This recipe comes from “The Historical Cookbook of the American Negro,” a fascinating cookbook compiled in 1958 by the National Council of Negro Women. The book is organized as a calendar of sorts, with recipes assigned to specific dates. Several recipes in this cookbook have particular Maryland connections, including a pie dedicated to Benjamin Banneker and “Shrimp Boat Maryland,” contributed by the Baltimore chapter of the NCNW. This cornbread recipe falls on March 10th, the day that Harriet Tubman died in 1913.
Writing a biography of Tubman to accompany this post seemed a little bit unnecessary. Harriet Tubman is undoubtedly one of Maryland’s most cherished heroes. Compared to many other figures in American history, she has a large proportion of children’s books written about her and we all grow up with a sense of familiarity with her story.
After making this cornbread I began to think about that, and I did some more research into the actual details of her heroics and her life. I would encourage others to do so – you may be surprised to find how little you truly know.
Harriet Tubman (left) rescued 70 enslaved people on 13 trips back to Maryland
The recipe was contributed to the book by Vivian Carter Mason, the third president of the National Council of Negro Women. Mason’s mother used to make the cornbread for “Aunt Harriet” when Tubman was visiting with the family and sharing stories with the children (including young Vivian.)
Harriet Tubman is believed to be the daughter of a cook, and it is said that she raised money selling food she made. In Beafort, SC, near the site of the Combahee raid that freed more than 750 enslaved people, Tubman “sold Union soldiers root beer, pie and ginger bread, which she baked during the night, after her day’s work,” according to an NPR story.
Reading through the various accounts of Tubman’s life will turn up many contradictions as well as a tragic paucity of information about her enslaved Maryland childhood. At the time of her death, Harriet Tubman was beginning to be forgotten, especially by the white media. In the decades following, her story and legend were built back up to suit different ideas about what makes an American hero. We would all do well to read more and get a sense of the real person behind a new face on currency. We in America love our heroes. When the heroes had been outlaws in our own unjust system the canonization is complicated. Seeking a better understanding of it may just offer a valuable lens for the present.
Recipe:
3-4 slices salt pork
1 cup of plain white flour
3 cups yellow conmeal
1 heaping tb baking powder
pinch baking soda
enough sour milk to moisten ingredients
4 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
2 tb brown sugar
Parboil salt pork (this removes some of the salt), drain & pat dry. Fry to a crisp and set the grease aside. Mix dry ingredients and add in beaten eggs followed by enough milk to make a thick batter. Cut up salt pork and add to batter, along with desired amount of pork grease (I used just under ¼ cup). Pour into well greased pan or skillet and bake at 350° until bread shrinks from sides of pan and browns/cracks on top. Serve hot buttered generously.
Recipe Adapted from “Our ‘Aunt Harriet’s’ Favorite Dish”, the Historical Cookbook of the American Negro
Before the internet and magazines boasted millions of novel (and disposable) recipes, newspapers were a valuable source for recipes that could become staples in a household. With that in mind, I’m hoping to source more entries from newspaper recipes.
This one was shared in 1939 in the Afro-American by Lillian Lottier, prominent Baltimorean, teacher, activist, and columnist for that paper.
Lottier’s “Royal Tropicaroma Cake” was first popularized in “The Royal Guide to Meal Planning” in 1929 as “Tropic Aroma” cake. I expected pineapples & bananas but this is actually more of a spice cake complimented with coffee and chocolate.
Lillian, born in 1881, was the daughter of Reverend Reuben Armstrong, who came to Baltimore from Harrisburg, PA to become pastor of historically black Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church from 1897 to 1904. According to the church’s website, the ministry of Armstrong was “riveted in the policies of black middle classness and intellectualism. [He] encouraged and sponsored ecumenical involvement, wholesome cooperation, and cultural activities – including forums and literary and musical programs.”
It was from this tradition that Lillian Lottier dedicated herself to a life of working for civil rights and social progress. In 1924, Lottier served as the first female president of the Baltimore NAACP. There she “led the Branch for only a single term but made a tremendous statement and mark on the Branch and the City of Baltimore.” She was a founding member of the Baltimore Urban League, and remained active with that organization as well as the Women’s Presbyterian Society.
“Her social activism gives an insight into the interest of female members of the NAACP. She was a long-time member of the United Protestant group in Baltimore that raised funds for inter-church meetings and charity work starting in 1933 and was executive officer by World War II. During the great depression Lottier was a member of National Negro Congress and was a publicity officer for its Baltimore branch, spearheading campaigns to end racial discrimination in employment, targeting large corporations such as Consolidated Gas, Electric Light, and Power Company [now BGE].” – Borders of Equality: The NAACP and the Baltimore Civil Rights Struggle, 1914-1970
Outside of her own column, Lillian Lottier merited frequent mentions in the Afro-American due to her active involvement in the PTA of several Baltimore schools. Her namesake daughter, Lillian Lottier Bolden (1918-2000) was an educator herself, who taught physically and mentally challenged students in Baltimore City.
“Teachers participated in a wide range of efforts to promote democracy, reform curricula, organize communities, and mentor young civil rights activists. Their engagement, both in the public sphere and behind the scenes, has shaped and influenced the Civil Rights Movement.” – Teachers in the Movement: A civil rights oral history project
Reading through Lottier’s columns in the Afro-American is a reminder of the diverse viewpoints among those working for civil rights. “Borders of Equality” described some of her activism with contraception as being “in the vein of the middle-class progressive urge of the era,” and some of Lottier’s views might not seem progressive those with a modern view of civil rights causes.
Nonetheless, her column is an interesting insight into the generation that laid the groundwork for the civil rights activism of the 1960s. In one spirited column she decries a preacher making a flirtatious “remark” to a parishioner. She passionately censures this affront to morality. Despite the amount of words dedicated to this outrage, the “remark” seems to be lost to time. I for one feel cheated.
“Now, she’s a person that puzzles me. I have often wondered whether she is a saint or a sinner. There are times when she seems pious enough to be a cardinal, and there are times when she seems to have a devil-may-care glint in her eye and a ‘Come-on, I-dare’ look in her face.” – 1930 Afro-American column about Lillian Lottier
1957
Lillian was married to George V. Lottier, a postal worker. Although he was involved with the YMCA and a writers group called the “Scribblers,” he does not appear to have been as outspoken as his wife. The family lived at 1509 Druid Hill Avenue in the Upton neighborhood.
“Even though this sex of ours has convincingly demonstrated our ability to compete successfully with men in almost every phase of life, there are still a few dull-witted, pig-headed, narrow-minded males left for whom we welcome additional proof.” – Lillian Lottier, 1926
The frequent Afro-American coverage of Lillian Lottier’s active life began to taper off in the 1950s. An avid-reader, she remained active in book clubs and celebrated milestones in the lives of her four children. In 1957 the Lottiers’ 50th anniversary is celebrated in the paper. Lillian passed away in 1976 with little fanfare. A Baltimore Sun obituary states that in addition to her four children, she was survived by twelve-grandchildren and fifteen great-grandchildren.
“At the best our gain in knowledge during a short life-time is but partial and limited, and it does seem a shame to waste any precious hours in willful blindness and self-deception.
Let it be our earnest desire… to do our feebly best to live fully, deeply, richly, and in accordance with the Creator’s wonderful purpose for mankind.” – Lillian Lottier, 1926
Recipe:
.75 Cup butter
1.25 Cup sugar
2 egg
2.5 Cup flour
4 Teaspoon baking powder
.25 Teaspoon salt
1 Teaspoon nutmeg
1 Teaspoon cinnamon
1 Cup milk
1 Tablespoon cocoa
1 Tablespoon boiling water
For icing:
2 Tablespoon butter
2 Cup sugar, powdered
1 Tablespoon cocoa
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
1 Tablespoon strong coffee
Cream butter; add sugar a little at a time followed by well beaten eggs, mixing thoroughly.
Sift flour, salt, baking powder and spices together. Add a little of the dry ingredients to the first mixture; slowly add milk followed by remaining dry ingredients.
Pour two-thirds of this batter into two greased and floured layer tins.
To remaining third of batter, add 1 tablespoon cocoa mixed with 1 tablespoon of boiling water. Use this batter for middle layer.
Bake layers at 375 F for 15-20 minutes. Put the filling and icing between layers and on top and sides of the cake.
Filling/Icing: Cream butter and add sugar and cocoa very slowly, beating until light and fluffy. Slowly add vanilla and coffee until soft enough to spread.
Recipe adapted from “Cake for a Postman,” Baltimore Afro-American newspaper, 1939
A few weeks ago, while the snow was still coming down, with nowhere to go, I forced myself to do something that I haven’t done since the internet ostensibly put all of history at our fingertips: I called a stranger.
The purpose of my call was to reach anyone involved in the cookbook “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County.”
After some disconnected numbers and voice messages to the void, I reached Bertha Hunt, the daughter of Theresa Swales “Nannie” Young of Leonardtown, a woman with many recipes throughout the book. Theresa Young passed away in November 2012 at the age of 91.
“It’s in my kitchen right now,” Bertha declared when I asked about the cookbook.
Theresa Young was “a living saint” according to her daughter, with cooking skills that were “a gift from God.” Hunt emphasized her mother’s ability to cook completely from scratch with no assistance from conveniences like Jiffy cornbread mix – the likes of which “couldn’t touch” her mother’s cornbread. She recalled how they once grew sweet potatoes, kale, green beans, and “tomaters”, and how they always had “some form of dessert” with dinners – cake, raisin bread, her scratch-made peach cobbler. Her mother, she said, didn’t raise any “skinny twiggy daughters.”
Hunt continues to reside in Leonardtown. She has inherited her mother’s love (and skill) of cooking and spoke with pride about that fact.
Southern Maryland Stuffed Ham is still very popular in St. Mary’s County, and many of the longtime Black citizens there have not forgotten that this delicacy was born from the inventiveness and hardship of their ancestors. Four of the hundred-some-odd pages of “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County” are dedicated to stuffed ham, and Bertha Hunt mentioned it specifically, although her mother’s treasured recipe does not appear in the book. Hunt extolled the importance of fresh Amish market greens and McCormick spices in stuffed ham, which she still makes for special occasions with corned hams from B. K. Miller Meats in Clinton.
The heritage of stuffed ham is also discussed in an oral history interview located in the “SlackWater Archive” at St. Mary’s College of Maryland Archives. There, Theresa Young recorded that her grandmother was enslaved at the Blackistone Plantation at the current location of the St. Mary’s Academy. Theresa’s grandmother was a child growing up on a plantation while her mother tended the cows and worked the fields. They slept in a shack with a dirt floor and used oyster shells for eating utensils. Bertha Hunt mentioned to me that her great-grandmother had slept on beds made of potato sacks stuffed with autumn leaves. These stories have been passed down through generations, but the SlackWater oral histories are a fortunate document for posterity.
Many of the intertwined families of contributors to “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County” come up in those documents. My entry for Edith Dyson’s crab cakes explores another family connected with the cookbook.
“A chitterling dinner consists of chitterlings, potato salad, greens, bread, pie and beer or iced tea.” – Theresa Young in 300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County
Food and race can be a fraught topic – one which I lack the experience or the authority to fully delve into in this website. The most visible facet is the stereotypes that have been used to deride African Americans’ (and other groups’) relationship with food from the outset of the United States. While trying to stay mindful of that context, my aim is to relay the joy and determination preserved within the spiral-bound covers of “300 Years of Black Cooking.” In the face of cruel stereotypes and food access injustice, cookbooks like this one not only preserved a neglected aspect of American heritage, but also sometimes served to fund – and feed – social causes.
“These culinary community advocates ‘bore little resemblance to the smiling, subservient, plump fictional mammies projected in advertising and on film, not only liberating Black women from the backs of buses but also from white kitchens’ as Patricia Turner Observed in Ceramic Uncles and Celluloid Mammies. And they took their recipes with them.
Black culinary workers championed their neighbors’ economic, social and political priorities during the civil rights movement the same way that the Colored Female’s Free Produce Society organized women in the 1830s to boycott products produced by slave labor and to ‘overthrow the economic power of slavery’” – Toni Tipton-Martin, The Jemima Code: Two Centuries of African American Cookbooks
“300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County” was put together in 1975 by “Citizens for Progress,” a group working to address poverty by tackling issues such as welfare rights, housing, and financial services. The book was intended to help fund a new community center. Community cookbooks were of course very popular at the time but this one is special.
Rather than representing members of a particular organization, church parish, school, or social club, the recipes in “300 Years” were gathered from an assortment of families in the region.
The introduction includes a brief explanation of the African origins of Southern Maryland food. Although “soul food” had been receiving some cultural recognition around the time of the book’s publication, Maryland then as now was caught in a nether region of questioned Southern identity. When people’s foodways become a commodity to rank, authenticate, and exploit, real people’s experiences fall by the wayside. “300 Years” is one of the only books documenting the history of Black cooking in Maryland (outside of the recipes adopted by and subsequently credited to white cooks.)
I’m glad I picked up the phone and spoke to a person, rather than relying on what sparse documentation of this book is available on the internet. Bertha Hunt, daughter of just one of the many people who contributed to this book, so kindly and spiritedly demonstrated the importance of these unique Maryland food traditions.
There is a modern misconception about “folkways”: that the groups who created and perpetuated these cultures of food, music, and craftsmanship didn’t recognize their value. It may seem that if it weren’t for prescient cultural saviors -Alan Lomax types (nothing against Lomax!)- that people would carelessly let their treasures slip away into obscurity with the changing times. This is, of course, projection. It is society at large which did not place a value on the many cultural treasures of the poor, the marginalized, the ‘folks.’ Issues with literacy, material hardship and resources may have made deliberate preservation a daunting undertaking, but there has never been a shortage of people – especially women- who recognized the significance of their contributions, even in the face of a society that didn’t.
