We must remember, moreover, that the greater part of all food consumed in a family was prepared through its every stage by that family. No factory-canned goods, no ready-to-warm soups, no evaporated fruits, no potted meats stood upon the grocers' shelves as a very present help in time of need. On the farm or plantation and even in the smaller towns the meat was raised, slaughtered, and cured at home, the wheat, oats, and corn grown, threshed, and frequently made into flour and meal by the family, the fruit dried or preserved by the housewife. Molasses, sugar, spices, and rum might be imported from the West Indies, but the everyday foods must come from the local neighborhood, and through the hard manual efforts of the consumer. An old farmer declared in the American Museum in 1787: "At this time my farm gave me and my whole family a good living on the produce of it, and left me one year with another one hundred and fifty silver dollars, for I never spent more than ten dollars a year, which was for salt, nails, and the like. Nothing to eat, drink or wear was bought, as my farm provided all."
The very building of a fire to cook the food was a laborious task with flint and steel, one generally avoided by never allowing the embers on the family hearth to die. Fire was indeed a precious gift in that day, and that the methods sometimes used in obtaining it were truly primitive, may be conjectured from the following extract from Prince's Annals of New England: "April 21, 1631. The house of John Page of Waterton burnt by carrying a few coals from one house to another. A coal fell by the way and kindled the leaves."[85]
Over those great fire-places of colonial times many a wife presented herself as a burnt offering to her lord and master, the goodman of the house. The pots and kettles that ornamented the kitchen walls were implements for pre-historic giants rather than for frail women. The brass or copper kettles often holding fifteen gallons, and the huge iron pots weighing forty pounds, were lugged hither and thither by women whose every ounce of strength was needed for the too frequent pangs of child-birth. The colonists boasted of the number of generations a kettle would outlast; but perhaps the generations were too short—thanks to the size of the kettle.
And yet with such cumbersome utensils, the good wives of all the colonies prepared meals that would drive the modern cook to distraction. Hear these eighteenth century comments on Philadelphia menus:
"This plain Friend [Miers Fisher, a young Quaker lawyer], with his plain but pretty wife with her Thees and Thous, had provided us a costly entertainment: ducks, hams, chickens, beef, pig, tarts, creams, custards, jellies, fools, trifles, floating islands, beer, porter, punch, wine and along, etc."
"At the home of Chief Justice Chew. About four o'clock we were called to dinner. Turtle and every other thing, flummery, jellies, sweetmeats of twenty sorts, trifles, whipped sillabubs, floating islands, fools, etc., with a dessert of fruits, raisins, almonds, pears, peaches.
"A most sinful feast again! everything which could delight the eye or allure the taste; curds and creams, jellies, sweetmeats of various sorts, twenty kinds of tarts, fools, trifles, floating islands, whipped sillabubs, etc. Parmesan cheese, punch, wine, porter, beer."[86]
To be a housewife in colonial days evidently required the strength of Hercules, the skill of Tubal Cain, and the patience of Job. Such an advertisement as that appearing in the Pennsylvania Packet of September 23, 1780, was not an exceptional challenge to female ingenuity and perseverance:
"Wanted at a Seat about half a day's journey from Philadelphia, on which are good improvements and domestics, A single Woman of unsullied Reputation, an affiable, cheerful, active and amiable Disposition; cleanly, industrious, perfectly qualified to direct and manage the female Concerns of country business, as raising small stock, dairying, marketing, combing, carding, spinning, knitting, sewing, pickling, preserving, etc., and occasionally to instruct two Young Ladies in those Branches of Oeconomy, who, with their father, compose the Family. Such a person will be treated with respect and esteem, and meet with every encouragement due to such a character."
It is apparent that besides the work now commonly carried on in the household, colonial women performed many a duty now abrogated to the factory. In fact, so far are we removed from the industrial customs of the era that many of the terms then common in every home have lost all meaning for the average modern housewife. For nearly two centuries the greater part of the preparation of material for clothing was done by the family; the spinning, the weaving, the dyeing, the making of thread, these and many similar domestic activities preceded the fashion of a garment. When we remember that the sewing machine was unknown we may comprehend to some extent the immense amount of labor performed by women and girls of those early days. The possession of many slaves or servants offered but little if any relief; for such ownership involved, of course, the manufacture of additional clothing. Humphreys in her Catherine Schuyler presents this quotation commenting upon a skilled housewife: "Notwithstanding they have so large a family to regulate (from 50 to 60 blacks) Mrs. Schuyler seeth to the Manufacturing of suitable Cloathing for all her family, all of which is the produce of her plantation in which she is helped by her Mama & Miss Polly and the whole is done with less Combustion & noise than in many Families who have not more than 4 or 5 Persons in the whole Family."