Every Day Life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony

by George Francis Dow

Potatoes and eggs were roasted in the ashes by wrapping them in wet leaves or paper, and then covering with hot coals. In half an hour or so the potatoes would be well cooked.

At first bread and other things were baked in a Dutch oven. It was a shallow cast-iron kettle with long legs and a cover of the same material, having a raised edge. The cover was filled with live coals, and then the oven was suspended from a pot hook or stood in the hot coals. It was used for both baking and frying. Indian bannock, made from corn meal mixed with water and spread about an inch thick on a board or wooden trencher, was baked before the fire by setting it on an incline against a sad-iron or skillet, the top a couple of inches back from the bottom, and when baked and made into milk toast it was considered a dish fit to be "set before a king"!

The brick oven was in the chimney of nearly every well-built house. The opening was inside the fireplace and was closed by a wooden door. In heating the oven dry pine wood, which had been spilt and seasoned out of doors for a short time and then housed, was a necessity for the best results. The oven was considered hot enough for a baking when the black was burned off the roof and the whole inside had assumed a uniform light color. The coals and ashes inside the oven were then removed with a "peel," a long-handled iron shovel made for the purpose. The bottom of the oven was then swept clean with a broom made of hemlock or other boughs. The process of removing the fire and getting it ready for use was called "clearing the oven."

The food to be cooked was then put in the oven: brown bread made from rye and Indian meal, drop cakes made with milk and eggs and wheat flour, which were placed directly upon the bricks and when baked and eaten hot with butter, were considered a great luxury. Beans, meats, potatoes, pies, and many other things were cooked in the brick oven at the same time.

Families in good circumstances, made it a rule to heat the oven daily, but Saturday was generally reserved for the week's baking.

The skins of animals killed on the farm were tanned by some local tanner and a year or more was required by the old process, but it produced an excellent quality of leather.

The utmost economy was practiced. Nearly all the young people and some of the older ones went barefoot during the summer. In going to meeting on Sunday the girls and young women often walked a number of miles. They wore heavy shoes or went barefooted, carrying their light shoes in their hands to save wear until near the meeting house.

In the early years following the settlement, all clothing or materials were brought from overseas but in time, flax and wool were produced on many farms, and the women of the family were capable of taking the wool as it came from the sheep, cleansing, carding and spinning it into yarn, and then weaving it into cloth, from which they cut and made the clothes for the family. The carding was done with hand cards similar to those used for carding cattle, only a little larger and of finer mesh. The carded rolls were spun into yarn upon the hand wheel. Five skeins was considered a good day's work.

The yarn was woven into cloth on the hand loom, which was a ponderous affair and occupied a great deal of room. Not every family possessed a loom, but there were weavers in every locality. The yarn which went lengthwise of the cloth had to be drawn into the harness by hand; that which went the other way came from the shuttle. The yarn which was in the shuttle was wound upon short quills, which were pieces of elder three inches in length with the pitch punched out, and these quills were wound on a wheel called a "quill wheel" which made a great deal of noise. This work was usually done by children or some helper, while the woman of the house was weaving.