From the Garden to the Table - Vegetable Soup Recipes from Virginia's Mary Randolph

Pehr Hilleström (Swedish artist, 1732-1816) Woman Taking Soup from a Cauldron

The Virginia Housewife: or, Methodical Cook
By Mary Randolph 1762-1828
Baltimore: Plaskitt, Fite, 1838 

Soups

ASPARAGUS SOUP.
TAKE four large bunches of asparagus, scrape it nicely, cut off one inch of the tops, and lay them in water, chop the stalks and put them on the fire with a piece of bacon, a large onion cut up, and pepper and salt; add two quarts of water, boil them till the stalks are quite soft, then pulp them through a sieve, and strain the water to it, which must be put back in the pot; put into it a chicken cut up, with the tops of asparagus which had been laid by, boil it until these last articles are sufficiently done, thicken with flour,butter and milk, and serve it up.

BARLEY SOUP.
PUT on three gills of barley, three quarts of water, a few onions cut up, six carrots scraped and cut into dice, an equal quantity of turnips cut small; boil it gently two hours, then put in four or five pounds of the rack or neck of mutton, a few slices of lean ham, with pepper and salt; boil it slowly two hours longer and serve it up. Tomatos are an excellent addition to this soup.

DRIED PEA SOUP.
TAKE one quart of split peas, or Lima beans, which are better; put them in three quarts of very soft water with three onions chopped up, pepper and salt; boil them two hours; mash them well and pass them through a sieve; return the liquid into the pot, thicken it with a large piece of butter and flour, put in some slices of nice salt pork, and a large tea-spoonful of celery seed pounded; boil it till the pork is done, and serve it up; have some toasted bread cut into dice and fried in butter, which must be put in the tureen before you pour in the soup.

GREEN PEA SOUP.
MAKE it exactly as you do the dried pea soup, only in place of the celery seed, put a handful of mint chopped small, and a pint of young peas, which must be boiled in the soup till tender; thicken it with a quarter of a pound of butter, and two spoonsful of flour.

OCHRA SOUP.
GET two double handsful of young ochra, wash and slice it thin, add two onions chopped fine, put it into a gallon of water at a very early hour in an earthen pipkin, or very nice iron pot; it must be kept steadily simmering, but not boiling: put in pepper and salt. At 12 o'clock, put in a handful of Lima beans; at half-past one o'clock, add three young cimlins cleaned and cut in small pieces, a fowl, or knuckle of veal, a bit of bacon or pork that has been boiled, and six tomatos, with the skin taken off; when nearly done, thicken with a spoonful of butter, mixed with one of flour. Have rice boiled to eat with it..

From the Garden to the Table - 1798 America's Earliest Cookbook

American Cookery, or the art of dressing viands, fish, poultry, and vegetables, and the best modes of making pastes, puffs, pies, tarts, puddings, custards, and preserves, and all kinds of cakes, from the imperial plum to plain cake: Adapted to this country, and all grades of life.

By Amelia Simmons

Hartford: Printed for Simeon Butler, 

Northampton, (1798)

The importance of this work cannot be overestimated. Its initial publication (Hartford, 1796) was, in its own way, a second Declaration of American Independence. It was not the first cookbook printed in America but was the first written by an American for Americans. All earlier American cookery imprints were reprints from the British repertoire. Simmons' book attempted to recognize and use American products, specifically corn, cranberries, turkey, squash and potatoes, all uniquely indigenous to the New World.

Although native Americans had been using corn for many millenia and European and African Americans from earliest pilgrim days, this book offers the first printed recipes using cornmeal - three for A Nice Indian Pudding and one each for Johnny Cake or Hoe Cake and Indian Slapjacks. Simmons also suggested using corncobs to smoke bacon and the pairing of cranberry sauce with turkey.

Perhaps the single most important innovation in American Cookery was the use of pearlash as a chemical leavening for dough, an American practice which has influenced worldwide baking methods. Prior to the late 1700s, the preferred lightness in baked goods was attained by beating air along with the eggs, or adding yeast or various spirits to produce a leavening. But by the first publication of American Cookery, Americans were adding pearlash (a refined form of potash, an impure potassium carbonate obtained from wood ashes, and a common household staple in the early American kitchen) to their doughs to produce carbon dioxide quickly. This was the forerunner of modern baking powders which were soon to revolutionize both home and commercial baking, here and elsewhere.

This book was quite popular and was printed, reprinted and pirated for 30 years after its first appearance. There are at least three 18th-century printings including the first and this one both published in Hartford, Connecticut and a Second Edition (so labelled) in Albany in 1796. There are at least 10 editions or variants between 1804 and 1831, published in several cities in New York, Vermont and New Hampshire. Some have Simmons' name; some not. See Lucy Emerson's New-England Cookery, 1808, for an example of a pirated edition. All editions are rare.

The information in this book also appears in the following publication which is essentially a pirated editon of Amelia Simmons' American Cookery (1798).
The New-England cookery, or the art of dressing all kinds of flesh, fish, and vegetables, and the best modes of making pastes, puffs, pies, tarts, puddings, custards and preserves, and all kinds of cakes, from the imperial plumb to the plain cake. Particularly adapted to this part of our country.
By Lucy Emerson
Montpelier, VT: Printed for Josiah Parks, 1808.

From The Historic American Cookbook Project: Feeding America.

1794 On the Healthy Aspects of Vegetables & Irrigation

This print is from the 1790s.  

Earlier in the 18C "Most New Englanders had a simple diet, their soil and climates allowing limited varieties of fruits and vegetables. In 1728 the Boston News Letter estimates the food needs of a middle-class 'genteel' family. Breakfast was bread an milk. Dinner consisted of pudding, followed by bread, meat, roots, pickles, vinegar, salt and cheese. Supper was the same as breakfast. Each famly also needed raisins, currants, suet, flour, eggs, cranberries, apples, and, where there were children, food for 'intermeal eatings.' Small beer was the beverage, and molasses for brewing and flavoring was needed. Butter, spices, sugar, and sweetmeats were luxuries, as were coffee, tea, chocolate, and alcoholic beverages other than beer."  A History of Food and Drink in America, Richard J. Hooker [Bobbs-Merrill Company:Indianapolis 1981(p. 67)

And from The Pennsylvania Gazette,  July 30, 1794, copied from The FARMER'S and IMPROVER'S FRIEND.

THE PROFIT AND COMFORT OF GARDENS

On eating vegetables...
Gardens do not appear to have sufficiently attracted the attention of either the wealthy or the poor farmer. Plenty and variety of good vegetables have the most favourable effect upon the health of a family, and particularly of the children and women. The doctor's bill is greatly encreased, by inattention to the garden , and often valuable lives are lost by feeding in times of sickness in the hot weather, upon meat, cheese and butter, because there are no early potatoes, carrots, early turnips, cabbages, beans, peas, beets, &c. In every garden raspberries, currants, peaches and pears should be planted. They grow as freely as weeds in this climate, especially the two first, and if used only when ripe, they are preventatives of some disorders, and more certain cures for others, than any medicine.

On irrigation...
The French and Italians place their gardens so as to command a pond of water near them. On the bank of the pond they place an upright post, with a pole across the top, twining on a piece of wood or iron. At one end of the pole is fixed a little pail or bucket, so as to be easily dipped into the pond filled often; the other end of the pole serves as a long handle, by means of which the bucket or pail is dipped into the pond and filled, then raised (by pressing down the handle end of the pole) till the bucket is brought over a cask, into which it is emptied. Water is sometimes raised in like manner by a wheel turned by hand. It is then carried, by little rough troughs, all over the garden , so as to produce a great abundance of vegetables, and especially of those kinds, which usually fail, for want of rain, in dry season.

This is another pleasing instance of the good effects of the Irrigation or watering, so earnestly recommended in the first number of these papers. It is proper to recommend attention to the position of such ponds in relation to dwelling-houses. They should, if near or large, be on one of those sides from which the summer winds do not blow, and they should be kept running, and indeed should be occasionally emptied in the summer months. Here to, it may well to recommend to the farmer and miller, of every denomination, not to place his buildings nearer than is necessary to any mill-pond, common pond, wet ditch or drain, creek, or other stream; and so to place his dwelling, that any such water may lie on the northerly and easterly side of his house, and by no means to have even a running stream, much less a standing water or pond, or a marsh, on the side from which the summer winds can bring the dampness and pernicious vapours, which the sun always raises from such places. Farmers, whose houses, unfortunately are already built on the northerly or easterly side of bogs or marshes, would do well to drain such places, and if they are covered with wood, it will be proper to make the principal ditches or drains one reason before the wood shall be cut off, that, when the sun is let in upon the ground, it may be found, as far as possible, in a dry condition, incapable of producing vapour.

1st Orchard in Colonial America New England

Giorgio Liberale (1527–79); W. Meyerpeck - Apple - Folio woodcut - 1562 

Rev. William Blackstone (1595-1675) (also spelled Blaxton) was the 1st European to settle in what is now Boston, & probably the 2nd European to settle in what is now Rhode Island. Blackstone was one of the earliest Anglican episcopal clergymen resident in New England as distinguished from the Puritan founders of New England. He is also is said to have planted the 1st orchard recorded in colonial British America at present-day Boston, MA. It is written that he also had planted an apple orchard, the 1st that ever bore fruit in Rhode Island.  

William Blackstone, born in Durham County, England, on March 5, 1595, to John & Agnes Hawley Blackstone.  William Blackstone's mother died on December 8, 1602, when he was only 7 years old.  In 1607, when William Blackstone was 12 years old, as JOHN SMITH was settling in Jamestown, New Virginia. At the age of 14, in September 1609, he entered Emmanuel College, Cambridge, England. In 1617, at the age of 22, William Blackstone took his B.A. at Emmanuel College.

Three years later, in 1620, the Pilgrims had safely landed at Plymouth, in the new world. In 1621, at the age of 26 years, William Blackstone got his M.A. & Orders in the Church of England & graduated from Emmanuel College. William Blackstone's father died in 1622, 3 days before William Blackstone's 27th birthday, & his oldest brother inherited the family estate.

In 1623, Captain Robert Gorges was in charge of a government-funded expedition to propagate the Gospel in the New World & the plan was distinctly to be a church settlement, specifically in the Massachusetts Bay area, as contrasted with the Separatists settlement already established at Plymouth. The Pilgrims had recently established a colony on Cape Cod, and KING JAMES wanted to establish his own colony to counter the threat they represented to his religious authority. Captain Gorges, accordingly, took with him at least two ordained clergyman. Rev. William Blackstone had been designated to take the Plymouth pulpit. (Proceedings of Massachusetts Historical Society 1878, p. 197.) Unhappy with the inflexible Anglican Church in England of the time, he had joined the Gorges' expedition.  This attempt at settlement was unsuccessful, and most of the expedition returned to England, but Blackstone did not want to return to England & remained to settle in solitude in what is now Boston’s Beacon Hill.

Rev. William Blackstone was 28 years old, when he arrived in the new world; & now at 30, when his shipmates were returning to England, he moved across to the North Shore & established his home on the western slope of the peninsular of Shawmut (Boston), opposite the mouth of the Charles River. Blackstone had land to tend & books to read. Rev. William Blackstone brought with him to the New World a large collection of books, approximately 186 in various languages.  Blackstone settled at Shawmut “like a sensible man, Blackstone chose the sunny southwest slope of Beacon Hill for his residence”  Two landmarks existed to fix the site of Blackstone’s house, namely the orchard planted by him, the 1st in New England, & his spring. The orchard is represented on the early maps; in mentioned in 1765, as still bearing fruit; & is named in the deeds of subsequent landowners.

Conjectural drawing of Blackstone's house in Boston, 1630-1635 by Edwin Whitefield 1889

He needed apple seeds to plant that 1st orchard. Some speculate that that he was foresighted enough to retrieve & save every apple core (which naturally contains seeds) he could find. Most ships crossing the Atlantic were stocked with apples along with other foodstuffs. Others believe that Blackstone brought a bag of apple seeds with him when he sailed to the new world.

Backstone’s isolation came to an end in 1630 when the ship Arbella appeared in the harbor, carrying Puritans who were fleeing Charles I, England’s new king. GOVERNOR WINTHROP sailed into Boston Harbor in July 1630 in his flagship, Arabella, of 350 tons & 28 guns, along with the Talbot & the Jewel. They landed at Charlestown where sickness soon befell them due to the lack of good drinking water, which took a heavy toll in lives. Rev. William Blackstone on the other side of the Charles River, witnessing this terrible scene offered to share. GOVERNOR WINTHROP & many of his followers came to Shawmut, taking advantage of Rev. William Blackstone's offer of water & assistance.

When GOVERNOR JOHN WINTHROP found Rev. William Blackstone in 1630, he had built his home & planted his orchard. On June 9, 1628, Rev. William Blackstone, at 33 years of age, was assessed 12 shillings toward the expense of Thomas Morton of Merry Mount's arrest. On March 12, 1629, at the age of 34, Rev. William Blackstone of New England, was nominated, & appointed by the Council for the Affairs of England in America to represent them in their place & stead in the Hilton Patent of Dover, New Hampshire.

On May 18, 1631, Rev. William Blackstone, 36 years of age, took the "Freeman's Oath". He was the 1st to do so & he took the oath before the passing of the order which restricted the privileges of Freemen to church members. In June of 1631, Rev. William Blackstone again did clerical work for the Council of New England. (Maine & New Hampshire Pioneers 1623-1660, by Pope, 1908, p. 126) "Thomas Lewis, gent...received a patent 12, Feb., 1629, of 'That part of the main land called Swackadock', between Cape Elizabeth & Cape Porpus; Rev. William Blackstone , Clerk..."

On April 1, 1633, GOVERNOR WINTHROP granted Rev. William Blackstone 50 acres of the 800 he had already had claim to for more than 8 years. Rev. William Blackstone offered to sell 44 acres of the 50 he had been allowed by WINTHROP. On November 10, 1634, at a general meeting upon public notice, it was agreed that "...the constable, shall make & assess all these rates, viz. a rate of 30 Pounds to Mr. Blackstone, for 44 of the 50 acres, but reserving 6 acres for himself, in the event his future plans failed to materialize."

GOVERNOR STEPHEN HOPKINS wrote in his "History of Providence" published in the 1765 Providence Gazette, only 90 years after Blackstone's death, that "Blackstone had been at Boston 'so long' (when the Massachusetts colony came) as to have raised apple trees & planted an orchard." The "History of Rehoboth" notes, "This is corroborated, too, by the circumstance of the right of original proprietor having been allowed, to some extent, at least, to Blackstone by the Massachusetts colony, by virtue of pre-occupancy."  Congregational clergyman Cotton Mather (1663-1728) grumblingly alludes to  in his Magnalia Chrisi Americana: “There were also some godly Episcopalians; among whom has been reckoned Mr. Blackstone; who by happening to sleep first in an old hovel upon a point of land there, laid claim to all the ground whereupon there now stands the Metropolis of the whole English America, until the inhabitants gave him satisfaction.” This concedes only a squatter’s title to Blackstone.

Colonists did purchase Rev. William Blackstone's 44 acres: "The desposition of... These deponents being ancient dwellers & inhabitants of the town of Boston in New England...agree with Rev. William Blackstone  for the purchase of his estate & right in any lands lying within the said neck of land called Boston...reserving only unto himselfe about six acres of land on the point commonly called Blackstone's Point, on part whereof his then dwelling house stood; after which purchase the town laid out a trayning field; which ever since & now is used for that purpose, & for the feeding of cattell... Mr. Blackstone bought a stock of cows with the money he received as above, & removed & dwelt near Providence, where hee lived till the day of his death.  "Deposed this 10th day of June, 1684, by... "Before us "S. Bradstreet, Governor, "Sam. Sewdll, Assist." 
(Snow's History of Boston, Page 50-1) The Puritans decreed that the 50 acres they bought from Blackstone were to be used as a training field and cattle grazing ground. The land has been known as the Boston Common ever since. 

In the Spring of 1635, Rev. William Blackstone left Boston with all of his worldly possessions, 186 books & all, across the Neck, through Roxbury, turning his back on the "very good house with an enclosure to it, for the planting of corn;" & also a stipend of 20 Pounds per year, which awaited his acceptance as clergy at Agamenticus, Maine, & directed his steps southward. He passed through the area of the Plymouth Colony & eventually brought him to a spot that pleased him on the banks of a river which emptied at no great distance further on into the Narragansett Bay. He decided to stay in this spot about 35 miles south of Boston on what the Indians called the Pawtucket River, today known as the Blackstone River in Cumberland, Rhode Island, he was the first settler in Rhode Island in 1635, one year before Roger Williams established Providence Plantations. Here he built another house, planted another orchard & passed the remander of his life, nearly 40 years of it.

The first European settler within the original limits of Rehoboth was Rev. William Blackstone, who lived about 3 miles above the village of Pawtucket. Here he tended cattle, planted gardens, & cultivated a 2nd apple orchard, where he cultivated the 1st variety of American apples, the Yellow Sweeting. He called his home "Study Hill" and was said to have the largest library in the colonies at the time.  ROGER WILLIAMS was banished from Salem, Massachusetts in in September 1635, but was allowed to await until Spring. However, he feared deportation & left in January, 1636. He founded the city of Providence, Rhode Island, only 6 miles from Rev. William Blackstone, who, by this time, had built his house which he called "Study Hall" & the elevation upon which he built it  named "Study Hill."

In 1641, a visitor of Blackstone in his new habitation above Pawtucket, & made the following statement: "One Master William Blackstone, a minister, went from Boston, having lived there 9 or 10 years, because he would not joyne with the church; he lives neere MASTER ROGER WILLIAMS, but is far from his opinions."(Winthrop. Vol. 1 45)   In Providence, Rhode Island, the first General Court composed of all the Freemen of the colony, was held in the Autumn of 1640. Rev. William Blackstone  was 45 years old then.  Over 100 persons were admitted Freemen of the colony.  Among the applicants for freedom was Rev. William Blackstone.  Blackstone became a good friend of Roger Williams. While they disagreed on many theological matters, both agreed on tolerance and the value of expression of various religious opinions. Baptist Williams invited Anglican Blackstone to regularly preach to William’s followers in Providence.

Rev. William Blackstone once again planted an apple orchard, the first that ever bore fruit in Rhode Island. "He had the first of that sort called yellow sweetings that were ever in the world perhaps, the richest & most delicious apple of the whole kind." He frequently went to Providence to preach the Gospel, "and to encourage his younger hearers, gave them the first apples they ever saw."

In 1655, at the age of 60, on one of his jaunts to Boston, Rev. William Blackstone sold his remaining 6 acres. On May 20, 1656, permission was granted to Rev. William Blackstone  to enter the titles of his land in the records of land evidence in the colony. At the age of 64, in 1659 Boston, Clergyman William Blackstone met a recent widow of a cobbler Mrs. John Stevenson. She was left to provide for herself & 6 children. She was married to Clergyman Balckstone by GOVERNOR JOHN ENDICOTT on July 4,1659 in Boston. One year later, Sarah at the age of 35, gave Rev. William Blackstone his first & only child,  John, in 1660, born at Rehoboth, R.I. New father  Rev. William Blackstone was then 65 years old. Suddenly the somewhat reclusive Clergymam Blackstone was married with a wife & 7 children underfoot.

June 15, 1673, Sarah, Blackstone 's wife for 14 years died at the age of 48 years. Rev. William Blackstone was then 78.  Their son John Blackstone was 13. Rev. William Blackstone died May 26, 1675, at the age of 80 years. He was buried May 28, 1675 at Lonsdale, Rhode Island next to his wife, Sarah.  ROGER WILLIAMS, writing a few days later to GOVERNOR JOHN WINTHROP, JR., of Connecticut, gives these details of his end: "About a fortnight since your old acquaintance, Mr .Blackstone, departed this life in the fourscore year of his age; four days before his death he had a great pain in his brest, & back, & bowells: afterward he said, he was well, had no pains, & should live, but he grew fainter, & yeilded up his breath without a groane." 

Blackstone believed in purchasing his land from the Indians as the true owners of the land.  On June 2, 1675, KING PHILIP, second son of MASSASOIT, attacked Swansea (Providence area). Rev. William Blackstone had recently died, when PHlLIP's warriors destroyed his 40-year old homestead, library, livestock, & all. His buildings at Study Hill, burned in King Philip’s War were not rebuilt or resettled.

Rev. William Blackstone 's inventory of his estate & library, taken 2 days after his death.  "Inventory of the lands, goods & chattels taken May 28, 1675.  (From "The History of Rehoboth", by Bliss, 1836) "Sixty acres of land & two shares in meadows in Providence, The west plain, the south neck, & land about the house & orchards, amounting to two hundred acres, & the meadow called Blackstones Meadow."  
LIBRARY
3 Bibles, l0s. - 6 English books in folio,                      £ 2      l0s. 
3 Latin books, in folio, 15s. - 3 do. large quarto £2         2      15 
15 small quarto, £ 1 17s. 6d. - 14 small do. 14s.             2      11    6d. 
30 large octavo, £4, - 25 small do. 1 5s.                        5        5 
22 duodecimo,                                                            1      13 
53 small do. of little value,                                                    13 
10 paper books,                                                                     5 
                                                                             _________________ 
                                                                                15       12     6 
Remainder personal,                                                   40       11 
                                                                             _________________ 
Total personal,                                                        £ 56         3     6 
  
John Blackstone, son of Rev. William Blackstone. his only child, born at Rebohoth. When his father died,  John was a minor. The Plymouth colony records show this entry —— "June 1, 1675, ...are appointed & authorized by the Court to take some present care of ...this son now left by him"  Court Order dated July 10, 1675: "...John Stevenson, step-son to Rev. William Blackstone , late deceased, was very helpful to his step-father & mother, in their lifetime without whom they could not have subsisted, as to a good help & instrument thereof, & he is now left in a low & mean condition, & never was in any manner recompensed for his good service aforesaid; & if (as it is said at least) his step-father engaged to his mother, at his marriage with her, that he should be considered with a competency of land out of the said Blackstone's land... do order & dispose fifty acres of land unto the said  John Stevenson out of the lands of the said Rev. William Blackstone  & five acres of meadow, to be laid out unto him...according as they shall think meet so as it may be most commodious to him...By order of the Court...of Plymouth."

For Research on the life of William Blackstone see  Nathaniel Brewster Blackstone 

History Blooms at Monticello - Maple Trees & Maple Sugar

Peggy Cornett, who is Curator of Plants at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello in Virginia, tells us that -

The Sugar Maple by Monticello’s West Front Flower Walk was planted over two decades ago to replace an original tree that was destroyed in a violent storm in the summer of 1992. In 1791 Thomas Jefferson ordered numerous trees from the William Prince Nursery on Long Island, New York, including Sugar Maple saplings. The venerable Sugar Maple, likely the oldest cultivated tree on the mountain, was part of Jefferson’s vision to establish a domestic sugar industry.

More from The Thomas Jefferson Encyclopedia -

Sugar Maple
An Article Courtesy Of The Thomas Jefferson Encyclopedia.

"At the end of November 1790, just a week after his arrival in Philadelphia, Thomas Jefferson bought fifty pounds of refined maple sugar. Such a purchase seems odd for someone living in a boardinghouse. Jefferson was not, however, beginning to stock the cellars of the new house he would soon occupy. He was making his first contribution to the cause of eliminating slavery in the West Indies.

"Jefferson had known the most vocal champion of the cause, Dr. Benjamin Rush, since the days of the Second Continental Congress. When the new Secretary of State had passed through Philadelphia the previous spring, Rush had called on him, later confiding to his commonplace book his relief at finding Jefferson uncontaminated by five years of contact with European courtiers. "He was plain in his dress," Rush wrote, "and unchanged in his manners." He still professed himself attached to republican forms of government.

"Although they spent most of the visit deploring the "attachment to monarchy" of their mutual friend John Adams, Rush and Jefferson almost certainly discussed the sugar maple The doctor's enthusiasm for domestic sugar production had been growing during Jefferson's absence in France. In 1788, Rush had published an essay on the "Advantages of the Culture of the Sugar Maple Tree" in a Philadelphia monthly. In 1789 he had founded, with a group of Philadelphia Quakers, the Society for Promoting the Manufacture of Sugar from the Sugar Maple Tree. He had even staged a scientific tea party to prove the potency of maple sugar. The guests – Alexander Hamilton, Quaker merchant Henry Drinker, and "several Ladies" – sipped cups of hyson tea, sweetened with equal amounts of cane and maple sugar. All agreed the sugar from the maple was as sweet as cane sugar

"Rush's aim, like that of the Quaker philanthropists who shared his cause, was "to lessen or destroy the consumption of West Indian sugar, and thus indirectly to destroy negro slavery." Other advocates of a sugar war on slavery used prose of a higher pitch. French abolitionist J.-P. Brissot de Warville, roused by his conversations with Pennsylvania Quakers, believed that tapping the maple would "drive out" the sugar produced by the tears and blood of slaves. "Sugar made at home," announced one almanac maker, "must possess a sweeter flavor to an independent American of the north, than that which is mingled with the groans and tears of slavery.

"Soon after his meeting with Rush, Jefferson joined the chorus. The sugar maple, he wrote a friend in England, "yeilds a sugar equal to the best from the cane, yeilds it in great quantity, with no other labor than what the women and girls can bestow .... What a blessing to substitute a sugar which requires only the labour of children, for that which it is said renders the slavery of the blacks necessary."

"And so, when he made his purchase from sugar refiners Edward and Isaac Pennington in November 1790, Jefferson could dispense with a sweetener tainted by slavery. "Mr. Jefferson uses no other sugar in his family than that which is obtained from the sugar maple tree," Rush wrote in this period. And Jefferson himself documented this use in a memorandum book entry for March 1791. He calculated the cost – two cents – of his morning coffee, noting that "On trial it takes 11. dwt. Troy of double ref[ine]d Maple sugar to a dish of coffee" (eleven pennyweight was the equivalent of 3 ½ teaspoons)

"Jefferson and other conscientious consumers could now, as Brissot phrased it, "put sugar in [their] coffee without being saddened by the thought of all the toil, sweat, tears, suffering and crimes that have hitherto been necessary to procure this product." The Secretary of State, however, envisioned political as well as humanitarian benefits from an American sugar industry. He hoped to gain commercial independence from the British, and even to compete with them by exporting a surplus. In April 1791, Jefferson's expectations were further raised when Rush introduced him to Arthur Noble, who came from upstate New York with sugar samples and accounts of the maple's productivity. Noble wrote William Cooper, his associate in schemes to encourage settlement of their frontier lands, that Jefferson "is as Sanguine as you or I about the Maple Sugar, he thinks in a few years we shall be able to Supply half the World."

"What one scholar has called the "Maple Sugar Bubble" was created by a strange association of land speculators and abolitionists. Cooper, the founder of Cooperstown and father of James Fenimore Cooper, tried to use sugar maples – "these diamonds of America" – to lure settlers to Otsego County. The "Bashaw of Otsego," as Jefferson called him, managed to yoke his own commercial objectives to the prevailing interest in "diffusing useful knowledge," by asking the aid of Rush and other philanthropists in preventing wholesale destruction of maple trees by the advancing tide of settlement.

"Stimulated by the news from New York, Jefferson immediately wrote to President Washington and others, noting that "evidence grows upon us" that the United States could become an exporter of sugar. "I confess I look with infinite gratification to [its] addition to the products of the U.S. ...."

"Two weeks later, Dr. Rush came to Jefferson's house on Market Street for breakfast. Over their cups of coffee sweetened with the "innocent" product of the maple, Jefferson and Henry Drinker listened to Rush read his account of the tree and its benefits and gave him "some useful hints." Rush went home to revise his piece, while Jefferson made preparations for a vacation expedition that would carry him into the heart of sugar maple country.

"On this journey north to Lake Champlain and into New England, Jefferson took seriously his role as a promoter of alternatives to cane sugar. In the new whaling port of Hudson, he urged its founder to find a substitute for the West Indian molasses used in the town's distillery. In Bennington, Vermont, and perhaps elsewhere, he tried to interest some of the more prominent landholders in making maple sugar in a systematic manner, by tending orchards of maples as they would apple trees. His advice was broadcast in the Vermont Gazette and one Bennington acquaintance, Joseph Fay, resolved "to plant an orchard in regular form next Spring, in hopes to encourage others in the same laudable undertaking in case I succeed."

"Jefferson had been making his own efforts to create a sugar grove at Monticello, but the maple seeds he had sent home the previous December "failed completely." On his return journey through Long Island, he stopped at the Flushing nursery of William Prince and reserved Prince's entire stock of sugar maples. Sixty trees reached Monticello in November and were planted "in a grove" below the Second Roundabout on the northeast slope of the mountain.

"Back in Philadelphia in the summer of 1791, Jefferson tried to get one hundred pounds of unrefined maple sugar to send to Albemarle County, "in order, by a proof of it’s quality, to recommend attention to the tree to my neighbors." None of sufficient quality could be found. "Such is the avidity for Maple sugar," he wrote later in the year, "that ... I have not been able this year to buy a pound for myself," and there is no record that he ever bought it again.

In the meantime, Benjamin Rush read his revised account of the sugar maple at a meeting of the American Philosophical Society on August 19, 1791. This essay, Rush told Jefferson, "owes its existence to your request." It took the form of a letter to Jefferson, describing the process of making maple sugar and discussing its superiority to West Indian cane sugar. He furnished figures to prove that New York and Pennsylvania could provide for the entire domestic consumption and leave sugar worth a million dollars for export. Several pages were spent extolling the "nutritious qualities" of sugar and its remedial use in medicine. "It has been said," Rush added, "that sugar injures the teeth, but this opinion now has so few advocates, that it does not deserve a serious refutation."

"Bringing his reading to a close, Rush confessed that "I cannot help contemplating a sugar maple tree with a species of affection and even veneration, for I have persuaded myself to behold in it the happy means of rendering the commerce and slavery of our African brethren in the sugar islands as unnecessary as it has always been inhuman and unjust." And finally, Jefferson's contributions to the cause were highlighted: "I shall conclude this letter by wishing that the patronage which you have afforded to the maple sugar as well as the maple tree by your example, may produce an influence in our country as extensive as your reputation for useful science and genuine patriotism."

"Because of "the impatience of the gentlemen interested in the sugar lands," Rush published his essay as a pamphlet in 1792. It was widely reprinted in the United States and Europe and its words were often repeated in books and encyclopedias. But despite Rush's publicity and Jefferson's subtler patronage, through recommendation and example, the great expectations of patriots and land promoters alike were disappointed. The various New York enterprises failed and Rush's Pennsylvania company of Quakers was dissolved in 1795 with the loss of £1400. The "large plantations" of maples that Jefferson envisioned for the slopes of Monticello consisted in 1794 of only eight surviving saplings. Two more trees were sent south in 1798, and one of them may be the ancient specimen still standing near the West Lawn today.

"Both Jefferson and Rush must have looked with distaste on another maple product brought by Arthur Noble from New York – maple whiskey. Jefferson went so far as to sample it, but was gratified to hear that "less profit is made by converting the juice into spirit than into sugar." Rush praised instead the weaker beverages that could be made from the maple. The thin sap afforded "a cool and refreshing drink in the time of harvest" and "a pleasant summer beer could be made from its syrup."

"Rush died after twenty years of silence on the subject of the sugar maple, his visionary ideas of 1791 forgotten. Jefferson, although he had tempered his hope for a national sugar industry, still advocated the cultivation of the sugar maple on a household scale: "I have never seen a reason why every farmer should not have a sugar orchard, as well as an apple orchard."

"By then, his attention was caught by another possible substitute for cane sugar. Hearing of the auspicious beginnings of the beet sugar industry in France, Jefferson asked two French correspondents for "recipes" of the process of making sugar from the beet, as well as advice on the best species. He lauded the sugar beet as he had the sugar maple: "[It] promises to supplant the cane particularly, and to silence the demand for the inhuman species of labour employed in it’s culture & manipulation."

Lucia C. Stanton, 11/90. Originally published as "Sharing the Dreams of Benjamin Rush," in Fall Dinner at Monticello, November 2, 1990, in Memory of Thomas Jefferson (Charlottesville, VA: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, 1990), 1-12.


PRIMARY SOURCE REFERENCES
Undated. "Take up the young aspens and plant a dble. row of them on the road leading from the gate down towards the landing. Where they fail, plant locusts, walnuts, wild cherries, elms, lindens, maples, and cedars, just as you can get them."

1786 February 8. (Jefferson to James Madison). "The seeds of the sugar maple too would be a great present."

1786 May 12. (Madison to Jefferson). "I have taken measures for procuring the Paccan nuts and the seed of the Sugar Tree."

1787 December 9. (Madison to Jefferson). "The annexed list of trees will shew you that I have ventured to ... add 8 other sorts of American trees, including 20 of the Sugar Maple."

1788 October 8. (Madison to Jefferson). "I shall send along with this a few seed of the sugar maple, the first and the whole that I have been able to obtain."

1790 June 27. (Jefferson to Benjamin Vaughan). "Though large countries within our Union are covered with the Sugar maple as heavily as can be concieved, and that this tree yeilds a sugar equal to the best from the cane, yeilds it in great quantity, with no other labor than what the women and girls can bestow, who attend to the drawing off and boiling the liquor, and the trees when skilfully tapped will last a great number of years, yet the ease with which we had formerly got cane sugar, had prevented our attending to this resource. ... What a blessing to substitute a sugar which requires only the labour of children, for that which it is said renders the slavery of the blacks necessary."

1790 December 16. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "I send herewith some seeds which I must trouble you with the care of. They are the seeds of the Sugar maple and the Paccan nuts. Be so good as to make George prepare a nursery in a proper place and to plant in it the Paccan nuts immediately, and the Maple seeds at a proper season."

1791 May 1. (Jefferson to William Drayton). "The attention now paying to the sugar-Maple tree promises us an abundant supply of sugar at home; and I confess I look with infinite gratification to the addition to the products of the U.S. of three such articles as oil, sugar, and upland rice."

1791 May 1. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "I shall be glad to hear how the white wheat, mountainrice, Paccan and Sugar maples have succeeded. Evidence grows upon us that the U.S. may not only supply themselves the sugar for their own consumption but be great exporters."

1791 May 1. (Jefferson to George Washington). "A Mr. Noble has been here, from the country where they are busied with the Sugar-maple tree. He thinks Mr. Cooper will bring 3000£’s worth to market this season ...."

1791 May 27. "Cohoes. Sugar Maple."

1791 June 5. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "We were more pleased however with the botanical objects which continually presented themselves. Those either unknown or rare in Virginia were the Sugar maple in vast abundance ...."

1791 July 6. (Jefferson to William Prince). "When I was at your house in June I left with you a note to furnish me with the following trees, to wit[:] Sugar maples. All you have."

1791 July 7. (Thomas Mann Randolph to Jefferson). "In a late letter you desire us to let you know our success with the seeds you sent from Philadelphia. The Sugar maple has failed entirely, a few plants only having appeared which perished allmost immediately.... For both of these [rice] and the maple we preferred the flat ground below the park on the little stream which passes thro' it, being the natural situation of the latter, and more suitable to the former than the garden."

1791 July 17. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "I have taken effectual means of repairing the loss of the sugar maple seed, by bespeaking a new supply of seed, and purchasing a considerable number of young trees from Prince in Long-island who will forward them to Richmond in the fall."

1791 August 9. (Joseph Fay to Jefferson). "... respecting the sugar maple seed ... I had determined to furnish you had you not written, but the seed does not come to maturity until the Month of October, when the frost kills the stem of the leaf and seed, and causes them to fall from the tree .... no time shall be lost in doing it in the proper season and forwarding them to you. I have examined my young groves since you left this, and find the young maple very thrifty and numerous, by calculation nearly one thousand to the acre. I intend to plant an orchard in regular form next Spring, in hopes to encourage others in the same laudable undertaking in case I succeed."

1791 August 30. (Jefferson to Fay). "I am to acknolege the receipt of your favor of the 9th. inst. and to thank you for your attention to my request of the Maple seed. Every thing seems to tend towards drawing the value of that tree into public notice. The rise in the price of West India sugars, short crops, new embarrasments which may arise in the way of our getting them, will oblige us to try to do without them."

1791 November 8. "60 Sugar Maples trees at 1/ 3-0-0."

1791 November 25. (Jefferson to William Short). "Such is the avidity for Maple sugar, that it is engaged in the country before it comes to market. I have not been able this year to buy a pound for myself .... When double refined it is equal to the double refined of the Cane, and a like equality exists in every state of it. There is no doubt but that were there hands enough in the Sugarmaple country, there are trees enough not only to supply the U. S. but to carry a great deal to Europe and undersell that of the cane. The reason why it may be cheaper, is that it is the work of women and children only, in a domestic way, and at a season when they can do nothing in the farm. The public attention is very much excited towards it, and the high price of W. India sugars will draw these forth."

1791 November 29. (Fay to Jefferson). "I am sorry to inform you that not a single seed of the Maple has come to maturity this year in all this Northern Country. I have made diligent inquiry thro’ the State; wheather this is owing to the Worms, or a General blast is uncertain. The Great Scarcity and high price of sugars (owing to the Insurections in the Islands) occasions the Greatest preparations for improving the Maple in this quarter, every providential circumstance seems to Conspire to promote this usefull branch."

1791 December 11. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "Mr. Brown writes me word that the 4. bundles of trees from Prince are safe arrived there, so that I am in hopes you have recieved them."

1792 January 26. (Rush to Jefferson). "I enclose you a few copies of the tract on the manufactory of Maple Sugar. It owes its existence to your request."

1792 March 27. (Thomas Mann Randolph to Jefferson). "The sugar maple, it appears, is the most delicate of the whole number, for all of them are totally lost. It gives some consolation however, to know with certainty that this plant is abundant about Calf-pasture ...."

1792 April 19. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "I am sorry to hear my sugar maples have failed. I shall be able however to get here any number I may desire, as two nurserymen have promised to make provision for me. It is too hopeful an object to be abandoned."

1792 May 27. (Martha Jefferson Randolph to Jefferson). "Many of your sugar maples are alive and tolerably flourishing considering the drouth."

1792 July 2. (Jefferson to Hugh Rose). "I am now endeavoring to procure as many as I can of the Sugar maple trees, to commence large plantations of these."

1792 October 8. (Fay to Jefferson). "I have taken the earliest care to collect a few of the maple seeds, which you will receive herewith by the post; should the soil of Virginia prove friendly you will soon be able to furnish the State, as they produce very spontaniously. Please to offer a few to Mr. Madison with my best respects. I also enclose a Small bunch to his Excellency the President which perhaps his curiosity will lead him to accept, if you will please to take the Trouble to offer them. This seed must be committed to the Earth as soon as convenient this fall, in some place where they will not be exposed to be devoured by fouls and squirrels."

1792 October 16. (Jefferson to Washington). "Colo. Fay having sent him a paper of Sugar-Maple seed, Th:J., on his request, asks the President's acceptance of the within."

1792 November 4. (Jefferson to Fay). "I have delivered a part to the President and will deliver another portion to Mr. Madison who is just arrived here. In the name of us all accept thanks for this present, which I deem valuable.... Of 80. trees I bought in N. York, very few survived the transplantation. Do they begin to increase the quantity of sugar made with you?"

1794 April 20. "There are 8. sugar maples alive."

1798 March 22. (Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph). "I have just had put on board the sloop Sally ... a box of plants ... as follow: ... Sugar maple 2. plants."

1808 July 15. (Jefferson to C.P. de Lasteyrie). "I should think the maple-sugar more worthy of experiment. There is no part of France of which the climate would not admit this tree. I have never seen a reason why every farmer should not have a sugar orchard as well as an apple orchard. The supply of sugar for his family would require as little ground, and the process of making it as easy as that of cider."

1809 November 6. (Jefferson to Thomas Lomax). "I propose to make me a large orchard of Paccan & Roanoke & Missouri scaly barks which I possess .... to these I shall add the sugar maple tree if I can procure it."

Notes, References, & Further Sources on the above article available here.

Also see the Peggy Cornett's Twinleaf article from January 2004 Encounters with America’s Premier Nursery and Botanic Garden here

For more information & the possible availability for purchase
Contact The Tho Jefferson Center for Historic Plants or The Shop at Monticello 

Garden to Table -

 At Market with the Fruit Seller by Louise Moillon (1610–1696)    Detail