Born five years before the Civil War and the daughter of an enslaved cook, little Emma Wilson wanted to go to school with her white friends. She was told she couldn’t because of her race, and after the civil war she was told she couldn’t because she was a girl. Through her determination, she kept pace with the class outside of school. When the time came that she could attend school, she was placed within her grade.
Emma Wilson, founder and principal of the Maysville Industrial and Educational Institute
Wilson’s commitment to education and the great desire to assist others of her locale and race made her change her plans of ministering in Africa to building a local school in her hometown of Maysville South Carolina. The school began in the kitchen of her mother’s cabin in 1885. It quickly grew and incorporated as the Maysville Industrial and Educational Institute. After a few years Wilson became committed to not only teaching liberal arts, but to teach skills such as blacksmithing, sewing, and cooking.
Fannie Farmer taught plain cooking, richer cooking, and fancy cooking at the Boston Cooking School from circa 1896 to 1902. She then branched out and started her own school, Miss Farmer’s School of Cookery on August 23, 1902. the school continued after her death in 1915, managed by Alice Bradley until Miss Farmer’s School closed in the mid-1940s.
Plain Cooking
Cooking Fuels
Bread
Mashed and Boiled Potatoes
Soup Stock
Boiled Eggs
Beef Stew
Fried Fish & Potatoes
Apple Pie
Roast Beef
Macaroni
Plain Lobster Like
The Pioneer kitchen at the museum in Watertown New York is the scene for hands-on pioneer kitchen work for children during the Pioneer Times program. On the other side of the room you can see over 50 years in the future to a Victorian kitchen — a good way to compare historic kitchens side-by-side! Like
Genesee Country Village & Museum is conveniently located South of Rt 90 in Le Roy / Mumford, New York. Video by Rena Goff of Merrymeeting Archives LLC. They offer historic cooking and cheese-making classes.
The Farmer’s Museum, also in upstate New York, holds workshops including A Morning at Lippitt Farmstead where you will collect eggs and other morning farm chores before helping to cook and then eat a farm breakfast of traditional foods such as sausage, eggs, Indian Cake, toast, and boiled coffee.
More Classes Jourdan Bachman Pioneer Farm in Austin, Texas has a fun class catalog. And more often would be good! Like
1879: The Boston Cooking School — preceded by Women’s Education Association; taught by Joanna Sweeney, Mary Lincoln, and then Fannie Farmer — Boston, Mass.
1971: The Elite Cooking School Newton Centre, Massachusetts — founded by Madeleine Kamman, now The School for American Chefs in Beringer Vineyards, Napa Valley, California, meeting 2-weeks per year
Click here for a list of Cooking Schools, or Domestic Science departments, in the United States in 1905. The article begins on page 174. Included are notes such as the Boston Cooking School, with the writer, Fannie Farmer as principal, cost $125 per 6 months, the same as Simmons College in Boston. Another Massachusetts school, The State Normal School in Framingham, had one of the largest Domestic Science departments in the country. The Philadelphia Cooking School, is listed with Mrs. Rorer as principal, another famous cook book writer. Like
Wow! The American Museum of Baking in Manhattan has samples of Egyptian bread, cake more than 3,800 years old, priceless 200 year old baking books, and much more! The museum is part of The American Institute of Baking on Baker’s Way…near a major road named “Pillsbury!” Like
The first two full weeks of every June in Abilene Kansas children attend Pioneer Camp where they churn butter, cook and discover the other skills needed to live 100 years ago.
Call Heritage Center of Dickinson County 785-263-2681. Like
Would you like to visit an American diner, an early-American tavern, Victorian kitchens and a 1930s kitchen, and much more, all in one building? The Culinary Arts Museum in Providence Rhode Island is amazing–and has it all!
The museum is part of Johnson & Wales University’s culinary arts program and hosts special events such as the Weekend of Fire featuring baking demonstrations in a wood-fired brick oven, tours of a Swiss Military Mobile bread-baking truck and blacksmithing demos of culinary tools. Check their website for events.
