Let’s Eat or Food in different eras

Since I like to cook, I find researching the food eaten in the different times I write about in my books fascinating. I own several Shaker cookbooks as well as one of the first written (from the late 1700s). (I also own multiple ethnic cookbooks, several Amish, a Middle Ages and Elizabethan cookbooks, and a handwritten cookbook with old recipes handed down by family from the Depression.

I do not, of course, own anything from the Bronze Age Crete mysteries. Not only have we not decoded Linear A, but archaeologists are still excavating and interpreting what they find. Although we know that the Ancient Minoans had grapes and made wine, as well as olives, and olive oil, the rest of their diet is a little mysterious. We are not even sure they ate cheese, although right now theories tend toward yes. Researching what they ate has been a challenge. I assumed they drank an herbal tea and we know they drank beer as well as wine. Since barley was grown throughout the region, it is generally thought that was part of their diet. And since almond trees grow on Crete, we can be pretty sure they ate almonds.

The diet in early America tended to be meat heavy. Farmers had poke, although the pigs were almost feral and allowed to run wild. Cattle, sheep, poultry – all of it could end up on the dinner table. They also consumed game of various types. One of the recipes I saw began ‘tie the front legs of the turtle together.’ Venison is heavily featured. I have several recipes for squirrel (without any direction for cleaning or skinning). One begins with ‘cut two squirrels into pieces’, and ends with ;young squirrels can be fried.’ All I can is say is EWW.

The old time New England cookbook has fewer meat recipes but a lot involving lobsters, oysters, clams and so on. As one would expect.

What surprised me about the Medieval and Elizabethan cookbooks was the amount of spice and sugar used. These must have been food for the wealthy while the poorer folk ate cabbage.

Probably my favorites among these old cookbooks, though, are the Shaker ones. The Shaker Sisters cooked for a crowd so everything is in large amounts. They were famous for their foods, their cider, their seeds. They probably ate the best of anyone.

But what I like is those cookbooks contain extensive baking chapters. All kinds of bread, cakes, cookies and pies. Their potato bread is great, although it makes many more loaves than I need. The one failure that I’ve tried is the recipe for lemon pie. The lemons are sliced thin, covered with sugar, and baked in a crust. It was unbearably sour.

The Depression recipes include such items as navy bean hash, fried bean patties, and desserts such as tomato soup cake and grape pudding. Eggs and sugar were expensive so they were kept to a minimum or left out altogether (usually with some odd substitution.)

Communes – and Shakers

The communal style of living which is now so much a part of our picture of the Shakers was actually not a part of their beliefs. When they moved to the Colonies, however, relocating around Albany, financial stresses compelled them to live in a communal setting

If you have begun thinking of tie-dye, put it out of your mind.

The equality between the sexes was a direct outgrowth of the Shakers’ belief in the dual nature of God; a masculine half and a feminine half. It did not hurt that the spiritual leader of the order was a woman, Mother Ann Lee. Her experiences during childbirth, and the death of her young children, persuaded her that all sin came from sex and that only by overcoming fleshly desires could true salvation be attained. Unlike many of the new faiths that sprang up at that time, the Shakers were celibate.

The sexes lived together in the Dwelling Houses, but were separated and lived on separate sides of the Dwelling House. Personal property was abolished as well, all the property being held communally. New converts brought with them and gave to the order all of their worldly possessions, including land. Even though the order accepted anybody, including those who were penniless, the order became quite wealthy from the property deeded to them.

By living communally, the Shakers also had a work force, necessary on the large farms they owned.

Their agrarian methods ceased to be competitive with the United States economy when it shifted from farming and handcrafts to factories. The Shakers couldn’t compete and their numbers began to dwindle. Celibacy was part of the problem. Since they had no children of their own, they relied on converts, both adults and children. Once there were governmental agencies that cared for the poor and for the abandoned children, formerly a conduit of people to ‘make’ a Shaker, and the number of converts declined, the number of Shakers diminished rapidly.,

Tthey remain once of the most successful ‘communes’ ever established. Currently, there are still two surviving members.

Shakers and Orphans

Throughout my books, I reference the number of orphans, runaways, semi-orphans and other children who were raised by the Shakers. This group took in children from their very beginning right to 1966, when the United States government passed a law forbidding it.

Since the Shakers were celibate and did not reproduce themselves, they relied upon converts to increase membership. They also took in orphans or semi-orphans. Although the Shakers might have wished for the orphans to ‘make a Shaker’, they did not insist and many of the children married out of the community.

In a time when there was no safety net, no foster care, no food stamps, the injury or death of the man of the family was a catastrophe. No unemployment or workman’s comp either. Women had few options for work outside the home (wet nurse was one!) and when they did work they made far less than a man. Add in the prevalence of disease, some of which carried off both parents, and there was a frightening number of orphans.

Semi-orphans, what was that? Well, if a single father or more often a single mother couldn’t support her children she had a few options. Depositing them on the Shakers’ doorstep was one. Indenturing them out if they were old enough (and children as young as six were indentured) was another. Babies couldn’t be indentured unless a premium was paid to the employer for the extra care. Orphanages? The first and for many years the only was set up in Charleston, SC in 1793. Black orphans were not welcomed. However, they did not apprentice children out before they were twelve which, for those days, was enlightened. Although these were children they were still worked hard and as susceptible to accidents and death as an adult. One account describes a thirteen year old boy apprenticed to a ship maker. A load of lumber fell upon him, killing him. They found a series of strange bruises on his leg, bruises it turned out from a bag of marbles in his pocket. He was still a child who wanted to play. Sometimes the employers were called up before the town fathers for excessive cruelty to their indentured servants but not often. Many of the children perished.

And where did you go if you couldn’t suppor yourself? The workhouse. The descriptions in Dickens’s novels, although they take place at a later time, are unfortunately all too accurate.  Sometimes, if a woman remarried, she would be able to recover her children.

So the lot of poor children was dire, for orphans and semi-orphans it was almost a death sentence. Babies were especially at risk. They are so vulnerable and if they were nursing especially so. In those days there really was no good alternative to mother’s milk. Many women survived by wet nursing infants. Some managed to nurse both their own and the others. Some wealthy woman put out an infant to nurse if they were ill or if their husband wanted a male heir. Since nursing confers some contraceptive effect they handed off an infant girl to a wet nurse so they could conceive again. What happened to the infants of the wet nurse? Many or the wealthy women did not want to have the child in their household or to share. Some of the wet nurses sneaked off to feed their child. Another option is to hire a cheaper wet nurse. There are many accounts of women who did so and while they were nursing another child their own died.

So the Shakers were by far the best and safest alternative for orphans. The fact that they educated these children, not only in all the skills they would need to live in the agrarian world, but also to read and write is amazing. They truly lived by their altruistic beliefs.

Goodreads Giveaway

The pub date for Murder on Principle is August 3rd, although I have heard that many people have already received the book.

I set up a giveaway on Goodreads so join in and win a free copy.

The reviews so far have all been very good to great!

Murder on Principle – Cover

So excited to reveal the cover for my new Will Rees mystery: Murder on Principle. I am not sure when it will be released. Death in the Great Dismal will be available Jan 5, 2021.

I am guessing sometime this summer. Stay tuned for more information!

Goodreads Giveaway

A Circle of Dead Girls was just formally released on March 3rd. (I say formally because Amazon had it in mid-February.)

Death in the Great Dismal will come out October 7.

These titles are eight and nine, respectively.

Since it has been many years since the publication of the first three in the Will Rees saga, (and also because with people kept at home because of the corona virus – COVID-19, they have more time to read) I am offering a Goodreads giveaway of A Simple Murder:

Yes, I will be giving away three books to three lucky winners. Go to Goodreads to sign on.

Goodreads Giveaway – A Circle of Dead Girls

Although I planned to schedule the giveaway to hit just before the release date – March 3 – the book is available now!

So sign up for you copy on Goodreads.

The circus has come to town. Rees drives in to see a performance but sees his old nemesis, Magistrate Hanson, instead. Returning home, Rees meets up with a group of Shakers who are searching for a missing girl. Rees agrees to help search – and they find the girl’s murdered body in a field.

Pub day for A Circle of Dead Girls

But the publication day last Friday was in Great Britain. Publication of the new Will Rees in the United States does not occur until the beginning of March.

The circus is coming to town. Although primitive by our standards – the circus would not even have had a canvas big top – in 1800 where entertainment options were few, the circus would have been huge. No trapeze artists, but there would be a high wire act, a clown, maybe a magician and also animal acts. Not lions or even elephants, but the more common animals such as horses, dogs, and pigs.

Who could blame the children from being excited – even the children living with the Shakers. Sadly, only the boys would be allowed inside, and the men, as women were not permitted to view such frivolity.

Circuses also provided a haven for refugees. This was only 7 years after the French Revolution and Napoleon was marching across Europe with his armies.

A Circle of Dead Girls

I am very happy to announce that A Circle of Dead Girls, Will Rees number 8, will be released March 3, 2020.

The Circus has come to town. Rees arrives for the performance but the sight of his old nemesis, Magistrate Hanson, sends him home again. On his way, he meets a party of Shaker Brothers searching for a young girl. Her body is found in a nearby field.

Who killed Leah? The circus trick rider? The strong man? One of the Shaker Brothers? Maybe even the Magistrate.

A Circle of Dead Girls Cover v3

Finkelstein Memorial Library

On Sunday, March 31, I spoke about the Shakers, The Shaker Murders, and other topics at the Library. This is the library I was Director of for 14 years. A large library, it serves a diverse population. Working here was life-changing for me in so many ways. And, even though I left over ten years ago, they continue to be supportive.

The Shaker Murders