Machine-harvesting new tomato varieties, as depicted in the 1968 USDA Yearbook, Science for Better Living. / detail, THF621132

For millennia, people have domesticated plants and animals to ensure survival—this process is agriculture. And while most of us neither grow crops nor raise livestock, agriculture affects all our lives, every day: through the clothes we wear, the food we eat, and the fuel we use to move from place to place.

But agriculture is also the changing story of how this work is done. At every step, people have created new technology and tools to challenge nature’s limitations and to reduce the physical labor required to plant, cultivate, and harvest.

People produced much of what they ate until processed foods became big business in the United States during the late 1800s. As market demand increased, and commercial growing and canning grew, it prompted changes in farming. Take the tomato. Canning required ample quantity to guarantee supply, and vast fields of perishable crops required rapid harvest to ensure delivery of the best crop to processors.


Workers harvest tomatoes by hand at a Heinz farm in 1908. / THF252058

But mechanizing the tomato harvest required changing the crop—the tomato itself—so it could tolerate mechanical harvesting. During the 1940s and 1950s, crop scientists cross-pollinated tomatoes to create uniform sizes and shapes that matured at the same time, and with skins thick enough to withstand mechanical picking.

Agricultural engineers developed harvesting machines that combined levers and gears to dislodge tomatoes from the stalk and stem. But humans remained part of the harvesting process. At least eight laborers rode along on the machines and removed debris from the picked fruit.

In 1969, the first successful mechanical harvester picked tomatoes destined for processing as sauce, juice, and stewed tomatoes.


The 1968 United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook, Science for Better Living, depicted new machine-harvestable tomato varieties that “all ripen near same time, come from vine easily, and are firm fruited.” The oblong shape reduced rolling and bruising. / THF621135

Today, all processed tomatoes—the canned products you find on grocery store shelves—make their way from field to table via the levers, gears, and conveyor belts of a mechanical harvester. But you can still buy a hand-picked tomato at your local farmers’ market—or grow your own.

The process of growing food still involves planting and nurturing a seed. But exploring agriculture in all its complexity helps us recognize the many effects of human interference in these natural processes—an ever-changing story that affects all our daily lives.


Adapted by Saige Jedele, Associate Curator, Digital Content, from a film in Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation’s Agriculture and the Environment exhibit. The team that wrote and refined the film script included Debra Reid, Curator of Agriculture & the Environment; Ryan Jelso, Associate Curator, Digital Content; Ellice Engdahl, Manager, Digital Collections & Content; and Aimee Burpee, Associate Registrar—Special Projects.

Additional Readings:

• Agriculture and the Environment
  
• Horse Power
  
• #InnovationNation: Agriculture & Environment
  
• Biomimicry: Making Mother Nature Our Muse

Henry Ford Museum, farming equipment, food, farms and farming, by Saige Jedele, agriculture

William Ford’s farm, depicted in an 1876 county atlas. / THF116253

Farm families in the late 1800s often maintained orchards. Just a couple of apple, pear, plum, or cherry trees could ensure a varied diet and foodstuffs to preserve for winter. And those with land to spare could raise enough excess produce to bring to market.

William Ford, Henry Ford’s father, raised apples for market on his Dearborn, Michigan, farm. The image above, from an 1876 county atlas, shows orchard trees, and the 1880 census of agriculture (collected by the census taker in the summer of 1879) reported 200 apple trees on 4½ acres of the Ford farm—a number that would produce apples well beyond the Ford family’s needs.

Forty years later, apple trees remained part of the landscape at the farmhouse, which was restored by Henry Ford in 1919. Ford’s historical architect, Edward Cutler, drew a map that situated the homestead among outbuildings and trees. It’s difficult to make out, but Cutler identified three varieties of apple trees there—Wagner, Snow, and Greening—that were presumably grown during Henry Ford’s childhood.

At that time, illustrations from horticultural sales books and descriptions in period literature would have helped customers like the Fords determine what fruit tree varieties to buy. An 1885 book on American fruit trees described the Wagner as an early bearer of tender, juicy apples that could be harvested in November and keep until February. A nurseryman’s specimen book itemized the merits of the Snow, “an excellent, productive autumn apple” whose flesh is “remarkably [snow-]white, tender, juicy and with a slight perfume.” And an 1867 book touted the Rhode Island Greening as “a universal favorite” that bears an enormous fruit superior for cooking.




Wagner, Snow, and Rhode Island Greening apple varieties, as illustrated in nurseryman’s specimen books. / THF620189, THF620326, THF620178

When Ford Home was relocated to Greenfield Village in early 1944, Edward Cutler made efforts to represent the surrounding vegetation as Henry Ford remembered it. He included apple trees, though age and condition took their toll on those plantings in the decades that followed. In 2019, The Henry Ford’s staff collaborated with Michigan State University’s Extension Office on a plan to keep the fruit trees of the historic landscapes throughout Greenfield Village healthy. Their strategy involved replacing heritage trees with young stock of the same variety. As part of this project, in April of that year, groundskeepers at The Henry Ford planted new Wagner, Snow, and Rhode Island Greening trees at Ford Home.


Kyle Krueger of The Henry Ford’s Grounds team plants a new Wagner apple tree near Ford Home in Greenfield Village, April 18, 2019. / Photograph by Debra Reid

It will take as many as five years before these new trees bear fruit—as long as weather conditions and the trees’ health allow it—but in the meantime, visitors to Greenfield Village can walk the orchards to check on their progress!


Debra Reid is Curator of Agriculture and the Environment at The Henry Ford. This post was adapted for the blog by Saige Jedele, Associate Curator, Digital Content. It originally ran in a spring 2019 issue of The Henry Ford’s employee newsletter.

food, by Saige Jedele, by Debra A. Reid, agriculture, farms and farming, Ford family, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village

Wood engraving showing cidermaking, 1854. / THF118316

Since Europeans first introduced apples into the North American colonies, these cultivars (Malus domestica) have been destined for a range of uses. Depending on the variety, apples grown on family farms and in commercial orchards could be eaten on their own (fresh, dried, or cooked), used as an ingredient in sweet or savory preparations, or made into apple sauce or butter; jams or jellies; apple cider (sweet or hard), brandy, or wine; or apple cider vinegar. Below, explore some of the many historical uses of this versatile fruit through selections from The Henry Ford’s Digital Collections and Historic Recipe Bank.

Apples are great for snacking as soon as they ripen, but they also store well. This made apples an important food item to preserve for the winter, when fresh fruit wasn’t available. They could be sliced and dried or packed in barrels whole to keep in a cellar or other cool space. Nurseries advertised apple varieties well-suited for this use. For example, in the early 1900s, Stark Bro's of Missouri claimed its Starking "Double-Red" Delicious apple—the company’s “latest keeper”—remained “firm, crisp, juicy, months longer than Ordinary Delicious.”


Trade card for Stark Bro's Nurseries, Starking "Double-Red" Delicious apple trees, 1914–1940. / THF296714

As a cooked ingredient, apples featured in an array of dishes for every meal of the day—and, of course, dessert. Peeled, cored, and sliced or segmented (tasks made easier with the emergence of mechanical tools such as apple parers by the 19^th century), they could be paired with any number of meats, vegetables, or other fruits, or prepared as the star, often in baked goods. The Henry Ford’s holdings include recipes for pork pie (1796), fried sausages (1896), and pork chops (1962) with apples, as well as sweet preparations like apple fritters (1828), apple-butter custard pie (1890), sweet potatoes with apples (1932), and apple crisp (1997).


Trade card depicting apple preparation in a late 1800s kitchen. / THF296481

Apples could be pickled or cooked down and made into sweet jams and jellies, applesauce, or apple butter. Pressed apples yielded sweet juice, which could be fermented into hard cider—an overwhelmingly popular beverage in colonial America and beyond. Byproducts of the cidermaking process included a kind of apple brandy (known as applejack) and cider vinegar, which was an affordable replacement for imported vinegars and could also be served as a drink called switchel. Cider “champagne” and apple wine rounded out the alcoholic beverages made from apples.

To see how the Heinz company processed apples into apple butter and cider vinegar in the early 1900s, check out this expert set.


Streetcar advertising poster for Heinz apple butter, circa 1920. / THF235496

Adding to their amazing versatility, apples could also feed livestock, and wood from apple trees added flavor to smoked meats. Discover some of the many uses of apples firsthand on the working farms of Greenfield Village, and stop into Eagle Tavern to sample hot apple cider, hard cider, or applejack!


Saige Jedele is Associate Curator, Digital Content, at The Henry Ford.

making, beverages, by Saige Jedele, recipes, food

Debra A. Reid, Curator of Agriculture and the Environment at The Henry Ford, answers some questions about the Vegetable Building from Detroit’s Central Market, which is currently being reconstructed in Greenfield Village, on The Henry Ford’s Instagram account, August 5, 2021.

To celebrate National Farmers Market Week last week, some of our staff interviewed Debra A. Reid, Curator of Agriculture and the Environment at The Henry Ford, on site in Greenfield Village, where the Vegetable Building from Detroit’s Central Market is being reconstructed. In case you missed this story on our Instagram account, catch up below! And you can read even more about the Vegetable Building’s history and The Henry Ford’s plans for its future in prior blog posts.

Tell us about the Detroit Central Market Vegetable Building project.

The Detroit Central Market Vegetable Building project is a great museum project because museums collect, preserve, and interpret. We collected this building back in 2003, and it was in storage for almost 20 years, protected. Now it's being reconstructed in Greenfield Village as a hub for future food-related programs.

What is the significance of this Vegetable Building structure from the Detroit Central Market?

This structure is historically significant for a few different reasons. The master builders who are reconstructing it say that it's the most ornate timber-frame structure in North America that they've seen. That relates to another aspect of its significance, because it was designed by an architect who came from Bavaria, John Schaffer. He created the plans, and then there would have been a builder and master timber framers who erected it back in 1860, before it opened in 1861.


One of the original ornamental wooden brackets from the Detroit Central Market Vegetable Building. / THF173219

It's also an opportunity for us to talk about rural and urban connections, because the City of Detroit established the market to make sure that the citizens in the city could get food. So, it furthered food access and brought the farmers to the city.

How did The Henry Ford acquire the Vegetable Building from Detroit Central Market?

The Henry Ford acquired this building in 2003, purchasing it from the City of Detroit as an effort to save it from demolition—because it was planned for demolition. That was in its 140^th year. It had spent 30 years downtown in Detroit, between 1861 and 1894, and then 110 years on Belle Isle. During that 110 years, it had seen plenty of use as a shelter for vehicles and horses, as a riding stable, and as a storage building. Saving it really preserved a huge part of Detroit culture—but also public space culture, because it had been in use that whole 110 years on the public park on Belle Isle.

What’s the process for moving and restoring a historic structure in Greenfield Village?

After The Henry Ford purchased the building, staff and contractors then had to dismantle it, and it was stored until we had the financial support to reconstruct it. Master timber framer Christian and Sons, Incorporated, was hired to dismantle it—and almost 20 years later, they also oversaw the reconstruction of the timber frame roof. The Henry Ford’s recently retired Curator of Historic Structures and Collections Manager Jim McCabe worked with them on the whole process, with the reconstruction currently underway in Greenfield Village. Right now, the master tradesmen are putting purlins on the roof, and sheeting for the slate shingles that will top off the historic structure.


When the Vegetable Building was deconstructed on Belle Isle in 2003, the original materials were carefully tracked and stored so that eventually they could be reconstructed in Greenfield Village. / THF113552

What are the most interesting facets of working on the Detroit Central Market Vegetable Building project?

Working on this project allows me to do history research, which is what I absolutely love to do. I also know that guests have interests that don’t necessarily involve digging into the historic archive.

When we talk to guests, they often ask how much of a building is original. It's an interesting aspect of preservation for this project that half of the columns, 16 of the 32, will be original, and half of them will be replicas, to make sure that the structure is compliant with code and structurally sound engineering.

But beyond that, it's the history. Who were the vendors in the market? Where did they live? What were their family lives? And we're putting together information to create dramatic presentations, performances, and information for daily presenters to help ensure that we can share this fascinating story.

What’s the significance of National Farmers Market Week?

National Farmers Market Week is important for us because we are able to share this work in progress and get to some of the nuances about farmers markets. Detroit Central Market was Detroit’s public market: It was constructed, owned, and operated by the city and engaged many more people, many more vendors, than farmers and market gardeners alone.

But today you might hear the term farmers market, and it often means a farmer-owned and -operated cooperative venture in a community to ensure that farmers who grow produce have customers to sell to directly. So this opportunity to share during National Farmers Market Week helps us celebrate our work, the work of artisans, and the ongoing engagement between growers and you, the consumer.


Debra A. Reid is Curator of Agriculture and the Environment at The Henry Ford.

Additional Readings: 

• Detroit Central Market
  
• The Market, Envisioned
  
• Mary Judge’s Big Break: Central Market Through the Eyes of One Head-Turning
• Market Character
  
• Detroit Central Market Coming to Life

shopping, farms and farming, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford, food, Michigan, Detroit Central Market, Detroit, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village

Central Market in Downtown Detroit, Michigan, circa 1890. / THF96803

As a 2021 Simmons intern at The Henry Ford, my experience, skillset, and reverence for community engagement, localization, and food justice combined into a recipe for growth.

I came to this work having spent the winter working with staff from The Henry Ford and a group of my peers on a script for a Central Market character that will debut in Greenfield Village in 2022. I also brought my knowledge of the local food environment, agroecological issues, museology, key contacts, and equity methodology. This confluence of background knowledge enabled me to envision a plan for weekly open-air historical markets in Greenfield Village that will preserve slow food culture in an urban environment. Ultimately, this has brought me one step closer to my career in designing and interpreting agroecological landscapes with communities before I head off to Burlington, Vermont, to start my PhD in Food Systems.

By now you have likely read of the reconstructed Central Market Vegetable Building in Greenfield Village. You may even know how The Henry Ford plans to bring it to life in Spring 2022 through the resurrection of historical markets for visitors to purchase fresh cut flowers, fruits, vegetables, and honey, or to pick up a cup of coffee and hear stories from market characters such as Mary Judge. This weekly educational market experience will offer a dozen growers a space to share their story, practices, and agricultural knowledge with highly engaged visitors, providing them access to the thousands of members and visitors who come to Greenfield Village every day.


Central Market vegetable shed reconstruction by Christian & Son, Inc. construction company on July 15, 2021. / Photo taken by Ayana Curran-Howes.

These markets will begin with a spring flower market in April 2022, where visitors can purchase lilies, pansies, and sweet peas, to name a few. This will whet the appetites of museumgoers for the weekly Saturday markets, from mid-June through mid-August, where 12-24 farmers (scaled up over time) will sell honey, fruit, vegetables, flowers, dairy, poultry, eggs, value-added items (like jams, pickles, salsa, and bread), and refreshments (such as coffee, cider, and donuts).


People look at flowers for sale at the Central Market, undated (BHC glass neg. no. 2553). / Detail of image from Burton Historical Collection, Detroit Public Library. (EB02e878)

I conducted historical research to answer the questions, “What fruits, vegetables, and other foodstuffs were being sold in the Central Market? When? By whom? Where in the market?” This work focused on bookending the market, looking extensively at the 1860s and 1890s. I conducted primary research using Michigan Farmer from the 1850s and 1860s, seed catalogs and nurserymen specimen books from The Henry Ford’s Digital Collections, the Biodiversity Heritage Library, and the Detroit Free Press archives.



D.M. Ferry & Co. Seed Annual Descriptive Catalogue, 1883, front and back covers. / THF620066, THF620067

Michigan Farmer journals were particularly helpful for identifying notable growers and specific varieties beloved by growers. In the 1863 Michigan Farmer, the most popular varieties of pears described for growers are Belle Lucrative, Flemish Beauty, and the Bartlett, which “deservedly stands without a rival.”  This journal also introduces growers to new varieties like Clapp’s Favorite, which is “similar to Bartlett in form, but less musky in flavor” (Michigan Farmer, October, 1863, pg. 162–163). These specific varieties will be important for prioritizing heritage varieties in the market, a key component of slow food culture.


Description and depiction of pear varieties, Michigan Farmer, October 1863, pg. 163. / via Google Books, reproduced from the University of Michigan.

In order to paint a picture of what vendors sold within the market, we used city directories, George W. Hawes’ Michigan State Gazetteer, the Prairie Farmer Annual, Detroit Free Press advertisements, and some references to stall-keepers within newspaper articles from the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News. When we could identify what stalls individual hucksters, market gardeners, florists, butchers, and fishmongers occupied, we still had to discern where these stalls were located inside the vegetable shed. One Detroit News article was particularly helpful in orienting where certain types of vendors were situated: “Just at this time the southern row of stalls in the vegetable market is a center of floral radiance and beauty” (Detroit News, “Seen on the Streets,” May 24, 1891). Central Market shoppers found butchers in the Central Market building and fruit vendors on many corners around the market, and hired unskilled laborers, such as chimney sweeps, at the east entrance of the Central Market vegetable shed.


Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan. / Sanborn Map Company, Vol. 2, 1884, with annotations by Ayana Curran-Howes.

Then, to bring this historical research forward, I had to identify key farmers, as well as community organizations and other markets, who should be involved—in order to ensure the longevity and impact of this initiative. To not remain purely about the past, but to connect the past to the present and inspire the future, we had to become aware of how this Central Market project would be perceived and could be supported by the incredible urban agriculture community that exists in Detroit today and in southeast Michigan at large.

Consequently, I crafted an interpretation plan to ensure the markets become a sustainable, vital part of the slow food movement in Southeast Michigan. This plan is grounded in several desires: to be seen by market gardeners as a profitable venture and by the community as an asset, to be relevant to the local food environment (e.g., not to be redundant or competitive with other local markets), and to be feasible for staff of The Henry Ford and participating farmers. Additionally, we want to make sure that the market both showcases the ingenuity of late 19^th-century market gardeners and hucksters and continues to foster ingenuity in present-day farmers, as this is what helps them to thrive on the outskirts of the market economy.


Simmons intern Ayana Curran-Howes, presenting on July 22, 2021, to 30+ staff of The Henry Ford and affiliates, including Debra Reid, Curator of Agriculture and the Environment, at the annual Historical Resources internship presentations, organized by Sophia Kloc (featured left), Office Administrator for Historical Resources. / Photo captured by Deirdre Hennebury, Associate Director of the Museum Studies Program at University of Michigan.

It was incredibly important to me to ensure this market will be accessible, supports the existing food movement, and propels marginalized farmers forward through the marketing and financial resources of The Henry Ford. For instance, one measure that is feasible for The Henry Ford’s staff and increases accessibility, both for food-insecure residents around the museum and for farmers, is an earlier start to the market. For those for whom  the entrance fee is a barrier, we hope to have help such as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), Senior Project FRESH, and other food assistance available.

This is also a significant component of larger initiatives underway. Jennifer Junkermeier-Khan, this year’s other Simmons intern, has drafted a five-year strategic plan to “Inspire and provide training for the next generation of food entrepreneurs, innovators, and visionaries with a focus on sustainability, health, and social justice.” Community engagement is one of four pillars of this plan and is imperative for making the Central Market vegetable building installation a springboard into a new era for The Henry Ford: an era that not only speaks openly about difficult histories, including violence and racism (past and present) in the food system, but also seeks to create a counter-narrative and opportunities for social justice hyper-locally.

Consequently, we want this work to be founded in equity from the start, given the legacy of—and ongoing—racism within our food system and market economy. This will require long-term relationship development with the surrounding community and careful selection of vendors. Thus, I created criteria for selecting vendors to ensure that farmers who can benefit the most are approached, as well as those who have knowledge to share with visitors on farming practices, produce varieties, and their own cultural and food traditions. Some of the criteria for vendors include whether they are minority-owned and -operated; using family or fair-wage labor; using integrated pest management, mixed livestock-crop, and no-till systems; and growing heritage varieties and breeds.

This historic marketplace will allow growers to develop their narrative around their practices, varieties, and cultural heritage, immortalizing their stories and recording their history in ways they are not currently captured and appreciated.

Not many growers specialize in heirloom varieties in this area—this may be something they are interested in but are not currently growing due to slow production, financial costs, and lack of demand from consumers. By incentivizing and making heirlooms more visible, we can increase demand by consumers and increase their feasibility for farmers.

Lastly, for the Central Market vegetable building and its weekly markets to have a lasting impact on visitors and lead to the food systems change we hope to see, they have to have a “big idea” and a few key messages. Within broader institutional initiatives, the Central Market will “transform relationships between consumers and the origins of their food through immersive historic market educational experiences that center the stories of diverse producers, past and present, to progress slow food culture.” This big idea will be supported by key messages for visitors to take home with them.

First, the current industrial agricultural system supports fast food culture. This harms the environment through soil erosion and nutrient degradation. It is also extremely inefficient at producing “real” food. Vast monocultures (or the cultivation of single crops in a given area) occupy most agricultural lands in the United States, resulting in products used for biofuels, animal feed, and processed foods. Our current agricultural system is also discriminatory and disconnects consumers from their food and those who produce it.

Second, slow food culture, preserved and practiced in museum spaces, and led by diverse producers in the local food environment, can heal this metabolic and sociocultural rift. This is done in large part by the replacement of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) with heirloom crops and livestock bred to produce way beyond their bodily means with heritage varieties. With the preservation of genetic diversity through heritage and heirloom crops, farmers gain resilience against climate change. Diversity protects farmers against devastation to their crops and provides environmental benefits like erosion prevention. Growing heirlooms can also improve human health through the nutritional quality of food and can preserve cultural heritages. “Every culture in the world has a history of growing and cooking food for health, taste, beauty, and affordability,” and it is our goal to be a part of active preservation—not simply in the museum’s collections for perpetuity, but practiced in real time (Waters et al. 2021, pg. 118).


Simmons Interns Jennifer Junkermeier-Khan (left) and Ayana Curran-Howes (right), with Debra Reid, advisor and The Henry Ford’s Curator for Agriculture and the Environment. / Taken July 15, 2021, outside Lovett Hall at The Henry Ford.

Many genes incorporated into GMOs are stolen (biopiracy) from indigenous varieties, so that corporations profit from centuries of stewardship and plant knowledge by Black, Indigenous, Latina/o, and other marginalized groups (Shiva, 2016). Taking practices out of context and without the wisdom of those who stewarded them into existence only ensures that they are co-opted and watered down. Thus, the third key message of the Central Market vegetable building and its weekly markets is that social justice and supporting BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) farmers is restorative agriculture, and the practices of restorative agricultural practices are only carried forward from the past by diverse producers.

Lastly, visitors will walk away with an understanding and appreciation for public markets, where entrepreneurship, opportunity, struggle, and community all collide. All these messages will be told through the sights, sounds, smells, and tastes at the market—through performances, signage, and experiences, such as cooking demonstrations and magicians roaming the market vying for visitors’ attention.

Sources

Shiva, Vandana. Who Really Feeds the World?: The Failures of Agribusiness and the Promise of Agroecology. North Atlantic Books, 2016.

Waters, Alice, et al. We Are What We Eat: A Slow Food Manifesto. Penguin Press, 2021.


Ayana Curran-Howes is 2021 Simmons Intern at The Henry Ford.

Additional Readings:

• Detroit Central Market
• Market Day: Detroit Central Market’s Vegetable Shed Comes to Greenfield Village
• Reading an Artifact: The Reconstructed Detroit Central Market Vegetable Shed
  
• Detroit Central Market Vegetable Building: Curator Q&A

by Ayana Curran Howes, shopping, Michigan, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, food, farms and farming, events, Detroit Central Market, Detroit, agriculture, #Behind The Scenes @ The Henry Ford

"History of Detroit and Michigan," Silas Farmer, 1884, page 794 / THF139107

Fresh food markets have always brought communities of all backgrounds together for nutritional and social sustenance. The markets of the 19^th century were different than today’s in terms of sanitation, regulations, and petty crimes, but the desire for community that existed then remains true. Today, Detroit’s Eastern Market and dozens of other markets in southeast Michigan provide citizens with food security and support a burgeoning urban agricultural movement and the local economy.


Interior of a farmers’ market, 1875, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Originally published in Earl Shinn, A Century After: Picturesque Glimpses of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania (published in Philadelphia by Lane Allen & Scott and J.W. Lauderbach, 1875), pg. 156, on the title page of the chapter "Marketry.” This illustrates what we can imagine the inside of Central Market looked like on a busy market day. / THF610498

The Vegetable Building (now being reconstructed in Greenfield Village) opened in Detroit's public market, then known as City Hall Market, in 1861. It remained a hub of community cohesion and commercial competition for 30 years until the city closed it, later dismantling it and relocating it to Belle Isle in 1894. In the three decades that the Vegetable Building attracted vendors and customers, Detroit’s population grew from 45,619 to 205,876 (per Detroit Historical Society) and the market tried to keep pace.

Mounting calls for the demolition of Detroit’s rat-infested “eyesore” resulted in the obliteration of the three-story “Central Market” brick building that housed butchers and market administrators between 1880 and 1894. It also prompted removal of the Vegetable Building to Belle Isle, and its replacement with a retail park (Cadillac Square) and a new public market (Eastern Market). This process destroyed the public market in central Detroit, but ultimately preserved the market’s Vegetable Building.

The Henry Ford acquired the Vegetable Building in 2003. After its reconstruction, the Central Market’s Vegetable Building will allow us to tell the stories of the vendors and consumers that frequented the market. These stories will illustrate that Central Market was a place where Detroiters came to purchase food stuffs, where entrepreneurs (many of them immigrants) were able to make a living, and where vibrant community life (including competition and discrimination) played out.

This year, we’ve been working to establish authentic stories as the basis for living history programming at the Vegetable Building, featuring costumed presenters and dramatic performances. Additional research underscores decisions about modern-day vendors invited to sell their honey, bread, pickles, eggs, flowers, and fresh fruits and vegetables to visitors at weekly markets and specialty markets in Greenfield Village.


Group of women, one with a baby carriage, in front of the Central Market Building, Detroit, Michigan, circa 1890. / THF623829

A partnership between The Henry Ford and the University of Michigan Museum Studies Program resulted in a script for a dramatic presentation that will help guests grasp the numerous ways that the market building affected urban life. Four students from the Museum Studies Program—Kathleen Brown (American Culture), Laurel Fricker (Classical Art and Archeology), Antonello Mastronardi (Classics), and myself, Ayana Curran-Howes (Environment & Sustainability)—crafted a script for a noteworthy Central Market character. The market was filled with characters, but one that captured the attention of newspaper reporters, the police, and a fair number of male suitors was Mary Judge. She became the focus of our investigation.

Our research into Mary Judge unveiled a fascinating and difficult, yet vibrant, individual. Newspaper reports documented her wit, sharp tongue, charm, and self-awareness as a woman staking her claim to independence. Newspaper reports from the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press gave us a foundation on which to build a script for an entertaining and educational performance.


Vegetable Shed at Detroit’s City Hall Market, known as Central Market after 1880. It is identified as “Cadillac Square Market (Detroit, Mich.)” in the George Washington Merrill photographs collection, University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library (BL003974). The original was one of two photographic images likely taken by James A. Jenney for A. J. Brow, Detroit, Michigan, and published as a stereograph. The original stereograph is in the Burton Collection, Detroit Public Library. We believe the woman circled in orange may be Mary Judge, vending flowers. 

The script, featuring Mary Judge, is set during a Saturday night market in the 1880s. We chose a Saturday night market to introduce guests to the hustle and bustle of market life that everyday Detroit residents experienced. Farmers saved their best produce for busy Saturday nights when throngs of factory workers and working-class citizens came to purchase fresh produce and meat, as well as to socialize.

Mary Judge enters as a whirlwind. Her livelihood depended on capturing the public’s attention, and the dramatic presentation conveys that urgency. Mary also conveys the tumultuous yet essential relationship that hucksters like herself had with the farmers who grew the products that hucksters resold. Mary’s success at reselling depended on the relationships she cultivated with other vendors and the larger market community. The eight-minute solo act features Mary’s opinions about the role of the market in Detroit life, before the politics around the closing of the market disrupted Mary’s status quo starting in 1891.

What did Mary resell? The Michigan climate lent itself to a wide array of produce. Consumers could choose between market crops such as strawberries and cherries, often eaten to the point of bellyache (Detroit Free Press, June 25, 1874), or other seasonal crops such as rhubarb, cucumbers, and celery worthy of larceny (Detroit Free Press, August 12, 1879). Mary herself sold many different things, including coffee, flowers, fruit, poultry, and “fried cakes, gingerbread, pig's feet” (November 22, 1875). The Free Press reported her doughnuts “were very fillin’ for the price” (February 28, 1876).


Cherries. Nurseryman's Specimen Book, 1871-1888, page 48. / THF620211

Additional carnival-like attractions included strong-man machines, magic tricks, and exotic pets for sale. The variety of attractions created a bustling crowd that made it “often a feat to swallow a cup of coffee, without having it spilled” (Detroit Free Press, December 19, 1869).

The research plan we devised included numerous stages.

We reviewed other dramatic performances at The Henry Ford, including “The Disagreeable Customer” at J.R. Jones General Store and “How I Got Over” at Susquehanna Plantation. We also reviewed expert advice about living history programming collected in the Living History Anthology (Katz-Hyman et al., 2018). These informed the structure and style of our script.

Then, we asked ourselves “What was the social and economic function of the market? Who was allowed to keep a stall in the market and in what ways were they restricted, supported, and able to survive in this market economy?” Answers to these questions were revealed through secondary sources including Gloria Main, “Women on the Edge: Life at Street Level in the Early Republic” (2012); Jen Manion, “Dangerous Publics,” in Liberty’s Prisoners: Carceral Culture in Early America (2015); and Melanie Archer, “Self-Employment and Occupational Structure in an Industrializing City: Detroit, 1880” (1991).

We also looked at Detroit’s demographic data to understand the composition of the consumers in the market space. Then we conducted primary research, reviewing news reports published in the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News that featured Mary Judge over 30 years. These conveyed the verbiage of the time, the historic perspective on events, the politics of the past, and the atmosphere of the market. The newspaper coverage of the market generated a body of evidence that continues to inform us.


From left to right: Ayana Curran-Howes, The Henry Ford’s Curator of Agriculture and the Environment Debra Reid, and Antonello Mastronardi, looking at the site where the Vegetable Building is being reconstructed in Greenfield Village, March 6, 2021. Photo taken by Laurel Fricker.

The low capital investment required to become a huckster allowed some immigrants to Detroit, including Mary Judge, to carve out a space in the public market. Other immigrants, including English and Irish individuals as well as Germans, Poles, and Italians, gained a toehold on economic independence. German butchers dominated the fresh- and processed-meat markets. They had more capital and political influence and, therefore, access to better stalls. In contrast, the Italians, newcomers during the 1880s, tried their hand at selling fruit.

Long before these European ethnic groups arrived, Black Detroiters faced racism in the marketplace and endured discrimination and violence. Nonetheless, they used the marketplace, as did other entrepreneurs, to sell their labor as chimney sweeps and whitewashers (those who painted cellars and building interiors, even the Vegetable Building interior, to intensify natural light).

The portrayal of Mary Judge will show guests how women used huckstering to gain financial independence. This was one of few alternatives for single women at the time, other than domestic service. Secondary readings and primary evidence indicated that women rarely held public-facing positions comparable to that of Mary Judge, the Central Market huckster. When they did, they were harassed by men and police alike. The consequences compounded for poor unmarried women, identified as “unladylike” in demeanor, and disruptive in action.

Hierarchies based on privilege kept many vendors marginalized. Female and immigrant vendors had to overcome language barriers, and had to navigate racism, sexism, and xenophobia when they tried to obtain permits, rent a stall, and obtain goods to sell. As an example, anti-immigrant sentiment followed Italian fruit vendors wherever they went. Mary Judge perpetrated this herself, verbally engaging with Italians and decrying their business decisions: “Go an’ absolve yerself of your business, sir; an’ not be hawkin’ ye’r truck on the streets this blessid day [Sunday]” (Detroit Free Press, July 25, 1887).


From left to right: Debra Reid, Kathleen Brown, Ayana Curran-Howes, Laurel Fricker, Antonello Mastronardi, and The Henry Ford’s Director of Greenfield Village Jim Johnson, standing outside the fenced off area where the Vegetable Building was being erected, March 6, 2021. Photo taken by Jeanine Head Miller.

All vendors faced other societal pressures. One of the most pernicious threats, petty theft perpetrated by those “sampling” products, undermined market vendors. Mary turned to market administrators to mediate her grievances, as did other vendors. She also reported abuses to the police, who intervened in some situations.

Despite these barriers, hucksters made this their way of life and stayed in the market for decades. Mary Judge, a twice-married devout Catholic, was as durable a huckster as one could be. She kept a stall from 1863 until city officials dismantled the market in 1894.

Starting in Spring 2022, you will be able to visit the Vegetable Building in Greenfield Village, and soon you'll be able to meet the “queen of the market,” Mary Judge, selling coffee and decades of wisdom as a huckster from her stall. This coming-soon one-woman show (as Mary would have preferred it) will illustrate huckstering as an occupation and as a way of life.

Thanks to the following people for research support and guidance during the Winter 2021 term:

• Gil Gallagher, curatorial research assistant volunteer, The Henry Ford
• Jim Johnson, Director of Greenfield Village and Curator of Historic Structures and Landscapes, The Henry Ford
• Jeanine Head Miller, Curator of Domestic Life, The Henry Ford
• Patricia Montmurri, author/journalist, Detroit Free Press
• Debra A. Reid, Curator of Agriculture and the Environment, The Henry Ford
• Susan Whitall, author/journalist, Detroit News

Ayana Curran-Howes is 2021 Simmons Intern at The Henry Ford.

Additional Readings:

• Detroit Central Market Vegetable Building: Curator Q&A
  
• The Market, Envisioned
  
• Reading an Artifact: The Reconstructed Detroit Central Market Vegetable Shed
  
• This GivingTuesday Help The Henry Ford Bring a Historic Piece of Detroit to Greenfield Village

food, shopping, women's history, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, Detroit, Detroit Central Market, research, by Ayana Curran Howes

Central Market in Downtown Detroit, Michigan, circa 1890 / THF96803

The historic Detroit Central Market vegetable shed will re-create a local food environment within Greenfield Village

Few mid-19th-century public market structures survive. Detroit’s vegetable shed or building, which opened in 1861, is one of the oldest of those survivors in the nation.


This ornamental bracket from the Detroit Central Market vegetable shed will be one of the architectural elements visitors will see when the building is reconstructed in Greenfield Village. / THF173219

The shed’s story is certainly harrowing. It escaped fire in 1876 and dismantling in 1894. A relocation to nearby Belle Isle saved it. There, it served many purposes until 2003, when The Henry Ford acquired it. And now, generous donors have made its reconstruction in Greenfield Village possible. (Follow @thehenryford on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and/or via our e-mails for more on when the shed will officially open in the village.)


Detroit Central Market’s Vegetable Shed, repurposed as a “horse shed,” circa 1900, on Detroit’s Belle Isle. / THF139104

As a reconstructed event space, the shed will serve as an open-air market of ideas, a place where food and common cause will bring people together to discuss meaty subjects, such as land use and regenerative agriculture, social entrepreneurship, urban and alternative agriculture, and food security. It will shelter a vibrant historic market vignette where florists, fishmongers, hucksters (hucksters being another term for market gardeners, people who raised vegetables to sell at market to retail customers), and peddlers all vied for sales. The scripted exchanges will inform us about ways that vendors historically managed ethnic tensions and provided a social safety net to the homeless, impoverished, and downtrodden. This content will be carefully curated and managed by The Henry Ford’s dedicated staff, who will ensure programming on the stuff of life in perpetuity.

Heart of a City

The Henry Ford’s vision for the restored Detroit Central Market vegetable shed as a communal center in Greenfield Village is akin to what Detroit city officials envisioned when they adopted a nearly 1,000-year-old tradition to establish a public market in 1802.


View of Detroit Central Market (here called “Cadillac Square Market”) from the roof of City Hall, circa 1875 / THF146289

The market grew near the city hall and was maintained by the city for decades, calling attention to the symbiotic relationship between urban governments, the market gardeners and farmers in and near the city, and the health and well-being of city dwellers. The market, in fact, was called City Hall Market until the city hall moved across the centrally located downtown gathering space known as Campus Martius. Thereafter, the name Detroit Central Market came to be—denoting the market’s location, but also its centrality to the civic, cultural, and ceremonial heart of the city. Within an easy walk lay city hall, the Michigan Solders’ and Sailors’ Monument, churches, schools, playhouses, and the opera, among other attractions. Within this vibrant environment, vendors went about their daily business helping customers feed themselves, a routine that fed a city.

Theoretically, a thriving city market eased Detroiters’ worries about the source of their next meal. It freed them to build a livelihood around something other than agriculture, while farmers and market gardeners knew they had a steady market for their produce and fresh meat. Today, we would call Detroit’s Central Market a “local food environment,” the place where customers bought foodstuffs directly from butchers, hucksters, florists, fishmongers, and confectioners.



A community grew within and around the market that facilitated entrepreneurship. Vendors, usually sole proprietors and startups, had a fixed number of resources—the vegetables, fruit and flowers they raised, fish they caught, fresh meat they butchered, knickknacks or “Yankee trinkets” they sold, or services such as chimney sweeping that they hawked to customers.

They had to be ingenious to draw attention to their resources and thus increase the likelihood of a sale. This made for vibrant market days.

People & Prejudices

Practicality dictated that the market be in the center of downtown Detroit and in the shadow of city hall. These were heavily trafficked areas, and structures were built as enclosed spaces to protect vendors and customers from the weather. The Detroit Common Council authorized, funded, maintained, and updated structures and built new ones as needed. It authorized a “clerk of the market” to collect rents, monitor compliance, mediate conflicts, and report to elected officials.

All did not go smoothly at Detroit’s Central Market, however. The fish market in the Catholic city of Detroit was, by many accounts, the poorest fish market in the country. Why? As one fish dealer explained, people in Detroit fished. Therefore, they did not have to buy. Yet care went into designating northern stalls in the vegetable building as the purview of fishmongers, available for auction and then for rent by the month, for ten months of the year.


People gather at the vegetable building at Detroit's Central Market, circa 1885 / THF136886

Records indicate that there was no love lost between fishmongers and butchers, likely because butchers held power that fishmongers did not. Butchers were organized. Some even served as elected officials. They held membership in community associations and had strong ties to ethnic and immigrant communities.

The vegetable shed at Detroit Central Market most obviously housed hucksters, many of them women. Of the 32 greengrocers and market hucksters who listed their business address as City Hall Market (CH Market) in the 1864–1865 Detroit City Directory, nearly one-third (ten) were women. In 1874, the percentage of women hucksters increased to nearly 40%. Racial diversity also existed. Several Black hucksters had market addresses over the years, and at least one had a relatively stable business selling garden vegetables at the market from the early 1860s to the mid-1870s. Overall, however, newspaper accounts stereotyped hucksters as country bumpkins unable to handle their market wagons. This indicated a lack of respect on the part of city dwellers who depended on these growers for their food.

Cultural conflict erupted at the market as individuals from numerous ethnic groups, some well-established and others newcomers, had to cohabitate and compete at the public market. Louis Schiappecasse, an Italian immigrant identified as the first outdoor fruit merchant in Detroit, provides a good case in point. He established himself on Jefferson Avenue across from the Biddle House in 1870. When he died in 1916, the headline read: “Millionaire Fruit Merchant Is Dead.” Yet, in the fever pitch of anti-immigrant sentiment in 1890, a newspaper reporter, without naming names, quoted shop owners near Central Market who were frustrated with Italian fruit salesmen too cheap to pay rent for a market stall. Instead, they claimed that fruit salesmen set up pop-up stands that obstructed sidewalks and made it difficult for patrons to enter some stores.


A customer at the Detroit Central Market vegetable building, 1885–1893 / THF623871

Finally, one of the most notable entrepreneurs at Central Market, who appears regularly in minutes of Detroit Common Council meetings, gained attention for her refusal to accept the city’s decision to close the market. Mary Judge was a widow, listed her address as an alleyway at least once, and changed her market specialty almost every year—sometimes selling vegetables, sometimes flowers, sometimes candy, sometimes refreshments. She also received special dispensation from Detroit’s Committee on Markets when she was cited for violating three market standards. She was allowed to sell vegetables out of stall No. 44 because she was “very poor and unfit for any other occupation.” This last affirmed the function of the public market as a social safety net.

Vendors practiced benevolence, too, operating as social entrepreneurs, at least in relation to residents in the Home for the Friendless. The Ladies’ Christian Union organized the Home for the Friendless in May 1860 to aid homeless women, children (including the children of incarcerated individuals), and elderly women. Twice each week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays during the market season, boys from the home carried a basket to the market. Butchers and hucksters filled the basket with produce and meats, which helped make ends meet at the home.

National Platform

Some views of the Detroit Central Market vegetable shed on Belle Isle as The Henry Ford dismantled it in 2003, so it could be reconstructed later in Greenfield Village. You can browse over 100 additional photos of this complex process in our Digital Collections. / THF113491, THF113506, THF113516, THF113517, THF113545, THF113573

The Detroit Central Market vendors helped feed hundreds of thousands of mouths in downtown Detroit. When reconstructed in Greenfield Village, the vegetable shed where they once sold their wares will support programming that will enrich millions of minds on topics as wide ranging as agricultural ethics and food justice.

Countless stories await exploration: Stories based on the lives of vendors and their customers; city council members and market staff; and the business owners, entertainers, and entrepreneurs at work around the marketplace can all teach us lessons that we can adapt to help shape a better future.


Debra A. Reid is Curator of Agriculture and the Environment at The Henry Ford. This post was adapted from an article originally published in the January-May 2021 issue of The Henry Ford Magazine.

Additional Readings:

• Farmers Market
  
• Bring the Detroit Central Farmers Market to Greenfield Village
  
• Detroit Central Market Coming to Life
  
• The Market, Envisioned

Detroit Central Market, The Henry Ford Magazine, by Debra A. Reid, Michigan, Detroit, entrepreneurship, shopping, food, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village

“Calvin Wood, Caterer” sign outside Eagle Tavern. / THF237357

Outside Greenfield Village’s Eagle Tavern, an early 1830s building originally from Clinton, Michigan, is a sign that reads: “Calvin Wood, Caterer.” Yes, Calvin Wood was a real guy—and the tavernkeeper at Eagle Tavern in 1850. The Eagle Tavern building was just a few years old when Calvin Wood and his young family arrived in nearby Tecumseh Township about 1834. Little could Calvin guess that life’s twists and turns would mean that one day he would be the tavernkeeper there!


William H. Ladd’s Eating House, Boston, about 1840. Image courtesy American Antiquarian Society.

Why caterer? In the 19^th century, a “caterer” meant someone who not only provided food and drink, but who also catered in any way to the requirements of others. Some tavernkeepers, like Calvin Wood, referred to themselves as “caterers.” As Eagle Tavern’s tavernkeeper a few years hence, Calvin Wood would offer a bed for the night to travelers, a place to get a meal or a drink, a place to socialize and learn the latest news, and a ballroom upstairs to hold dances and other community events.

Moving to Michigan

1857 map of portion of Tecumseh Township, inset from “Map of Lenawee County, Michigan” (Philadelphia: Bechler & Wenig & Co., 1857), highlighted to show Calvin Wood’s farm located southeast of the village of Clinton. Map image from Library of Congress.

In the mid-1830s, Calvin and his wife Jerusha sold their land in Onondaga, New York, and settled on a farm with their children in Lenawee County, Michigan—a few miles south of the village of Clinton and a few miles north of the village of Tecumseh. (Calvin and Jerusha’s children probably numbered four—all but one would die in infancy or childhood.) The Wood family had plenty of company in this journey. From 1830 to 1837, Michigan was the most popular destination for westward-moving settlers caught up in the highly contagious “Michigan Fever.” During this time, the Michigan Territory’s population grew five-fold!

The move to Michigan offered promise, but the years ahead also held misfortune. In the early 1840s Calvin lost Jerusha, and some of their children likely passed away during this time as well. By 1843, Calvin had married for a second time, this time to Clinton resident Harriet Frost Barnum.

Harriet had left New York State with her parents and siblings and settled in Monroe County by 1830. The following year, 19-year-old Harriet married John Wesley Barnum. The Barnums moved to Clinton, where they were operating a “log hotel” along the Chicago Road in the fall of 1835. In October 1836, Wesley Barnum died, leaving Harriet a young widow with two daughters: Irene, age two, and Frances, age four. After their marriage, Calvin and Harriet’s blended household included not only Harriet’s two daughters, but also Calvin’s son. (There may also have been other Wood children in the home as well, though they might have passed away before this time.)

Calvin Wood, Tavernkeeper

In the early and mid-19^th century, tavernkeeping was a small and competitive business. It didn’t require much experience or capital, and as a result, most taverns changed hands often. In 1849, farmer Calvin Wood decided to try his hand at tavernkeeping, an occupation he would engage in for five years. Many other tavernkeepers were farmers as well—like other farmer-tavernkeepers, Calvin Wood probably supplied much of the food for tavern customers from his farm. Calvin Wood didn’t run the tavern alone—a tavernkeeper’s family was often deeply involved in business operations as well. And, of course, Calvin’s wife Harriet was the one with previous experience running a tavern! Harriet would have supervised food preparation and the housekeeping. Frances and Irene likely helped their mother and stepfather in the tavern at times. Calvin’s son, Charles, was married and operating his own Tecumseh Township farm by this time.


Residence of F.S. Snow, & D. Keyes, Clinton, Michigan,” detail from Combination Atlas Map of Lenawee County, Michigan, 1874. / THF108376

By the time that Calvin and Harriet Wood were operating the Eagle Tavern, from 1849 to 1854, the first stage of frontier life had passed in southern Michigan. Frame and brick buildings had replaced many of the log structures often constructed by the early settlers twenty-some years before. The countryside had been mostly cleared and was now populated by established farms.


Mail coaches changing horses at a New England tavern, 1855. / THF120729


Detail from Michigan Southern & E. & K. RR notice, April 1850. / THF108378, not from the collections of The Henry Ford

Yet Clinton, whose early growth had been fueled by its advantageous position on the main stagecoach route between Detroit and Chicago, found itself bypassed by railroad lines to the north and south. The Chicago Road ran right in front of the Eagle Tavern, but it was no longer the well-traveled route it had once been. Yet stagecoaches still came through the village, transporting mail and providing transportation links to cities on the Michigan Central and Michigan Southern railroad lines.


Map of Clinton, Michigan, inset from “Map of Lenawee County, Michigan” (Philadelphia: Bechler & Wenig & Co., 1857). Map image from Library of Congress.

Though Clinton remained a small village, it was an important economic and social link—its businesses and stores still served the basic needs of the local community. During the years that Calvin operated the Eagle Tavern, Clinton businesses included a flour mill, a tannery, a plow factory, a wagon maker, wheelwrights, millwrights, coopers who made barrels, cabinetmakers who made furniture, chair manufacturers, and a boot and shoe maker. Clinton had a blacksmith shop and a livery stable. The village also had carpenters, painters, and masons. Tailors and seamstresses made clothing. A milliner crafted ladies’ hats. Merchants offered the locals the opportunity to purchase goods produced in other parts of the country, and even the world: groceries (like salt, sugar, coffee, and tea), cloth, notions, medicines, hardware, tools, crockery, and boots and shoes. A barber provided haircuts and shaves. Three doctors provided medical care. In 1850, like Calvin and Harriet Wood, most of Clinton’s inhabitants had Yankee roots—they had been born in New York or New England. But there were also a number of foreign-born people from Ireland, Scotland, England, or Germany. At least two African American families also made Clinton their home.

Many of Calvin’s customers were probably people who lived in the village. Others lived on farms in the surrounding countryside. Calvin’s customers would have included some travelers—in 1850, people still passed through Clinton on the stagecoach, in their own wagons or buggies, or on horseback.


Advertisements for Eagle Hotel, Clinton, and The Old Clinton Eagle, Tecumseh Herald, 1850. / THF147859, detail

Though Clinton was a small village, Calvin Wood faced competition for customers—the Eagle Tavern was not the only tavern in Clinton. Along on the Chicago Road also stood the Eagle Hotel, operated by 27-year-old Hiram Nimocks and his wife Melinda. It appears that the Eagle Hotel accommodated boarders as well—seven men are listed as living there, including two of the town’s merchants. These men probably rented bedrooms (likely shared with others) and ate at a common table.

Moving On

In 1854, Calvin Wood decided that it was time for his five-year tavernkeeping “career” to draw to a close. He and Harriet no longer operated the Eagle Tavern, selling it to the next tavernkeeper. Initially, the Woods didn’t go far. In 1860, Calvin is listed in the United States census as living in Clinton as a retired farmer. Yet Calvin and Harriet Wood soon moved to Hastings, Minnesota, where Harriet’s daughters, now married, resided. There Calvin and Harriet would end their lives, Calvin dying in 1863 and Harriet the following year.


The Wood family tombstone in Brookside Cemetery. / THF148371

You can still pay Calvin a “visit” at Brookside Cemetery in Tecumseh, where he shares a tombstone with his first wife, children, his father, and his brother’s family. For Harriet? You’ll have to make a trip to Hastings, Minnesota.


Jeanine Head Miller is Curator of Domestic Life at The Henry Ford. Many thanks to Sophia Kloc, Office Administrator for Historical Resources, and Lisa Korzetz, Registrar, for assistance with this post.

Additional Readings:

• Eagle Tavern Happy Hour: Mint Julep Recipe
  
• Eagle Tavern Happy Hour: Maple Bourbon Sour Recipe
  
• Making Eagle Tavern's Butternut Squash Soup
  
• Eagle Tavern at its Original Site, Clinton, Michigan, February 2, 1925

1850s, 1840s, 19th century, restaurants, Michigan, hotels, home life, Greenfield Village buildings, Greenfield Village, food, Eagle Tavern, by Jeanine Head Miller, beverages

Lithograph, "Strawberries," by Currier & Ives, 1870 / THF624651, detail

By the mid-19^th century, true leisure time was a rare commodity among the American population. There were very few “official” holidays on the calendar and a twelve-hour workday, six-day workweek was the norm. For these Americans, bringing and sharing food to an outside gathering, whether it be an excursion to the seaside, to a rustic location, or to enjoy a simple meal after church, was a shared experience, a time to pause and take a breath.

What we call a picnic derives from the 17^th-century French word “pique-nique,” a term used to describe a social gathering in which attendees each contribute a portion of food. They ranged from very formal affairs with several courses served by servants to very simple gatherings with the most basic of foods being served.

Mid-June is strawberry time here in Michigan, and strawberry-themed gatherings were a popular entertainment. Period magazines, newspapers, and other sources of the 1850s and 1860s go into great detail about picnic ideas and the logistical requirements for a successful event.

On Saturday, June 12, 2021, step back into the early 1860s to our re-created strawberry party outside the Chapman Home in Greenfield Village from 10 AM to 4 PM. You’ll be able to purchase strawberry hard cider, strawberry shortcake, strawberry pie, and strawberry frozen custard at various locations within the Village to soothe your own strawberry cravings, and can watch historic cooking demonstrations highlighting strawberries at Daggett Farmhouse, Ford Home, and Firestone Farm.

The recipes we’ll be demonstrating at each building are included below. Note that these are historic recipes and some of the measurements and techniques may not be familiar to today's home cooks. For more modern recipes dedicated to all things strawberry, check out Strawberry Love, featured in our Shop Summer 21 catalog.

Daggett Farmhouse

A Pound Cake 

Take a pound of butter, beat it in an earthen pan with your hand one way till like a fine thick cream; then have ready twelve eggs, with half the whites; beat them well, and beat them up with the butter, and work into it a pound of flour, a pound of sugar, and a few carraways, well together for an hour with your hand, or a great wooden spoon. Butter a pan and put it in, and then bake it an hour in a quick oven.

--Susannah Carter, The Frugal Colonial Housewife, 1742, pg. 104

To Make Currant Jelly

Strip the currants (strawberries) from the stalks, put them in a stone jar, stop it close, set it in a kettle of boiling water, half way the jar, let it boil half an hour, take it out, and strain the juice through a course hair-sieve; to a pint of juice put a pound of sugar, set it over a fine clear fire in our preserving pan or bell-metal skillet; keep stirring it all the time till the sugar is melted, then skim the scum off as fast as it rises. When your jelly is very clear and fine, pour it into gallipots; when cold, cut white paper just the bigness of the top of the pot and lay on the jelly, dip those papers in brandy; then cover the top close with white paper, and prick it full of holes; set it in a dry place, put some into glasses, and paper them.

--Hannah Glasse, The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, 1747, pg. 183

Ford Home

Strawberry Shortcake

2 cups of flour            

1 tsp baking soda       

1 tsp salt

4 tbsp shortening (1/2 butter)

About 1-1/2 cups sour milk “lobbered”

Sift the flour, salt, and soda together into a bowl and work in the shortening. Make a hole in the center and pour in the milk, stirring the flour into it from the sides with a wooden spoon. The dough should be just about as soft as it can be handled, so the amount of milk is indefinite. Pour it out on to a floured board and then pat it out or roll it gently—handling it just as little as possible—to a cake about three quarters of an inch thick. Put this into a buttered baking tin either square or oblong and bake it on a hot oven (450 degrees) for fifteen minutes. The amount of soda depends somewhat on the sourness of the milk. Do not try to sour pasteurized milk, for it can not be done. It will get "old" but it will not "lobber."

And if you don't know what "lobbered" means, it means thick—the dictionary stylishly calls it "clambered." If you use too much soda, the cake will be yellow and taste like lye. Of course, you may be safer in making a baking-powder dough, in which case you take your regular recipe for biscuits but add another tablespoonful of shortening (using half butter, at least, for the shortening) and bake it the same way.

When your cake is done (and "shortcake" in my kind of recipe doesn't mean "biscuits"), proceed after this fashion: have your strawberries (dead ripe) washed, hulled, mashed, and sweetened, in a bowl... And be sure there are plenty of them. Turn your hot cake out on the platter and split it in two, laying the top half aside while you give your undivided attention to the lower. Spread this most generously with butter just softened enough (never melted) to spread nicely, and be sure to lay it on clear up to the very eaves. Now slosh your berries on, spoonful after spoonful—all it will take. Over this put the top layer, and give it the same treatment, butter and berries, and let them drool off the edges—a rich, red, luscious, slowly oozing cascade of ambrosia. On the top place a few whole berries—if you want to—and get it to the table as quickly as you can. It should be eaten just off the warm, and if anybody wants to deluge it with cream, let him do so. But the memory of a strawberry shortcake like this lies with the cake and not the cream.

--Della Lutes, Home Grown, 1936, p. 128-130

Firestone Farmhouse

Strawberry Pickles

Place strawberries in bottom of jar, add a layer of cinnamon and cloves, then berries, and so on; pour over it a syrup made of two coffee-cups cider vinegar, and three pints sugar, boiled about five minutes; let stand twenty-four hours, pour off syrup, boil, pour over berries, and let stand as before, then boil berries and syrup slowly for twenty-five minutes; put in jars and cover. The above is for six quarts of berries.

--Buckeye Cookery and Practical Housekeeping, Estelle Woods Wilcox, Ed., 1877, p. 268

Fruit Ice Cream

To every pint of fruit-juice, allow a pint of sweet cream. The quantity of sugar will depend upon the acidity of the fruit used. Apples, peaches, pears, pine-apples, quinces, etc., should be pared and grated. Small fruits, such as currants, raspberries, or strawberries, should be mashed and put through a sieve. After sweetening with powdered sugar, and stirring thoroughly, let it stand until the cream is whipped—2 or 3 minutes. Put together and then whip the mixture for 5 minutes. Put into the freezer, stirring it from the bottom and sides 2 or 3 times during the freezing process.

--Mrs. Frances E. Owens, Mrs. Owens’ Cook Book and Useful Household Hints, 1884, p. 301


Jim Johnson is Director of Greenfield Village at The Henry Ford.

2020s, 1860s, 20th century, 19th century, recipes, Greenfield Village, food, events, by Jim Johnson

“Wilson’s Albany Seedling” from D.M. Dewey’s Series of Plates of Fruits, Flowers and Ornamental Trees, 1871-1888. The Chicago Tribune (July 4, 1862) gave a shout-out to Wilson’s Seedling in “A Chapter on Strawberries: How to Eat Them. Features of the Strawberry Market.” / THF148036

We wait patiently for the first field-ripened strawberry of the season. But horticulturalists have tried to reduce this wait-time for decades by selecting strawberry plants that yielded fruit earlier—and fruit that grew bigger, tasted better, and matured to a brilliant scarlet-red color. They planted seeds from these plants, and after consistent yields across generations, then advertised the improved cultivars for sale. Farm families, market gardeners, and horticulturalists purchased, planted, and harvested these plants, and repeated this, season after season.

The first volume of the Michigan Farmer and Western Agriculturalist in 1843 reported on the latest innovations. Editor Daniel D. T. Moore waxed eloquent about “Strawberries -- Large and Luscious!” He described a Michigan-grown fruit as “the largest and most delicious strawberries we have ever before seen or tasted” (July 1, 1843, pg. 76).

That “Large and Luscious” berry had no name. Moore described it as “a native of this State, cultivated.” Subsequent issues of Michigan Farmer, however, specified numerous varieties and their merits. John Burr in Columbus, Ohio, listed six different seedling strawberries for sale in August 1847, just in time for transplanting.  He stressed the large uniform size and sweet flavor of the Ohio Mammoth berry as well as its hardiness. He described a namesake, Burr’s New Pine, as maturing “very early” with a “highly aromatic, sweet and delicious flavor,” concluding that it was “unquestionably the very best strawberry cultivated.” He sold these two seedlings for $2.50 per dozen, while he sold his stalwart, Burr’s Old Seedling, for 50 cents per dozen or $2.00 for 100 (August 23, 1847, pg. 96).

Horticulturalists generated plants suitable to local climates and useful to local market gardeners. The go-to early berry in one place might not transfer well to another growing zone. Sometimes hype did not match performance. James Dougall, a nurseryman living across the Detroit River, south of Windsor, Ontario, Canada, assessed 15 varieties of strawberries for Michigan Farmer subscribers in 1849. He described the Duke of Kent’s Scarlet as “Only valuable as being the earliest strawberry, but not worthy of cultivation in comparison with the large early scarlet which is double the size, and ripens only a few days later” (August 1, 1849).

The public remained eager for the seasonal treat. “And what fruit is more delicious than the strawberry?” wondered Michigan Farmer editor Warren Isham in May 1850. But propagating strawberries required regular replanting, at least every two or three years, to maintain the patch. This sustained a lucrative business for plant breeders and horticulturalists. Colorful illustrations helped them capture the attention of growers, as the illustrations below from horticultural sales books indicate.


Nurseryman’s Specimen Book, 1871-1888, page 58. The Illustrated Strawberry Culturist (1887) described the Cumberland Triumph as “jumbo . . . light bright scarlet. . . flesh pale pink of excellent flavor. Very popular among amateur cultivators of the Strawberry” (page 48). / THF620221


Nurseryman’s Specimen Book, 1871-1888, page 57. The Illustrated Strawberry Culturist (1887) described the Glendale as “large . . . dull scarlet. . . not first quality, but a valuable late variety for market” (page 49). / THF620220


Nurseryman’s Specimen Book, 1871-1888, page 56: Miner’s Great Prolific, advertised for 50 cents per dozen. The Illustrated Strawberry Culturist (1887) described the Miner’s Great Prolific as “large to very large. . . deep bright crimson. . . vigorous” and “a popular variety among amateurs as well as those who cultivate Strawberries extensively for market” (page 51). / THF620219


Nurseryman’s Specimen Book, Great Northern Nursery Co., Baraboo, Wisconsin, circa 1900. This specimen book, carried by a salesman, included cloth pages that folded out. Customers could then compare attributes of six berries including: Michel’s Early, Jesse, Warfield No. 2, Splendid, Bederwood, and Parker Earle. / THF620262

As strawberries ripened, growers had to get busy picking and processing the perishable fruit. For farm families, this often meant that all members took their turn picking in their own patches. Families without a strawberry patch, but with a yearning to pick their own, could do so at community gardens or pick-your-own nursery businesses.


Ella and Edward Posorek in a Strawberry Field, circa 1932. / THF251170

Growers raising large quantities for market relied on agricultural laborers hired to pick as fast as berries ripened. Two photographs indicate the scale of production on the Atlantic coast, serving Eastern urban markets, and in California, serving Western fresh markets and processor demand.


Picking Strawberries, Charleston, S.C., 1907. This photograph, part of the Detroit Publishing Company Collection, shows the scale of Southern strawberry fields that helped satisfy customer demand in urban coastal markets. / THF624649


Japanese Men and Women in the Strawberry Fields, California, 1921-1922. (Note that while this photograph features berry cultivation, it was taken to support an article in the Dearborn Independent attacking Japanese farmers' real status in the fruit-growing industry in California. More information on the photo can be found in our Digital Collections at the link that follows.) / THF624653

Educational materials designed for geography instruction often featured fruits and vegetables. This Keystone View Company stereograph, in tandem with an instructional workbook, oriented teachers to lessons that helped students understand sources of their food supply. In the case of strawberries, students could see a person about their age busy in a strawberry field in Florida, picking a crop that the students might eat on their strawberry shortcake!


Picking Strawberries in January in Florida, circa 1928. / THF624669

Fresh berries had to be eaten quickly to enjoy them in all their lusciousness. The Chicago Tribune drew readers’ attention to the “luxury” of strawberry shortcake at the height of berry season in that Northern city (July 14, 1857): “Make a large, thick shortcake, split it twice through, and spread with butter and fresh strawberries and sugar, put the parts together again, and serve hot.”

The Chicago Tribune shared two additional recipes in a “how to eat them” feature a few years later (July 4, 1862). The editor recommended starting with a recipe for a very light soda biscuit, baked in a round tin about the size of a dinner plate. Directions continued with instructions to immediately split the baked cake in two or three parts. “Butter each part slightly—spread a thick layer of berries upon one of the slices, then place the other slice over it. . . . Scatter powdered sugar over the berries as they are placed on the slices, and finish by pouring a goodly portion of thick, rich cream upon the berries before the next slice is laid on.”

One last recipe comes from “About Strawberries,” printed in the Detroit Post & Tribune and republished in the True Republican (Sycamore, Illinois). This described the common strawberry shortcake as “a favorite [but] rich” dish. The editor suggested taking “one quart of flour, three tablespoonfuls of butter, one large cup sour cream or rich loppered milk, one egg, one tablespoonful white sugar, one tablespoonful soda dissolved in hot water, and one saltspoonful salt. Rub the salt, butter and flour together; add the soda to the sour milk; stir in the egg and sugar with the milk; put all together, mixing quite soft. Roll lightly and quickly into two sheets, the one intended for the upper crust fully half an inch thick, the lower less than this. Now lay one sheet of paste smoothly upon the other and bake until done. While warm, separate the sheets just where they were joined and lay upon the lower or thick sheet a thick, deep coating of strawberries; then add a coat of powdered sugar and cover with the upper crust . . . serve at tea, cut into triangles and cover with sweet cream and with sugar sprinkled over it. Always send around the powdered sugar and let the guests help themselves” (June 29, 1878).

Readers knew that they could only eat so much shortcake. Yields always outpaced demand. To meet the need, newspaper editors encouraged readers to turn the fruit into jam or preserves before the berries spoiled. Food processors also approached fruit preservation on an industrial scale. The postcard below from the H.J. Heinz Company provides a behind-the-scenes view of women in their work uniforms stemming strawberries as part of the preserve-making process.


Centennial Post Cards 1869-1969. H.J. Heinz Company, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania / THF291994

Strawberries remain one of the most highly anticipated seasonal fruits. Few compare in taste sensation. In the past as now, however, market opportunities lead growers to pick berries before they ripen to prevent damage in transit. Today, the end of strawberry season in one location means the end of the taste sensation, but not the end of availability for consumers.


Debra A. Reid is Curator of Agriculture and the Environment at The Henry Ford. Thanks to Saige Jedele, Associate Curator, Digital Content, for editorial advice.

by Debra A. Reid, recipes, agriculture, food