Showing posts with label 19th century. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 19th century. Show all posts

Friday, January 7, 2022

Happy New Year! by Eileen O'Finlan

 


I'm sometimes asked why there is no mention of Christmas in either Kelegeen or Erin's Children. The answer is simple. In Kelegeen the characters are too busy trying not to starve to death during Ireland's Great Hunger to celebrate Christmas and in Erin's Children which is set in Massachusetts, the holiday wasn't much celebrated. While the time period for Erin's Children, the 1850s, saw the establishment of Christmas as a holiday in Massachusetts (in 1856) it would still be a while before it got much real attention. Thanksgiving was the really big holiday at the time (you'll find three of them in Erin's Children!) along with George Washington's birthday and the 4th of July. New Year's was also celebrated though not with the same fanfare we associate with the holiday today.

Before 1752 New Years was celebrated on March 25th, the date when the new year started according to the Julian calendar. In colonial times young ladies prepared bowls of wassail and went "wassailing." The word comes from Middle English and means "health to you." The drink consisted of mulled ale or cider and sugar, ginger, cinnamon, and other spices and little bits of toast floating on top. It was also customary to give small gifts on New Years. In the 18th century these gifts were usually oranges decorated with ribbon and spiked with cloves. By the 19th century people began exchanging other gifts, though they were still just small tokens. 

In my current work-in-progress, sixteen year old Jerusha Kendall is given a diary for New Years in 1838. What she writes in it throughout the year piques the interest of Charlotte Lajoie, a folklorist and one of Jerusha's descendants, who uses it to uncover a long-hidden family secret. Thank goodness for New Years presents.

                                     

Sunday, July 7, 2019

My New 19th Century BFFs

                                                       Click here to purchase
                                                       Click here for Eileen O'Finlan's website

I’ve been making new friends as I research and write the sequel to Kelegeen. My latest BFFs are two prominent 19th century ladies – Catharine E. Beecher and Lydia Maria Child. Both wrote prolifically on several subjects, but for my purposes it’s their works on domestic science and cookery that are of particular interest. 

                                                        Catharine E. Beecher


                           1869 Edition of The American Woman's Home or Domestic Science
                                    by Catharine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe

Readers may not realize how much goes into the research of historical novels. Sure the author has to know the general history of the time – what was happening politically, economically, internationally, etc., but often even more important is knowledge of how people lived their everyday lives.  What did they eat and how did they prepare it? What did they wear? Did they purchase their clothing or make their own? How did they address one another? How did they celebrate holidays? What items did they have in their homes and, for that matter, what kind of homes did they live in? And just how much is that ubiquitous 19th century unit of measure, a hogshead? (64 gallons as it turns out). The questions go on and on. 

Fortunately, the answers can be found in books written in or near the time period (in my case 1850s New England). Specifically, I’ve been enjoying The American Woman’s Home or Domestic Science co-authored by Catharine E. Beecher and her younger half-sister, Harriet Beecher Stowe of Uncle Tom’s Cabin fame and The American Frugal Housewife by Lydia Maria Child. Both Beecher and Child wrote with self-assurance and the occasional strong opinion. 



Besides learning all about home economics of the 19th century, the reader also absorbs insights into the thinking of these women and their contemporaries. Though some entries seem quaint, others have had a “hey, that’s a good idea” effect on me. 

I wish I could meet these two exceptional ladies, but as that is impossible, I’m happy to settle for getting to know them through the writings they’ve left behind.

Tuesday, August 4, 2015

Stuff Like Toilet Tissue by Katherine Pym

CLICK TO PURCHASE



As a writer of historical fiction, I come across moments of, ‘When was this invented?’ And ‘Can I use this?’ There are certain things we take for granted, and while writing, it’s hard not to incorporate a few things we use every day.


Like...
Safety Pin

How hard would it be for an enterprising individual to come up with a safety pin? After all, since the days of early mankind, people secured their fabric or skin clothing with a tool of some sort.  In Egypt, pins were made of bronze with decorative heads, but they could still prick you. Fibulas and brooches date back to the Mycenaean era, which were closer to the safety pin, but close doesn’t mean you win the Kewpie Doll. Needles were also used from the dawn of time, and in London the Worshipful Company of Needlemakers had the power to seize your needles if they did not have their stamp of approval.

Apparently, the safety pin was a brain twister, for the first one came late in man’s existence, in the year 1825. The inventor was Walter Hunt (USA).
Toilet Tissue
The 19th century seemed to have been an awakening of sorts, for along with the safety pin, several items were invented during that time frame we take for granted. In 1857 toilet tissue was invented by Joseph Gayetty. He used hemp paper as a prevention of the ‘piles’, and charged 50¢ for a packet of 500 sheets.

But when reading a novel, one doesn’t often come across the hero or heroine going to the bathroom and using, what? on the backside. I have read of a protagonist in a time slip novel, though, going into the past where there isn’t much to keep the teeth clean. Authors of these tomes don’t often mention a gentleman and his lady kissing / clanking their fuzzy teeth. 


Toothbrush
The toothbrush was invented a bit earlier than the 19th century by a fellow in Newgate prison with not much to do during the day. He must have been fairly cash fluid though when he asked a prison guard to procure some items for him. This was in 1770. William Addis (UK) found cleaning his teeth with an old rag unpleasant and not very thorough. He bored little holes in a discarded meat bone, “tied them [hard bristles] into tufts, put glue on the ends, and wedged them into the holes...” Upon his release from prison, Mr Addis manufactured his invention and became an overnight success.

If I wrote in this era, I’d have to find out when Mr Addis started his venture, and when did the toothbrushes go on sale. One simply mustn’t write of something like this prior to the time it actually happened. Tsk tsk.

Back to the 19th century of ingenious people.

On the near subject of toothbrushes, in 1892 another person from the USA invented the toothpaste tube, thinking to stick your toothbrush into a jar of tooth cream that everyone under your roof used was unhygienic. Dr Sheffield was a dentist. My source does not say if the collapsible tube was made of lead or not.

Whitcomb Judson
One item I’ve always wanted to know about was the zipper. Now, the trouser fly (buttons) was incorporated quite a bit earlier by someone in Asia Minor so that he could gain entry quicker. To replace buttons with the zipper would make the entry gain quite speedy. Another intrepid American, Mr Whitcomb Judson, invented this in 1893 when shoes and boots were fastened with buttons.

Here you are in a hurry and you can’t find the button hooker-fastener thing. Then, when you do find it, minutes tick by as you fasten one tiny button after the other all the way up to the top of your shoe or boot.

Mr Judson invented “2 thin metal chains that could be fastened together by pulling a slider up between them. He patented this clasp locker or unlocker for shoes”. Judson was also the founder of the “Automatic Hook and Eye Company”. Along with his partner, they wanted to do away with all things fastened by buttons. Of course, these new zippers were primitive. It took a few more years to make them what we see today in men’s trousers and women’s skirts, along with shoes and purses, you name it, if it can be fastened by a zipper it is.

Quill & Inkpot
Other items an author of historical novels must be careful about are the writing implements your hero or heroine use. Prior to 1662 Pencils comprised of a graphite stick, wrapped with string to keep your fingers clean. After this date, pencils were mass produced in Nuremberg Germany. Quills were used almost exclusively for quite literally years and years.

The 19th century had a lot of ups and downs with writing utensils. After several failed attempts by other gentlemen, the metal nib did not grasp the populace until somewhere in the first half of the 19th century (John Mitchell in the UK). The fountain pen was invented about the same time as the metal nib, but this didn’t take hold until 1884 by an American named Lewis Waterman.  By 1885, Waterman had produced 200 man-made pens. 
Fountain Pen

Then, and finally, the pencil with an eraser. In 1858 this was invented by Hyman Lipman (USA). Until Mr Lipman’s invention, you had to carry an eraser along with your pencil (cumbersome!). He merely glued a bit of eraser to the top of the pencil, and voila, a new invention was born.

Many thanks to:
http://pencils.com/
The People’s Almanac by David Wallechinsky & Irving Wallace, Doubleday & Co., Inc., New York 1975
All pictures come from Wikicommons, Public Domain

         Jasper's Lament


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