, Massachusetts–she had visited several times to lecture and felt there was a gap. By 1877, she opened a cooking school. Two years later, she became one of the first instructors at the famed Boston Cooking School.By 1880, she had authored two more books, First Principles of Household Management and Cookery: A Text-Book for Schools and Families, and Miss Parloa’s New Cook Book: A Guide to Marketing and Cooking.

1880, First Principles of Household Management and Cookery: A Text-Book for Schools and Families

Sample pages from First Principles of Household Management and Cookery: A Text-Book for Schools and Families

Sample introductory pages from First Principles of Household Management and Cookery: A Text-Book for Schools and Families

1880, Miss Parloa’s New Cook Book, A Guide to Marketing and Cooking

Images from Miss Parloa’s New Cook Book, A Guide to Marketing and Cooking

Kitchen appliances from Miss Parloa’s New Cook Book, A Guide to Marketing and Cooking

In 1883, she left her cooking school and Boston for new opportunities in New York City, where she opened a new school. She continued to teach for the next four years before eventually taking more time to write and travel. During the late 1880s and early 1890s, she was prolific, publishing later editions of earlier books, as well as three new ones: Miss Parloa’s Kitchen Companion: A Guide for All Who Would Be Good Housekeepers in 1887; Home Economics: A Guide to Household Management in 1889 (we have the 1898 edition); and Miss Parloa’s Young Housekeeper: Designed Especially to Aid Beginners: Economical Receipts for Those Who are Cooking for Two or Three in 1893 (we have the 1895 edition).

1887, Miss Parloa’s Kitchen Companion: A Guide for All Who Would be Good Housekeepers

Index pages from Miss Parloa’s Kitchen Companion: A Guide for All Who Would be Good Housekeepers

Lunch planning tips from Index pages from Miss Parloa’s Kitchen Companion: A Guide for All Who Would be Good Housekeepers

1898, Home Economics: A Guide to Household Management, Including the Proper Treatment of the Materials Entering into the Construction and Furnishings of the House

Recipes from Home Economics: A Guide to Household Management, Including the Proper Treatment of the Materials Entering into the Construction and Furnishings of the House

Kitchen plan from Home Economics: A Guide to Household Management, Including the Proper Treatment of the Materials Entering into the Construction and Furnishings of the House

1895, Miss Parloa’s Young Housekeeper: Designed Especially to Aid Beginners: Economical Receipts for Those Who are Cooking for Two or Three

List of kitchen needs from Miss Parloa’s Young Housekeeper: Designed Especially to Aid Beginners: Economical Receipts for Those Who are Cooking for Two or Three

Invalid recipes from Miss Parloa’s Young Housekeeper: Designed Especially to Aid Beginners: Economical Receipts for Those Who are Cooking for Two or Three

Parloa was among the nation’s first home economics instructors and her focus was broad. She was also one of the first to embrace/promote a brand. Last summer, we acquired One Hundred Ways to Use Liebig Company’s Extract of Beef: A Guide for American Housewives, published in 1897. Parloa also endorsed and created publications for Walter Baker Chocolate in the 1890s.

1897, One Hundred Ways to Use Liebig Company’s Extract of Beef: A Guide for American Housewives

Title page from One Hundred Ways to Use Liebig Company’s Extract of Beef: A Guide for American Housewives

Index from One Hundred Ways to Use Liebig Company’s Extract of Beef: A Guide for American Housewives

By 1903, Parloa had mostly retired from writing. She moved to Bethel, Connecticut, where she lived until the time of her death in 1909. Maria Parloa was devoted to an all-around home economics education, as her book titles and the contents suggest. In addition to recipes, she featured directions for maintaining a clean and orderly home, thriftiness, hygiene, and temperance. She worked to provide a wider education in household management, caring for the home and family, and cooking techniques, and she was an important influence in the rise of home economics.

Special Collections’ Rare Book Collection includes 10 of Maria Parloa’s books. You can see a list of our holdings here: http://tinyurl.com/mariaparloa-vtsc. A New York Times description of one of her classes, published in 1882, is available online. A lengthier biography is available on the website of the Bethel Public Library, which began with a donation from Parloa.

Next week, we’ll look at another important figure in the Boston Cooking School, Fannie Farmer. Until then, be sure your pantry is organized and your luncheons are simple!

Happy Birthday To Us!

On this date last year, we launched What’s Cookin’ @Special Collections?! We weren’t sure what to expect, but it sure has been a great first year. We hope you’re enjoying it and we hope you’re still helping us spread the word–we have LOTS more to share!

The Grove–A Big Bite of University History

Just last month, an exciting new cookbook arrived on the Virginia Tech campus (actually, two did, but the other one will get its own post, too!): The Grove: Recipes and History of Virginia Tech’s Presidential Residence. Last week, we acquired a copy for the History of Food & Drink Collection. In addition to the recipes, the book also features an illustrated history of the Grove itself.Since it’s a relatively new publication and proceeds from sales are going to the endowment for the Employees’ Spouse and Dependent Scholarship Program, you can’t expect me to give too much away on the blog.

We’re adding a non-circulating copy here in Special Collections, but there will also be a copy going on the 3rd floor, if you’d like to check it out! If you’re looking for a copy all your own, you can pick one up at the University Bookstore or order it online.

The New Art & Convenience in the Kitchen

Convenience and efficiency are a common theme in the collection here. Growing middle classes in the late 19th and into the 20th century meant women were responsible for managing the kitchen and preparing food. In 1934, the General Electric Kitchen Institute offered this handy little home helper: The New Art of Buying, Preserving, and Preparing Foods. The book includes tips for home management, advice for how to modernize your kitchen, recipes and meal planning, and details on how to use modern appliances to improve feeding one’s family (especially the refrigerator, the range/over, the electric mixer, and the dishwasher).

“The most important room in the home has now become the most enjoyable. No longer is the modern woman tied down to monotonous hours of kitchen routine. Magic electric servants work for her, giving her new joyous hours of freedom–hours she can spend in any way she chooses.” The G-E Kitchen Institute was even offering personalized directions on how to modernize kitchens for women who sent a sketch of their current set up!

The book includes suggested menus for all kinds of meals, from family dinners to entertaining at a bridal shower, as well as recipes for every course. But there is an emphasis on convenience and speed (“Today in over 1,000,000 American homes, electric cookery does in minutes the work that hours did in years gone by”). There is a whole section on oven meals, in which the whole dinner goes into the oven and finishes at the same time. Many things can now be done in advance and stored in your refrigerator! Leftovers won’t be wasted, either! And the dishwasher will keep your hands out of that dirty water! A few of the recipes may make you wonder (like many of those in our collection) just who thought onions rolled in bread and spread with mayonnaise resulted in a tasty canape or chopped chicken needed to be embedded in gelatin, but that’s always what makes this collection and these publications special. They offer us a window in a food past we don’t see today.

It’s a bit challenging to pigeon-hole this publication into a single category. It isn’t just a cookbook, an advertisement for GE appliances, or a household manual. Rather, it’s a creative melding of all three–which is one of other reasons to highlight it this week. We’re gradually starting to think about our culinary collection in a new way here at Special Collections. Instead of defining it simply in terms of formats (books, manuscripts, educational kits, electronic resources, etc.), we’re trying to imagine it in terms of topics. While that could potentially be a long list, we’re noticing there are some distinct themes among existing holdings: receipts & recipes (including home remedies); dietetics, education/home economics & nutrition (children and adults); household management & social history; technology, food processing & preservation; and entertaining & the history of the cocktail.

We’ll be sharing more about some of these themes on the blog in the weeks to come, as well as serving up our usual fare of recipes, history, and a little gentle fun, so be sure to stick with us.

Cooking for the Sick Isn’t All Tea and Toast

Many of the cookbooks in the collection, especially those from the 19th century, include a section on cooking and preparing food for the sick. Others feature instruction on feeding children and infants. This week’s feature, Food and Cookery for the Sick and Convalescent, has a little of everything. A combination textbook for cooking school students and cookbook, it was written by well-known teacher/author Fannie Merritt Farmer. The book went through multiple editions between 1904 and the early 1920s (ours is from 1911), and it has been reprinted occasionally since then.

The book contains information on nutrition and food values, feeding children and infants, and a lengthy list of recipes. While many cookbooks include simple recipes for the sick (teas, gruels, and toast),  Food and Cookery for the Sick and Convalescent is much more elaborate, as you can see from some of the images above. Chapters have detailed instructions on preparing luncheon and dinner trays appropriately so they look neat and aren’t overcrowded. Recipes range from teas, soups, puddings/gelatins (it was too hard to resist the image of a carved orange basket!) and toast to chops, oysters, and custard souffles. The latter is not quite the simple fare you might expect.

However, if you look at Farmer’s list of things to consider when feeding the sick, the first two are appealing to sight and taste. “Never consult a patient as to his menu, nor enter into a conversation relating to his diet, within his hearing,” she advises, but “…the best means of stimulating the appetite is to have good food, well cooked, and attractively served.” (Admittedly taken to some strange extremes–see “Flowering Ice-Cream” above.) Chapters on specific types of food include notes on nutritive value, recommendations on the best ways to serve, and a variety of recipes.Contradictions aside (“Cream and Mayonnaise dressings, although highly nutritious, are so complex as to render them difficult of digestion” followed by recipes for both),  the fact that the book addresses different types and phases of illness, and, to some extent, transitioning back to a regular diet, is a change from many other publications from the time period. And it clearly had an audience for nearly 20 years!

And for those of you wondering what kind of stance the book takes on alcohol, there are cases of illness that justify its consumption, as “[t]he use of alcoholic beverages in some diseases seems almost imperative.” Before going on talk about when and why to drink a little brandy or  a lot of whiskey, however, Farmer includes the following statement: “Lives, without doubt, have been saved by the use of champagne.” There is a very brief explanation about champagne putting those with fevers into beneficial sleep, but either way, it might be my new favorite quotation.

And, on a vaguely related note, since it’s graduation weekend here at Virginia Tech, a little champagne might just be in order. Congrats and good luck, Class of 2012! Go out into the world…and find something good to eat. That’s my advice.