Home economics: From ‘apron strings to kitchen sinks’

While serving as chief of the Bureau of Home Economics within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) from 1923-43, Dr. Louise Ellen Stanley was responsible for educating American homemakers about cooking techniques and advising them on other domestic issues and concerns.

 

A native of Nashville, Tenn., Dr. Stanley earned a doctorate degree in chemistry from Yale University. She served as a home economics professor and department chair at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Mo., before going to work for the federal government.

At the USDA, Dr. Stanley took on the persona of “Aunt Sammy,” the fictional wife of America’s “Uncle Sam.” It was her job, working with a team of three other women, to produce a 15-minute radio program “Housekeeper’s Chat” that aired five days a week, beginning in 1926. The program was distributed nationally through a network of local radio stations.

 

Aunt Sammy was a huge success; millions of households tuned in. Listeners flooded Aunt Sammy with letters, asking for her help on the full spectrum of housekeeping topics.

 

For example, during one episode, Aunt Sammy shared that she loved cottage cheese, “a source of protein to build and repair body tissue. Cottage cheese makes a delicious sandwich filling, especially for the picnic season of the year.”

 

The “Housekeeper’s Chat” ran for two decades. Although the radio show was discontinued in 1946, much of the bureau’s work has been preserved by the U.S. National Agricultural Library in Beltsville, Md., through a digital exhibit “Apron Strings and Kitchen Sinks.” It cites numerous bulletins and publications authored by Dr. Stanley during her tenure at USDA.

 

She wrote curriculum for the first-year high school course in home economics. (The language reflects a bygone era.)

“The aim of any course in home economics is to make the girl a better homemaker,” Dr. Stanley stated. “By teaching her how to do, and the reasons why, and as well by giving insight into the fundamental importance of homemaking, such instruction transforms housework from drudgery into an honored profession.”

“In the average home, two industries stand out – sewing and cooking – and they furnish the basis of a well-rounded course; but they should be supplemented by other subjects necessary for the homemaker.”

 

Dr. Stanley stressed the importance of applying scientific principles to home canning of fruits and vegetables. “Canning is a method of using heat and airtight containers to preserve food as nearly as possible in the condition in which it is served when freshly cooked,” she wrote.

“It is a desirable and economical method of preserving many foods so that their use can be distributed over seasons and to places where they are not available fresh.”

 

“The method of canning foods affects the vitamin content to some extent,” Dr. Stanley said. “Emphasis is placed on canning foods very soon after they are gathered and on carrying every step of the process through rapidly…precooking foods for a short time, packing them hot and processing them in the containers….”

 

“A canning budget prepared at the beginning of the season will indicate what quantities of different canned foods are needed by the family. In making such a budget, consider the number of persons in the family, the length of time that fresh foods are out of season and what foods are available for canning, as well as the cost of equipment and containers.”

Dr. Stanley concluded: “Assistance in planning a canning budget suitable to the locality and adapted to the nutritional requirements of the family may be obtained from the State college of agriculture.”

Don’t go looking in all the wrong places…like Chapel Hill, N.C.

Happy 120th birthday to the Campbell Soup Kids!

Cheers to the Campbell Soup Kids, who celebrate their 120-year anniversary in 2025 as the advertising cartoon mascots of Campbell’s.

The legendary illustrations were drawn by Grace Gebbie, an accomplished artist from Philadelphia, Pa. Her first husband, Theodore Wiederseim, a lithographer, printed the streetcar advertising posters used by Joseph Campbell Company.

 

In 1904, Theodore took samples of Grace’s artwork to an account meeting at Campbell’s corporate headquarters in Camden, N.J. He suggested that illustrations of “healthy looking children” would be a good way to promote Campbell’s line of condensed soup products. Company officials readily agreed.

Grace’s children were loveable. She called them her “funny babies.” A tad on the plump side, with jolly faces, wide-set eyes and rosy cheeks, the cheerful characters were introduced on streetcar advertising posters in 1905. They represented the perfect picture of “health and wholesomeness” in that era.

 

Grace created about 16 variations of children that Campbell could draw upon for their ads. None were named.

 

Public reaction to the new Campbell Kids images was overwhelmingly positive. “Requests for copies of the advertisements inundated the company,” one historian commented. “Mothers hung images of the Kids on nursery walls, and teachers placed them in classrooms.”

 

The Campbell Kids also began appearing in print advertisements contained within popular magazines and publications, such as Ladies’ Home Journal, Good Housekeeping and the Saturday Evening Post. An example of the accompanying text is: “The main object of these rollicking youngsters is to remind you of Campbell’s Soup…as it helps you to promote good digestion and robust health.”

Soon thereafter, the Joseph Campbell Company licensed the rights to make Campbell Kids dolls to E.I. Horsman Company, a well-respected doll company based in New York City.

 

According to Kate Kelly (shown below), publisher of the America Comes Alive! website that features stories about U.S. heroes and trailblazers, “the dolls were a huge success and sold by mail order through Montgomery Ward and Sears but also in the mom-and-pop toy stores that proliferated at the time.”

 

Many other items featured the NIL (name, image and likeness) of the Campbell kids followed, ranging from cooking sets to children’s pajamas. Their value as prized collectibles continues to rise.

Today, Grace Gebbie Wiederseim Drayton occupies a special place in Kate Kelly’s collection of “Inspirational American Women.”

Grace broke through as a successful artist as a 17-year-old in 1895 – 20 years prior to the launch of the Campbell Kids. She worked steadily, drawing for magazines, greeting card and paper doll companies. She also illustrated children’s books and eventually sold comic strips to newspapers and syndicates.

 

Grace Drayton is considered to be one of the first and most successful American female cartoonists.

She studied at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women and also took drawing classes at Drexel Institute (now Philadelphia’s Drexel University) where many well-regarded illustrators taught.

Kate Kelly said she believes one of Grace Drayton’s major contributions was the creation of the highly popular “Dolly Dingle” series of paper dolls that appeared from 1913-33 in The Pictorial Review magazine.

 

Grace Drayton continued to draw her Campbell Soup Kids until she died of heart disease in 1936 at age 58.

The Campbell Kids characters progressed with the times. In the 1920s, for instance, Campbell girls donned flapper dresses and danced the Charleston. The Kids visited Egypt in 1922 after the discovery of King Tut’s tomb. They were shown riding in airplanes, a tribute to Charles Lindbergh’s famous transatlantic journey in 1927.

Into the 1930s, the Campbell Kids developed voices to sponsor radio shows like “Amos ’n’ Andy,” and to introduce the Campbell’s slogan: “M’m! M’m! Good!”

Remembering ‘Our Town’ and the magic of ‘saints and poets’

Back in 1964, drama students at Adrian (Mich.) High School performed the world’s best production of the popular play “Our Town,” written by Thornton Wilder. Or so we thought at the time.

Thornton Wilder

As an underclassman, my part in the “all school play” directed by drama instructor Raymond Lewandowski was a minor role. The stars of the show were Barbara Luke, a junior, who played “Emily Gibbs Webb,” and senior Milton “Rocky” Bailey II, who was cast as the “Stage Manager.”

Their knockout delivery of lines from Act III:

EMILY: “Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it – every, every minute?”

STAGE MANAGER: “No – Saints and poets maybe – they do some.”

How profound. I can’t begin to count the number of times I’ve pulled that “saints and poets” reference from the recesses of what’s left of my brain…over the past 60 years…to reflect on the loss of a family member, dear friend or someone who has touched my life…while pledging to do a better job of “realizing life…every, every minute.”

But it’s hard. Distractions get in the way. Obligations interfere. There are bills to pay, duties to be performed, commitments to keep, errands to run, groceries to buy, meals to prepare, a never-ending list of daily household chores…you name it.

Some comfort can be gained from the writings of the Rev. Beth Merrill Neel, a Presbyterian pastor in Portland, Ore. She’s a huge fan of “Our Town.”

“Those words about realizing life, ‘every, every minute,’ grow more poignant as I get older,” she said. “It’s the acknowledgement that these bones and ligaments and cells break down after a while, that they’re not made of diamonds or titanium, impenetrable and durable for eternity.”

“It has taken me a while to cultivate the practice of realizing life,” Rev. Neel wrote. “I’ve never been the kind who stops and smells the roses, but I’m beginning to do just that.”

Here is Rev. Beth Neel with her husband, the Rev. Gregg Neel, photographed on Easter.

It all hits home at about age 50, she said. The urge is to rush and cram in as “much living” as you can in however many days one has left, but the body says: “slow down.”

So, Rev. Neel says she has become a more intense observer of her loved ones and the little things in life…and she tries to follow the script of “Our Town.”

In her brief return to experience just one day of “life-after-death” in Grover’s Corners, N.H., Emily bids goodbye to her loving parents as well as “clocks ticking, her butternut tree, Mama’s sunflowers, new-ironed dresses and hot baths.”

 

Rev. Neel said: “I wonder at the perfect circle the dog makes when he curls up and the asymmetry of spider webs. I marvel at how hard it is to photograph a spider web or a rainbow or a sunset, and maybe it’s better that way.”

 

“I pay attention to the color of the sky on any given day, and the color of the leaves, and whether or not they’re still a part of the branch or part of the lawn,” she said.

“I look for what is good; I try to hold fast to what is good because that is the glue of life, the stuff that holds us together….”

Rev. Neel said she believes that there are saints among us who “dress up as teachers and CNAs (Certified Nursing Assistants)…and guys who punch a clock when the whistle blows.”

The clock strikes 11 p.m. in Grover’s Corners. “Tomorrow’s going to be another day,” the Stage Manager states matter-of-factly.

“May a saint or poet cross your path,” Dr. Neel prayed.

* * * 

Thornton Wilder (1897-1975) was a pivotal figure in the literary history of the 20th century. He is the only writer to win Pulitzer Prizes for both fiction and drama. 

He received the Pulitzer for his novel “The Bridge of San Luis Rey” (1927) and the plays “Our Town” (1938) and “The Skin of Our Teeth” (1942).

“Our Town” was licensed for amateur production in 1939. “Over the next 20 months,” English novelist Penelope Fitzgerald wrote, “‘Our Town’ was produced in at least 658 communities across the United States and in Hawaii and Canada.” 

To this day, it remains one of the most performed plays anywhere. 

Thornton Wilder played the Stage Manager in the Broadway production of “Our Town” for two weeks in September 1938. 

 

Hal Holbrook played the Stage Manager in a television version of “Our Town” in 1977.

Paul Newman played the Stage Manager in “Our Town” during a production that ran on Broadway in 2002-03, marking his final stage performance.

Pineapple emerges as world symbol of ‘hospitality’

Continuing to explore the development of the pineapple as the international symbol of hospitality, European explorers regularly gathered pineapples during their travels to the islands of the Caribbean Sea that began late in the 15th century.

The French are credited with declaring the pineapple as “the king of fruits,” according to journalist Beth McKibben of Atlanta, Ga., a regular contributor to southernkitchen.com.

“The fruit was costly cargo and often rotted in the bowels of ships during the long journey from the Caribbean islands back to Europe,” she wrote. “Eventually, sea captains discovered that the pineapples could be either candied or packed in sugar to preserve them.”

“The story of how the pineapple became a symbol of hospitality is deeply rooted in the history of New England,” McKibben said. “In the olden days, sea captains from the New England colonies, upon returning from voyages in the Caribbean, would stake a pineapple on their fence post.”

“This was a sign to the townspeople that the captain had returned home safely from sea. The pineapple served as an invitation for friends and neighbors to visit, share meals and listen to tales of the captain’s adventures at sea.”

“Also, pineapples carved into bedposts were a common sight at inns throughout New England,” McKibben said.

 

One of the earliest efforts to grow pineapples in the American colonies occurred at George Washington’s Mount Vernon estate in Virginia on the Potomac River.

In 1751, George Washington traveled to Barbados, at age 19, accompanying his elder half-brother, Lawrence Washington, who was suffering from tuberculosis and was advised to spend the winter in the tropics.

Having tasted pineapples in Barbados, George Washington built a “pinery” when he returned to Mount Vernon.

The pinery was a heated greenhouse that enabled a grower in temperate climate zones to raise tropical fruits indoors.

“In the years just prior to the Revolutionary War, the pineapple would play another role: peacemaker between Britain and the colonies,” according to McKibben. “Virginia Gov. Norborne Berkeley, known as Lord Botetourt, ordered 65 pineapples for several banquets he hosted throughout 1770, in an attempt to keep business relations strong between the colony’s planter class and the British Crown.”

“The pineapple was meant to bridge the growing gap between the motherland and her subjects during a period of uneasy peace,” she said.

Throughout the years, other symbols also came to represent segments of the hospitality industry, reported Dean Elphick, a marketing executive at Little Hotelier, an Australian software solutions company. 

One was the lantern, indicating “warmth, comfort and guidance,” he said.

 

A lantern’s light is a welcoming sight to a traveler, serving as a beacon and offering a friendly and warm greeting. Lanterns that incorporate the shape of a pineapple are even better.

The compass is yet another symbol that is frequently used to convey “a sense of direction, guidance and hospitality,” Elphick said. “Providing guests with the information and support they need to navigate their journey” is an important element for innkeepers, he added.

 

“If you’re near the ocean, a compass could be a natural fit, as could be an anchor or a breaking wave,” Elphick noted.

We have compasses, anchors and waves in Carteret County, as well as a multitude of other seaside symbols that “connect” to the hospitality-oriented businesses.

Some that readily come to mind are: sea turtles, dolphins, blue marlins, assorted fish, sand dollars, star fish, seashells, herons, pelicans, sea gulls, other shorebirds, sea oats, fishing piers, surfboards, divers, kayaks, boats of all sizes, sunshine, sand castles, beach umbrellas, pirates, Shackleford horses and the Cape Lookout Lighthouse.