By Anne Dealy, Director of Education and Public Information
By the 1820s
many Finger Lakes settlements were well
established. In town, supplies would arrive with some regularity. Water
transportation routes had been improved, and Indian trails had been widened and
turned into turnpikes that ran regular stagecoaches. Geneva
grew quickly in part because Seneca Lake and the Seneca River Geneva Erie Canal
in 1825. Not only could farmers finally sell their produce to larger markets,
far more goods could be brought into the communities along the canal system. As
historian Carol Sherriff details in her book The Artificial River, the
arrival of fresh oysters in western New
York
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As goods
became more plentiful and trade more reliable, families that had ready cash or
goods to trade no longer had to grow or preserve all their own food. Many
farmers like Robert Swan and John Johnston had smokehouses for producing hams
and other preserved meats. Some of this meat may have been sold to grocers in
town. Living on South Main Street Geneva Tunis
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| Mrs. Sill tracked her expenditures in this ledger in 1847 |
In
1809, French chef Nicholas Appert discovered that boiling food
in a sealed bottle kept it from spoiling. By 1823 New Yorker, Thomas Kensett,
had secured the first patent for the tin can, which provided a cheaper and
stronger container for preserving food using Appert's method. The first foods
to be preserved were highly perishable fish, and expensive cans of salmon and
lobster were luxuries not available to most families. After the development of
the Mason jar in 1858, women at home could also easily use this method to
preserve food. Just two years later, Genevan Adelaide Prouty
complained about these advances in preservation:
Bottling
fruit the new fashioned way. Oh for the simple ways and plain living of olden
times, when plain dinners and a few dishes were enough for the wants of a
family. But now look at it–Soups, fish, meats, vegetables, puddings, pies,
fruits, ices. And then the preparation for tomatoes. Fruits bottled, canned
& dried, pickled, preserved & brandied. Vegetables, put up green, ripe
& in every stage. It is enough to make the fall a season to be dreaded and
a housekeeper's life one of drudgery & weariness.
As reliable
supplies of food became normal and standards of living rose, expectations rose
as well. Women who could, were expected to provide more variety in their
family's meals. The new methods of preservation enabled greater consumption and
became status symbols. Ironically, the hard work of preserving food for
survival was transformed to hard work for the sake of conspicuous consumption.
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The
government's need for cheap, transportable, spoilage-resistant food during the
Civil War proved a boon to the canning industry. Soldiers all over the country
came back from war with a taste for canned pork and beans, and the industry
exploded. By the 1880s, grocers routinely advertised canned goods like baked
beans, corn, tomatoes, and canned fish.
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| Even canned goods were still seasonal in the 1880s. |
In 1889 the
Geneva Preserving Company started canning produce from area farms and
distributing their products across the country. In the first years, a few
thousand cans were produced each year. Production was time-consuming because
cans were handmade, and most fruits and vegetables had to be processed by
hand. Twenty-two years later, the manager of the company reported that they
were growing produce on 300 acres of land, using machines to process produce,
and handling 500 cans a day. Their business amounted to half a million dollars
in 1911.
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| Businesses like the Geneva Preserving Company moved food preservation to the factory in the late 1800s. |
Despite
advances in factory canning, many people continued to preserve their own food.
Farm families still preserved food for sale in markets. Cornell Cooperative
Extension distributed information leaflets in the early 20th century explaining
the process for preserving food safely for home consumption or sale. Home
preservation regained importance during the World Wars, as canning facilities
were converted to war time production and canned goods were reserved for the
military.
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| Bulletins were issued by the Cooperative Extension on home canning and preservation, as well as wartime food substitution |
Innovation
combined with continuing improvements in living standards in the 20th century
to make home food preservation a lifestyle choice, rather than a necessity.
Technological and social changes made electricity, refrigerators and stoves
necessities for a household, rather than options. Frozen foods, TV dinners and
convenience foods became accessible to the average family. Cooking, much less
home food preservation, became something of a lost art. Low-cost fast food and
convenience food have again transformed American households, apparently making
cooking itself a luxury activity. According to one poll in 2010, only 41% of
American adults cook five or more times a week and 11% never cook. At the same
time, locally-sourced, organic, and homemade products have been transformed
into high-end items for "foodies," while governments and social
welfare organizations consider ways to get the poor to consume more healthy,
fresh food. History may simply prove that only change is inevitable.
Sources:
Chicago Tribune Eating & Dining Staff. The Stew Blog
Orsamus Turner. History of the Phelps and Gorham Purchase
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