Food

Photo of McCall's Cheese

Part of a nation's history lies in what people eat. Artifacts at the Museum document the history of food in the United States from farm machinery to diet fads.

More than 1,300 pieces of stoneware and earthenware show how Americans have stored, prepared, and served food for centuries. Ovens, cookie cutters, kettles, aprons, and ice-cream-making machines are part of the collections, along with home canning jars and winemaking equipment. More than 1,000 objects recently came to the Museum when author and cooking show host Julia Child donated her entire kitchen, from appliances to cookbooks.

Advertising and business records of several food companies—such as Hills Brothers Coffee, Pepsi Cola, and Campbell's Soup—represent the commercial side of the subject

Date: 1940s

Saucer

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1946-05
maker
Homer Laughlin China Co.
ID Number
DL.252318.0059
catalog number
252318.0059
accession number
252318

Pie Pan

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1936 - 1940
ID Number
DL.314637.2447
catalog number
314637.2447
accession number
314637

Kenmore™ Corn Popper

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1948
date donors married (received item as wedding gift)
1948-09-02
retailer
Sears, Roebuck and Co.
ID Number
1985.0747.02
accession number
1985.0747
catalog number
1985.0747.02

Penguin Hot and Cold Server®

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1950 - 1960
design patent date
1941-05-20
patent date
1944-05-16
ID Number
1986.3179.45
nonaccession number
1986.3179
catalog number
1986.3179.45

McCall's Homemaking Cover 1944

Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. Cover for McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts a blonde male child opening a holiday loaf of fruit bread. There is a bright blue background.
Description (Brief)
Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. Cover for McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts a blonde male child opening a holiday loaf of fruit bread. There is a bright blue background. Verso: "8, McCall Homemaking cover 1944." (pencil).
Description
Nickolas Muray was born in Szeged, Hungary on February 15, 1892. Twelve years after his birth, Muray left his native town and enrolled in a graphic arts school in Budapest. Enrolling in art school was the first step on a road that would eventually lead him to study a photographic printing process called three-color carbro. In the course of his accomplished career, Muray would become an expert in this process and play a key role in bringing color photography to America.
While attending art school in Budapest, Muray studied lithography and photoengraving, earning an International Engraver's Certificate. Muray was also introduced to photography during this time period. His combined interest in photography and printmaking led him to Berlin, Germany to participate in a three-year color-photoengraving course. In Berlin, Muray learned how to make color filters, a first step in the craft that would one day become his trademark. Immediately after the completion of the course, Muray found a good job with a publishing company in Ullstein, Germany. However, the threat of war in Europe forced Muray to flee for America in 1913. Soon after his arrival in New York, Muray was working as a photoengraver for Condé Nast. His specialty was color separations and half-tone negatives.
By 1920, Muray had established a home for himself in the up-and-coming artists' haven of Greenwich Village. He opened a portrait studio out of his apartment and continued to work part time at his engraving job. Harper's Bazaar magazine gave Muray his first big assignment in 1921. The project was to photograph Broadway star Florence Reed. The magazine was so impressed with his photographs that they began to publish his work monthly. This allowed him to give up his part time job and work solely as a photographer. It did not take long for Muray to become one of the most renowned portrait photographers in Manhattan. Muray spent much of the early 1920s photographing the most famous and important personalities in New York at the time.
In his spare time Muray enjoyed fencing. In 1927, he won the National Sabre Championship and in 1928 and 1932, he was on the United States Olympic Team. During World War II, Muray was a flight lieutenant in the Civil Air Patrol.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1944
maker
Muray, Nickolas
ID Number
PG.007926
catalog number
7926
accession number
258415

Chocolate Pie

Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. Image used in McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts a decedant chocolate pie foodspread. There is a woman's hand serving a slice of the pie on a pink and golden dish.
Description (Brief)
Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. Image used in McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts a decedant chocolate pie foodspread. There is a woman's hand serving a slice of the pie on a pink and golden dish. Across from the woman's hand is a man's hand holding an espresso cup. Verso: "#3" (pencil). "McCalls Magazine" (pencil). "8690/2" (red pencil).
Description
Nickolas Muray was born in Szeged, Hungary on February 15, 1892. Twelve years after his birth, Muray left his native town and enrolled in a graphic arts school in Budapest. Enrolling in art school was the first step on a road that would eventually lead him to study a photographic printing process called three-color carbro. In the course of his accomplished career, Muray would become an expert in this process and play a key role in bringing color photography to America.
While attending art school in Budapest, Muray studied lithography and photoengraving, earning an International Engraver's Certificate. Muray was also introduced to photography during this time period. His combined interest in photography and printmaking led him to Berlin, Germany to participate in a three-year color-photoengraving course. In Berlin, Muray learned how to make color filters, a first step in the craft that would one day become his trademark. Immediately after the completion of the course, Muray found a good job with a publishing company in Ullstein, Germany. However, the threat of war in Europe forced Muray to flee for America in 1913. Soon after his arrival in New York, Muray was working as a photoengraver for Condé Nast. His specialty was color separations and half-tone negatives.
By 1920, Muray had established a home for himself in the up-and-coming artists' haven of Greenwich Village. He opened a portrait studio out of his apartment and continued to work part time at his engraving job. Harper's Bazaar magazine gave Muray his first big assignment in 1921. The project was to photograph Broadway star Florence Reed. The magazine was so impressed with his photographs that they began to publish his work monthly. This allowed him to give up his part time job and work solely as a photographer. It did not take long for Muray to become one of the most renowned portrait photographers in Manhattan. Muray spent much of the early 1920s photographing the most famous and important personalities in New York at the time.
In his spare time Muray enjoyed fencing. In 1927, he won the National Sabre Championship and in 1928 and 1932, he was on the United States Olympic Team. During World War II, Muray was a flight lieutenant in the Civil Air Patrol.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1944
maker
Muray, Nickolas
ID Number
PG.007931
catalog number
7931
accession number
258415

Advertisement for McCall's Magazine 1944

Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. For use in McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts several fresh vegtable and legume dishes. The objects have the appearance of floating in the air. Recto: Signed and dated by the artist in lower right (pencil).
Description (Brief)
Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. For use in McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts several fresh vegtable and legume dishes. The objects have the appearance of floating in the air. Recto: Signed and dated by the artist in lower right (pencil). "McCall" (pencil). Verso: "No 6" (pencil). "McCall"(pencil). "NM-2." (pencil).
Description
Nickolas Muray was born in Szeged, Hungary on February 15, 1892. Twelve years after his birth, Muray left his native town and enrolled in a graphic arts school in Budapest. Enrolling in art school was the first step on a road that would eventually lead him to study a photographic printing process called three-color carbro. In the course of his accomplished career, Muray would become an expert in this process and play a key role in bringing color photography to America.
While attending art school in Budapest, Muray studied lithography and photoengraving, earning an International Engraver's Certificate. Muray was also introduced to photography during this time period. His combined interest in photography and printmaking led him to Berlin, Germany to participate in a three-year color-photoengraving course. In Berlin, Muray learned how to make color filters, a first step in the craft that would one day become his trademark. Immediately after the completion of the course, Muray found a good job with a publishing company in Ullstein, Germany. However, the threat of war in Europe forced Muray to flee for America in 1913. Soon after his arrival in New York, Muray was working as a photoengraver for Condé Nast. His specialty was color separations and half-tone negatives.
By 1920, Muray had established a home for himself in the up-and-coming artists' haven of Greenwich Village. He opened a portrait studio out of his apartment and continued to work part time at his engraving job. Harper's Bazaar magazine gave Muray his first big assignment in 1921. The project was to photograph Broadway star Florence Reed. The magazine was so impressed with his photographs that they began to publish his work monthly. This allowed him to give up his part time job and work solely as a photographer. It did not take long for Muray to become one of the most renowned portrait photographers in Manhattan. Muray spent much of the early 1920s photographing the most famous and important personalities in New York at the time.
In his spare time Muray enjoyed fencing. In 1927, he won the National Sabre Championship and in 1928 and 1932, he was on the United States Olympic Team. During World War II, Muray was a flight lieutenant in the Civil Air Patrol.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1944
maker
Muray, Nickolas
ID Number
PG.007928
catalog number
7928
accession number
258415

Hamburgers

Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. For use in McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts several different ways to prepare hamburgers. Recto: Signed and dated by the artist in lower right (pencil). "McCall" (pencil). Verso: "No 6" (pencil). "McCall"(pencil).
Description (Brief)
Nickolas Muray color carbro photograph ca. 1944. For use in McCall's Magazine. The photograph depicts several different ways to prepare hamburgers. Recto: Signed and dated by the artist in lower right (pencil). "McCall" (pencil). Verso: "No 6" (pencil). "McCall"(pencil). "NM-2." (pencil).
Description
Nickolas Muray was born in Szeged, Hungary on February 15, 1892. Twelve years after his birth, Muray left his native town and enrolled in a graphic arts school in Budapest. Enrolling in art school was the first step on a road that would eventually lead him to study a photographic printing process called three-color carbro. In the course of his accomplished career, Muray would become an expert in this process and play a key role in bringing color photography to America.
While attending art school in Budapest, Muray studied lithography and photoengraving, earning an International Engraver's Certificate. Muray was also introduced to photography during this time period. His combined interest in photography and printmaking led him to Berlin, Germany to participate in a three-year color-photoengraving course. In Berlin, Muray learned how to make color filters, a first step in the craft that would one day become his trademark. Immediately after the completion of the course, Muray found a good job with a publishing company in Ullstein, Germany. However, the threat of war in Europe forced Muray to flee for America in 1913. Soon after his arrival in New York, Muray was working as a photoengraver for Condé Nast. His specialty was color separations and half-tone negatives.
By 1920, Muray had established a home for himself in the up-and-coming artists' haven of Greenwich Village. He opened a portrait studio out of his apartment and continued to work part time at his engraving job. Harper's Bazaar magazine gave Muray his first big assignment in 1921. The project was to photograph Broadway star Florence Reed. The magazine was so impressed with his photographs that they began to publish his work monthly. This allowed him to give up his part time job and work solely as a photographer. It did not take long for Muray to become one of the most renowned portrait photographers in Manhattan. Muray spent much of the early 1920s photographing the most famous and important personalities in New York at the time.
In his spare time Muray enjoyed fencing. In 1927, he won the National Sabre Championship and in 1928 and 1932, he was on the United States Olympic Team. During World War II, Muray was a flight lieutenant in the Civil Air Patrol.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1944
maker
Muray, Nickolas
ID Number
PG.007929
catalog number
7929
accession number
258415

Electric Toaster

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
c. 1948
maker
Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company
ID Number
1992.0338.05
catalog number
1992.0338.05
accession number
1992.0338

Opce Strojarstvo

This 1949 text book on general engineering is one of several used by Miljenko “Mike” Grgich during his course of study in viticulture and enology at the University of Zagreb.
Description
This 1949 text book on general engineering is one of several used by Miljenko “Mike” Grgich during his course of study in viticulture and enology at the University of Zagreb. It was among the books he carried with him when he left Croatia in 1954, having accepted a United Nations fellowship to continue his studies in West Germany. Months after completing the fellowship he received a visa to Canada, where he lived for two years before landing a job in the place of his dreams, California’s Napa Valley.
Grgich worked briefly for Lee Stewart of Napa’s Chateau Souverain, and for Brother Timothy at Christian Brothers. In 1959 he began working in the laboratory at Beaulieu Vineyards, under the supervision of André Tchelistcheff, a Russian enologist and fellow immigrant. In 1968, Grgich was hired by Robert Mondavi to be part of his new winery in Oakville, and in 1972 he became the winemaker at Chateau Montelena.
Grgich made the 1973 Chardonnay for Chateau Montelena that placed first in the 1976 Paris Tasting, an event that brought international attention to the wines being produced by a new generation of California winemakers. Grgich’s success allowed him to establish his own winery with Austin Hills in 1977.
date published
1949
ID Number
2006.3084.09
catalog number
2006.3084.09
nonaccession number
2006.3084

Apron

Concepción “Concha” Sanchez wore this cotton apron with embroidered images of birds while making tortillas in her small neighborhood business.
Description
Concepción “Concha” Sanchez wore this cotton apron with embroidered images of birds while making tortillas in her small neighborhood business. Her grandson, Adrian Sanchez, fondly recalls the machine and working with her to make tortillas and tamales:
I recall helping my Grandmother Concepcion Sanchez make corn tortillas for her to sell….[in] 1948 in Fillmore, California. …My uncle Arnulfo [bought] his mother a molino, a machine that grinds corn for masa to make tortillas…a comal, a griddle to cook the…tortillas, and a machine [tortilladora] that actually made the tortillas…the dry corn was cooked [and limed]…The cooked corn was then ready to be ground in the molino…The ground masa was then gathered into large balls to be placed on the machine…when the handle was turned, a tortilla would fall on an attached conveyor belt which…would drop the uncooked tortilla onto the comal…After the tortillas cooked, they were stacked and counted into dozens… The…neighborhood came to buy their warm tortillas…A…batch was sent…to…Tio Nuco’s market …During…Christmas…Grandma [made] masa for tamales…[she]…was into her 80’s when she quit. (Smithsonian interview, 2006)
Concha Sanchez and her family followed the path of many Mexican immigrants who turned their traditional foodways into a staple of community life. Concha and Abundio Sanchez migrated from Mexico in 1912 at the beginning of the Mexican Revolution. Through the 1920s, they worked in Kansas, in Texas, and in the produce fields of California, eventually opening a grocery store. When that failed in the Great Depression, Concha supported her family by creating a tortilleria, making and selling tortillas in her Ventura County neighborhood. Instead of making them by hand, as Mexican women had done for centuries, she used the new electric and gas-fired equipment bought by her son to produce tortillas and tamales for sale.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1940
1935-1945
ID Number
2006.0236.04
catalog number
2006.0236.04
accession number
2006.0236

Women in uniform, seated in a semi-circle

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1940s
ID Number
2017.0309.0011
accession number
2017.0309
catalog number
2017.0309.0011

Woman in uniform lining a buffet table

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1940s
ID Number
2017.0309.0008
accession number
2017.0309
catalog number
2017.0309.0008

Pamphlet, Wine Tasting, 1946

This six-panel fold-out pamphlet accompanied “A Tasting of Wines for Summer and Wine Bowls,” an event of the New York Branch of The Wine and Food Society. This tasting, the organization’s 65th, was held at in the Hotel Pierre Ballroom in New York, on May 15, 1946.
Description
This six-panel fold-out pamphlet accompanied “A Tasting of Wines for Summer and Wine Bowls,” an event of the New York Branch of The Wine and Food Society. This tasting, the organization’s 65th, was held at in the Hotel Pierre Ballroom in New York, on May 15, 1946. Founded in 1934, just after the Repeal of Prohibition, New York’s Wine and Food Society is the oldest, continuously operating gastronomic society in the country.
The pamphlet reveals a complex program with nine companies offering some 27 different beverages to taste. Starting with wines from Spain and Argentina, the tasting continued with a Chablis, a Sauterne, and a Haute Sauterne from Napa Valley’s Larkmead Winery. The next grouping featured a “Sweet Valley Ohio White Wine,” a “Meier’s Rhine Wine” and “Meier’s Sauterne,” both from the Lake Erie region. Three “wine bowls,” each containing brandy and some sort of sweet or sparkling wine, followed. Rounding out the program were another twelve summer wines, including a Riesling and Rosé from Beaulieu Vineyard in Napa, a 1941 Pinot Blanc from Wente Bros. in Livermore, several 1942-43 vintage wines from Sonoma’s Fountain Grove, and three undated vintages from Cresta Blanca, also in Livermore.
The pamphlet seems to have a celebratory undercurrent and perhaps there was a feeling of optimism among members of the Society as the event occurred less than a year after the end of World War II.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1946-05-15
ID Number
2014.0100.05
catalog number
2014.0100.05
accession number
2014.0100

Woman in uniform lining up around a buffet table

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1940s
ID Number
2017.0309.0009
accession number
2017.0309
catalog number
2017.0309.0009

Serving Oven (Bun Warmer)

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
ca 1939
1939 - 1942
patent date
1939-07-18
1939-08-29
1942-10-27
date donors married (received item as wedding gift)
1948-09-02
ID Number
1985.0747.01
catalog number
1985.0747.01
accession number
1985.0747
patent number
2170904

Sugar Bowl

date made
1939 - 1942
maker
Chase Brass and Copper Company
ID Number
1978.2470.02
accession number
1978.2470
catalog number
1978.2470.02

Creamer

date made
1939 - 1942
maker
Chase Brass and Copper Company
ID Number
1978.2470.01
accession number
1978.2470
catalog number
1978.2470.01

Bonbon Dish

"Bostonia" pattern bonbon dish. Small, shallow dish has flared sides ending in an octagonal or clipped-corner rim with downturned edge and a flat circular well; no foot ring. Plain; no monogram or surface decoration.
Description
"Bostonia" pattern bonbon dish. Small, shallow dish has flared sides ending in an octagonal or clipped-corner rim with downturned edge and a flat circular well; no foot ring. Plain; no monogram or surface decoration. Underside of well struck with two sets of incuse marks, an S-arc-and-rampant-lion logo above "STERLING" and "3953" at top, and "J.E. CALDWELL & CO. (arched) / 925 / STERLING / 1000 / PHILADELPHIA" in serif letters at bottom.
Location
Currently not on view
date made; date pattern introduced
1914
date received as gift
1948
ID Number
1977.0729.01
accession number
1977.0729
catalog number
1977.0729.01

Electric Toaster

Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
date made
c. 1930-1940
ID Number
1992.0338.24
catalog number
1992.0338.24
accession number
1992.0338

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