TIP FOR SUCCESS: The recipe makes 8 cups of cake batter. You can bake it in small or larger loaf pans, or even in cupcake tins, adjusting the baking time accordingly.
Makes 20 or more servings
ADAPTED FROM “LINCOLN CAKE,” AMERICAN COOKERY (THE BOSTON COOKING SCHOOL MAGAZINE), FEBRUARY AND MARCH 1899.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book began with a simple question: What do you think Abraham Lincoln enjoyed eating? I’ve pursued the answer in history, biography, cookbooks, and foodways, I’ve discovered wonderful recipes, benefited from scholarly support, and made new kitchen friends.
Anyone who writes about Abraham Lincoln’s early life is indebted to William Herndon and the scores of “informants” he interviewed after President Lincoln’s assassination. I begin my thanks there and to editors Douglas L. Wilson and Rodney O. Davis along with the University of Illinois Press for publishing Herndon’s documents. Through their work I was able to read these Lincoln stories in their entirety, uncovering details often not included by other authors who quoted from them.
I am appreciative of the efforts of Google Books and the New York Times for their searchable resources that brought original documents from the nineteenth century to my desktop.
I am also indebted to the National Park Service Lincoln sites. It is still possible to walk the paths of Lincoln’s childhood and married life. My deepest thanks go to those who work in Lincoln’s spaces for providing information and for reviewing the manuscript as I developed it. Susan Haake, curator of the Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield generously helped me understand Mary Lincoln’s stove and so much more about the daily life in the home at Eighth and Jackson and the Springfield community. Thanks also to John Popolis, museum technician, Tim Townsend, historian, and Superintendent Dale Phillips. At the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial in Lincoln City, Indiana, Michael Capps, chief of interpretation and especially Park Guide Taryn Hill helped me realize and express the details of that successful Lincoln farm.
At President Lincoln’s Cottage, Washington, D.C., restored and now managed by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Executive Director Erin Carlson Mast answered countless questions and shared copies from the diaries of the soldiers who camped around the president’s cottage. Director Mast and Zachary Klitzman, executive assistant, kindly reviewed the manuscript chapters written about that time in the president’s life. The staff at the White House Historical Association also provided insights as well as information and reviewed the Washington, D.C., chapters.
Staff members at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Patricia Barker at the Lincoln Library, the public library in Springfield, Illinois, provided important research resources.
I am indebted to many who have helped, encouraged, and supported my work over the several years of research, recipe testing and tasting, and writing. Early readers Robert Devens and Anne Kaplan helped me find the voice for this exploration of Lincoln’s life. I thank Shannon Pennefeather, Hamp Smith, and Maureen Fischer, friends who read the work in progress, made comments and corrections, and asked clarifying questions.
I owe a special thank-you to Dr. Wayne C. Temple, whose clear comments and kind direction helped me make the last improvements to this biography. Any errors of fact or interpretation are mine.
At Smithsonian Books, insightful recipe editor Susan Struck and incomparable manuscript editor Lise Sajewski engaged in this project with a generous spirit of partnership. They were a joy to work with. Editor Christina Wiginton also helped make Abraham Lincoln in the Kitchen a better book. Thanks, too, to Director Carolyn Gleason and Marketing Director Matt Litts for their belief in the strength of this work and for supporting it so well. I am delighted with the attention, clarity, and creativity Mary Parsons brought to the design of the book’s interior and its cover.
And always, my gratitude to John for his steadfast support, cheerful sampling of dishes made from old recipes, and especially for looking up during Thanksgiving dinner and wondering about what Lincoln might have enjoyed on his plate.
Rae Katherine Eighmey
Spring 2013
NOTES
I read both modern and classic biographies as I sought perspective and details of Abraham Lincoln’s life and the lives of his family. As I selected material to quote or cite, I relied upon modern writers including Michael Burlingame (2008), David Herbert Donald (1995), Doris Kearns Goodwin (2005), and Louis A. Warren (1926 and 1991). I also cited from Lincoln biographers from the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries, including Albert J. Beverage (1928), Francis Fisher Browne (1887 in 1995 reprint), William Herndon (1920), John Nicolay and John Hay (1890), and Ida Tarbell (1924 and 1928).
Earl Schenck Miers and C. Percy Powell’s Lincoln Day by Day: A Chronology 1809–1865 (1960 in 1991 reprint) was constantly open on my desk.
Wayne Temple took the title of his 2004 comprehensive listing of the foods Lincoln ate from one of Lincoln’s letters. In the letter, the soon-to-be candidate said of seeking the Republican presidential nomination: “The taste is in my mouth a little.” Temple’s thorough and well-organized book often provided just the piece of information I needed to carry my story ahead.
Much of the material in this book is gleaned from the words of Abraham and Mary Lincoln. Roy P. Basler (1953) compiled Lincoln’s complete works into eleven volumes. Those volumes and the collection of Mary Todd Lincoln’s letters by Justin and Linda Levitt Turner (1972) were also constant desktop companions.
Finally, I own a tremendous debt to William Herndon and James Weik, who sought out Lincoln’s companions and asked these informants insightful questions to describe the evocative details of daily life. The pages of my copy of the University of Illinois edition edited by Douglas Wilson, Rodney Davis, and Terri Wilson (1998) are littered with multicolored sticky notes.
INTRODUCTION
I found Phillip Ayers’s remarkable story of Lincoln putting on the blue apron and cooking in Rufus Wilson (1943). M. F. K. Fisher wrote her description of the power of food in With Bold Knife and Fork (1969). The quotation can be found on page 101. James Carey’s quotation can be found on page 180 of Robert Karl Manoff and Michael Schudson’s Reading the News (1987).
As to Abraham Lincoln’s weight, two friends from his young adulthood offered differing opinions to William Herndon. Nathanial Grigsby said Lincoln weighed 160 pounds; William Green claimed the weight was 214 pounds.
CHAPTER 1
I called upon a variety of modern and Lincoln-era resources to inform this chapter’s discussion of childhood, culture, and corn. Lincoln’s niece, Harriet Hanks Chapman, described his love for corn cakes to William Herndon (Wilson, Davis, and Wilson 1998). Her father, Dennis Hanks, similarly reported the crops the Lincolns grew in Indiana.
Louis A. Warren’s extensive research into primary documents of the Kentucky and Indiana pioneering days resulted in two books. From these books I gained key insights into the culture of those places as well as the lives of Thomas, Nancy, Sarah, Sally, and Abraham Lincoln. I have used the Indiana information (Warren 1991) here and, as you will see, in the next three chapters.
In his Two Years’ Residence on the English Prairie of Illinois (1968 reprint), John Woods wrote back home to London friends of his adventures and discoveries as he journeyed to Illinois in 1820, establishing his farm less than one hundred miles from Thomas Lincoln’s Indiana homestead. His reporting of the American prairie agriculture and community culture provides immediate details of how crops were planted, how they grew, the yields per acre, and preparation for winter storage. His descriptions of the Americans he encountered and explanations of their way of life are almost like podcasts into the past. His descriptions in the second half of the book are particularly informative about both agriculture and native plants harvested for food by the settlers.
Two modern sources for corn growing, Douglas R. Hurt (1994) and Betty Fussell (1992), present a basis for understanding the historical importance of this grain. Lincoln
-era sources, including the key farming periodical of the day the Union Agriculturalist, provide on-the-ground details of growing practices and harvest conditions.
Dennis Hanks’s description of the way young Lincoln carried and ate corn dodgers is related on page 26 of Eleanore Stackhouse Atkinson’s The Boyhood of Lincoln (1908).
My adventures in making hominy began with the Union Agriculturalist articles quoted in the text. I found more clues with the aid of early Lincoln Indiana friends Benjamin F. Irwin and Ira Emerson (Wilson, Davis, and Wilson 1998) and an 1840 edition of The Family Magazine, which I found online. Corn shellers were described by John McLean on page 88 in his 1919 book and by Richard Van Vleck in his article that I found on the American Artifacts website.
Three biographers provided descriptions and details of Mary Todd’s childhood (Helm 1928; Baker 1987; Berry 2007). The names of the household slaves are detailed on pages 22–23 of Helm.
CHAPTER 2
On my search to re-create the only recipe Abraham Lincoln described, I found the details of his version reported by Walter B. Stevens (1998), page 105. Lincoln biographers David Herbert Donald (1995) and Walter B. Stevens (1998) evocatively took me to Ottawa, Illinois, and the site of Lafayette Square for his debate with Senator Douglas, while Louis A. Warren (1926 and 1991) portrayed the Kentucky and Indiana farms.
Although period cookbooks served as the primary sources for my exploration of the gingerbread man recipe, modern sources helped explain the differences in the amounts of ginger and the American agricultural history of sorghum (John J. Winberry, Agricultural History, 1980; Turner 2004; Smith 2007; Fiery Foods and Barbecue SuperSite article by DeWitt and Gerlach).
CHAPTER 3
The White House website provided concise information on the boyhood homes of the presidents.
I found key insights into the foods Lincoln enjoyed or, at least, could have eaten in the detailed recollections of his childhood friends and neighbors. Letters to William Herndon and interviews conducted by him (Wilson, Davis, and Wilson 1998) were almost as good as a shopping list: Dennis Hanks, pawpaws, honey; J. W. Wartmann, game, fish, wild fruits, and Lincoln’s shooting skills; A. H. Chapman, Lincoln’s hunting skills as well as the crops and livestock on the Lincoln farm; E. R. Burba, Lincoln hunting with his dog; Elizabeth Crawford, wild fruits, special foods for church gatherings, and Lincoln’s claim that just potatoes for dinner were “poor blessings”; John Hanks described the Lincoln women as “good cooks.”
Lincoln’s stepmother, Sarah Bush Johnston Lincoln, recalled the wild and desolate conditions she encountered upon her arrival in Indiana to Herndon as well.
Louis A. Warren spent his life in the states of Lincoln’s childhood. Born and educated in Kentucky, he was the editor of the Larue County Herald in Hopkinsville, near Lincoln’s birthplace. Later he served as director of the Lincoln Library Museum in Fort Wayne, Indiana, for three decades. Warren brought his journalist’s research skills and his familiarity with the lay of the land of both those states to his valuable and detailed exploration of the social and economic conditions of Abraham Lincoln and his parents. Warren’s discoveries bring important insights into the childhoods of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks (Warren 1926). He also wrote extensive detail of the family’s early Indiana neighborhood and farm experiences, including young Abraham’s pulling fodder to pay for the ruined Life of Washington (Warren 1991). The description of the sound of Lincoln chopping wood as though it were three men can be found on page 143.
Lincoln’s own description of his farming life appears in his 1860 campaign autobiography.
I found James Little’s wonderful pawpaw memory at the Peterson Pawpaws website. Washington Irving’s bee-hunting essay was printed in The Crayon Miscellany (1871).
John Woods’s 1820 descriptions of foods and life (1968 reprint) were invaluable assets to understanding the pioneering Indiana culture. You can read his descriptions of pumpkins, vegetables, and seasonings on pages 155–61; rabbits running into logs on page 142; and frolics on page 154.
The staff of the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial generously answered my questions both during my visit and in follow-up telephone conversations and e-mails.
CHAPTER 4
Once again I relied upon Louis A. Warren (1991) and David Herbert Donald (1995) for the known facts of the departure of the extended Lincoln family for Illinois and for Abraham Lincoln’s first trip down the Mississippi. Ida Tarbell (1924) captured details of Lincoln’s New Salem life.
I had the extraordinary benefit of reading firsthand descriptions of the river and New Orleans written by other young men near the time Lincoln made his journey. Reading their words as they encountered this vital city and dynamic river was almost as though I could see, smell, and taste the place as Lincoln would have experienced it. All of these resources are available through Google Books. Robert Baird’s (1834) description of the cargoes at the levee can be found on page 280 and in H. Didimus (1845) on pages 6–7. Charles Sealsfield’s (1828) description of the steamboat sound and smoke can be found on page 111. James Stuart’s (1833) images of food for sale along the river on page 277 and George William Featherstonhaugh’s (1844) tales of evening entertainment along the way on page 137 gave me additional details of a traveler’s life on the river. Benjamin Moore Norman’s (1845) positive descriptions of all the virtues, sights, and edifices of his hometown highlighted the marketplaces on pages 136–39, while John Purdy (1839) described the vendors’ wares on page 185.
Lincoln’s associates described the Mississippi adventure to William Herndon. John Hanks’s key recollection that they “elected Abe cook” is somewhat contradicted by his remark that Lincoln “boarded at Carman’s,” the tavern in the town. However, I don’t think the two are mutually exclusive. Lincoln could easily have prepared two of the three days’ meals and gone up the bank and into the village for dinner.
Richard Campanella’s (2010) analysis of the two Lincoln journeys provided helpful details including the possible construction of the flatboat. I found information about the speed and routes of steamboats at “The History of Steamboats,” on the About.com inventors website. Robert Fulton is credited with inventing the practical steamboat when the Clermont made her round-trip from New York City to Albany in 1807. Fulton with partner Edward Livingston established steamboat routes between New Orleans and Natchez, Mississippi, beginning in 1814. These early boats traveled eight miles per hour with the downstream current and three miles per hour against the current upstream.
The slim volume by Thomas Reep, Lincoln in New Salem (1927), captures that village and its short history. Memories of Lincoln’s life and impact in the village can be found indexed by the names of the residents I quoted.
I discovered the Lake Pontchartrain Railroad history on the New Orleans Past website and the barred owl gumbo in Alexander Wilson and Charles Lucian Bonaparte (1831) volume 4, page 284.
Robert Mazrim’s (2007) wonderful descriptions of his archaeological explorations below New Salem’s soil highlighted the sophistication of this frontier community with settlers bringing and wanting to buy china, glassware, and clothing in addition to rustic basics.
The barrels of oranges and lemons arriving in Springfield were advertised in the January 1, 1842, edition of the Sangamo Journal.
CHAPTER 5
George M. Harrison’s culinary details dovetailed nicely with my perspective for this work. His lengthy letters to William Herndon form the basis for much of this chapter and our understanding of Lincoln’s brief military career. Harrison’s 1860 letter was quoted in Michael Burlingame (2006), pages 99–100.
William Souder (2004) quoted Audubon’s respect for the hunting skills of the Native American on page 139.
Wayne Temple’s (1981) explanation of Illinois militia equipment provided the information I needed to understand what the New Salem volunteers would have taken with them and how they were equipped.
I found details from the 1830 federal census online at Ancestry.com.
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br /> In the recipe section, I brushed up on my history of election cakes with Marian Burros’s November 2, 1988, New York Times article, “Election Cake: A Noble Tradition.”
CHAPTER 6
I first encountered the recipe for Mary Todd’s almond cake in Poppy Cannon and Patricia Brooks (1968). However, the same recipe, or a close version, appears in countless other sources.
Paul M. Angle’s (1935) work describing the increasingly sophisticated community of Springfield as it grew from a village into a city yielded many important details as I came to understand Springfield as the Lincoln family’s home.
Ruth Painter Randall (1953), David Herbert Donald (1995), and Michael Burlingame (2008) all wrote of the events leading up to the James Shield’s challenge of Lincoln and the duel. Each provided important facts and perspectives.
Judge Lockwood’s skeptical assessment of his wife’s new stove was related by Caroline Owsley Brown in her article “Springfield Society before the Civil War” in the Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society (April–June 1922) on page 477.
Abraham Lincoln in the Kitchen Page 27
