Cooking from “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County” always provides an opportunity for excursions into some neglected aspects of Maryland cuisine (both regionally and racially). This week I made a simple recipe for a scalloped potato dish, a comforting winter side. The recipe author: Julia Courtney? I’ve tried my best. As I’ve mentioned before, St. Mary’s County has a web of surnames linking Black and White families to the region’s plantation past.
While there is a relative wealth of resources for learning about the families who contributed to “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County,” it’s not always so easy to connect the dots definitively.
As best as I can tell, Julia Courtney may be Julia Dorothy Courtney, born in 1905, and married to James Cornelius Courtney. Julia Dorothy and James Cornelius’ son Joseph married a woman named Julia Haskell, a woman from South Carolina. She too may be the originator of the recipe. To further confuse me, one of the interviewees in the Slackwater Archive oral histories, named Dorothy Courtney, ultimately appeared to be from a White watermen family, despite being right about the same age.
So I can’t turn up too much about Julia Courtney herself.
Nonetheless, I always welcome an excuse to revisit the oral histories and photos documenting the life of St. Mary’s county farming communities.
Julia Dorothy and James Cornelius Courtney are listed as a family of farmers in the St. Mary’s county censuses of the early decades of the 20th century.
Canned Vegetables in home of FSA borrower, 1941 photo John Collier, loc.gov
Farming was the primary listed trade at the time – especially for Black residents. Flipping through the pages of the 1930 census reveals farming families with all of the names found in “300 Years of Black Cooking…”; Dotson, Briscoe, Dyson, Dove, Courtney… While most heads of families are listed as farmers or farm laborers, and a few are listed as watermen, it is likely that many citizens labored in both industries to make ends meet.
In addition to the oral history transcriptions I found two books in the Pratt Library that put some of the oral histories and photo-documentation together. Andrea Hammer, the founder of the St. Mary’s County Documentation Project, edited two books documenting St. Mary’s County. “In My Time” focuses on the work of Black and White women including farming, seafood and midwifery. “But Now When I Look Back” showcases some Farm Security Administration photographs (as seen in the Edith Dyson’s crab-cakes entry.)
The photos reveal a farming community working together – sharing resources, building infrastructure, raising families.
James Bush with horse which is owned cooperatively by three farmers, 1940, photo John Vachon, loc.gov
Modern stereotypes all but erase the existence and history of Black farmers but there is patent absurdity to this. First and foremost is the fact that ancestors of many African Americans were captured and enslaved for the sole purpose of farming. In many cases, the enslaved were allotted gardens to grow food in their own time, essentially necessitating a life of farming upon farming.
In general, it makes little sense to presume that any one race or culture is more inclined to farming than another. The food we all eat comes from farms and this is the case in most of the world.
Industrial agriculture has made little room for small farmers in general, and as usual there are are historical barriers preventing Black Americans from getting a foothold in an already-challenging industry.
“For decades, the U.S. Department of Agriculture discriminated against Black farmers, excluding them from farm loans and assistance. Meanwhile, racist violence in the South targeted land-owning Black farmers, whose very existence threatened the sharecropping system. These factors led to the loss of about 14 million acres of Black-owned rural land—an area nearly the size of West Virginia.” – After a Century In Decline, Black Farmers Are Back And On the Rise, Leah Penniman
It takes a concerted effort to recover from such obstacles but there is movement in Maryland and beyond. In addition to the many urban farms and community gardens that aim to reconnect citizens with their food supply, more concerted efforts like the Black Dirt Farm Collective (Preston, MD) are working with churches and Public Health groups to address food deserts and revive Black agrarian culture.
That spirit of co-operation is not unlike that seen in some of the Farm Security Administration photographs. Sadly, many of the photos are lacking complete captions naming the participants.
Well installation in Ridge, MD 1941, photo John Collier, loc.gov
Many Farm Security Administration photos and oral histories depict crushing poverty that Saint Mary’s County residents faced amidst a life of grueling work on land and in water. Many families, according to “But Now When I Look Back,” eventually moved to Baltimore and elsewhere to seek a better life:
“Not many people now have gardens like they used to because they’re working… different jobs, and they don’t have time to work the gardens. Not as many people can things now. Most everything gets frozen. Not as many people put up jellies as they used to. But I still feel that if there was a need, everybody would rally around and help the person. The only difference is , now it seems to be if there’s a need. At that time, it wasn’t because there was a need. It was because “I want to.” People just went out spontaneously and did it. But it seems now the sharing and caring is there but is sort of dwindled down to, “If you need me I’ll be there and I’ll share.
Most of my generation moved away, because of getting jobs… But I believe that wherever they are they’re still probably sharing cause I don’t think they could get too far away from it, having been brought up that way.” – Elvare Gaskin, “But Now when I Look Back: Remembering St. Mary’s County Through Farm Security Administration Photographs”
- as many potatoes as you need
- 1 small onion, chopped
- salt
- pepper, black
- milk enough to cover the potatoes
- 2 Tablespoon butter
Peel and slice the potatoes thinly. Place in a greased casserole dish, mixing with onions, and season with salt and pepper. Dot the potatoes with butter, and pour the milk over them. Bake very slowly in a 200° oven until brown and crispy on top, about 1 ½ hours.
Recipe adapted from “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County“
