Food
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
2,147
Page 1 of 108
-
Santa Claus 3-D Cake Pan, Back
- Description (Brief)
- Nordic Ware, a family-owned manufacturing firm in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was founded in 1946 by brothers Dave and Mark Dalquist, as “Plastics for Industry.” In 1950, the brothers bought Northland Aluminum Products, a small firm with a line of “Nordic Ware” products including griddles and steak platters. The same year, Dave Dalquist created a cast aluminum, fluted cake pan and trademarked it as the “Bundt” pan. The company continued to grow its product line to include specialty baking and cookware items, including the microwave turntable. Nordic Ware is notable due to its history of product innovation through engineering, and its continued production of cookware in the United States.
- This three-dimensional Santa Claus cake pan (back) was manufactured by Nordic Ware during the early 1950s. The pan is made of heavy cast aluminum in two sections to create a three-dimensional cake that looks like Santa Claus emerging from a chimney. Nordic Ware specialized in manufacturing a variety of seasonal cookware products, including several Christmas-themed cake pans.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- maker
- Nordic Ware
- ID Number
- 2007.0034.09.2
- accession number
- 2007.0034
- catalog number
- 2007.0034.09.2
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Enamel pitcher used in brewery
- Description
- This small, enamel-lined metal pitcher has no markings but shows signs of wear and age. It is part of a large collection of brewing material donated to the museum in 1967 by former brewmaster Walter Voigt, of Ruxton, Maryland, near Baltimore. Voigt attached a paper tag indicating that this “measure” was used by brewer Christian Heurich, Sr. If so, it would be a remarkable connection to the brewer who founded and ran the largest and most successful brewery in Washington, D.C., from the 1870s to his death in 1945.
- Christian Heurich, Sr., was born in Germany in 1842. As a young man, he learned to make lager beer from master brewers in Bavaria and Vienna, Austria. In 1866, Heurich left Germany to join his sister in Baltimore, where a thriving community of German immigrants had already established breweries and other businesses. Three years later, he and Paul Ritter, a Baltimore brewer, decided to open a brewery in Washington, D.C. In 1872, they rented a building in downtown Washington and while Ritter handled the books and advertising, Heurich brewed the barley-based lager he had learned to make in Europe. When the partnership fell apart, Heurich bought Ritter’s share and began running the business on his own, making a light lager called “Senate” and a darker brew called “Maerzen” (a style of beer named for the month of March, when it is traditionally brewed).
- Twice a widower, Heurich had four children with his third wife, including a son, Christian Heurich, Jr., born in 1901. Heurich and his family were among the leading citizens of Washington, D.C., and as he built and opened a new brewery and bottling plant in 1895, he also built a large home near DuPont Circle. Heurich’s real estate investments helped alleviate the financial impact of Prohibition (which lasted from 1920 to 1933), but he also turned to selling ice, which helped keep his brewery workers employed during the dry years. After Repeal, Heurich reopened his brewery, producing Senate Beer as his flagship brand, and Senate Ale, Senate Bock, Heurich Lager, and Maerzen Beer as well. Other local brewers never recovered from Prohibition and, by 1939, Heurich was the only brewer left in Washington, D.C.
- At Heurich’s death in 1945, his son took over the brewery. Although he had been involved in helping his father rebuild after the repeal of Prohibition, Christian, Jr., was a businessman, not a brewer. He introduced an Old Georgetown brand, and reintroduced a lager made from his father’s original recipe. Still, in the 1950s, as competition from large, national corporations increased, small, local breweries were closing across the country. In 1956, the Christian Heurich Brewing Company brewed its last beer.
- The collection of brewing objects donated by Walter Voigt consists of objects and archival materials reflecting the history of brewing in the mid-Atlantic region between 1870 and the beginnings of consolidation and large-scale, industrial production in the 1960s. His correspondence reveals an interest in preserving the history of brewing in America before brewmasters were “replaced by chemical engineers and highly trained chemists in modern laboratories.” Voigt’s papers are housed in the museum’s Archives Center, Collection #ACNMAH 1195, “Walter H. Voigt Brewing Industry Collection, 1935-1967.”
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- AG.MHI-M-9518
- accession number
- 276730
- catalog number
- MHI-M-9518
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Turtle Chocolate Mold
- Description (Brief)
- This two piece, metal chocolate mold was designed to produce one turtle.
- Description
- Molds began appearing in the late 1840s to early 1850s in Europe. In the late 1880s, U.S. companies began manufacturing chocolate molds, but Germany remained the largest supplier to the U.S. until the early 1900s. During the First World War, U.S. firms began to gain more ground against their European counterparts.
- The design of molds often followed the trends of the time. The “classic period” of 1880-1910 consisted of very realistic pieces made to resemble an object as closely as possible. Chocolatiers would often set up small vignettes depicting a complicated scene. These were time consuming and painstakingly complicated. From 1910-1930, molds were redesigned to be simpler and rounder in appearance. Fantasy began replacing realism. The mechanical design of the molds also began to change to accommodate changes in technology, such as new rotary machines that were developed to spin multiple molds at the same time to evenly distribute the chocolate.
- Matfer was formed in 1814 in Paris, France. The company distributed molds to European and American markets for use in confectionary production. Matfer is still in business today, specializing in kitchen equipment, including chocolate making equipment and plastic chocolate molds.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- maker
- Matfer
- ID Number
- AG.76-FT-04.0016A
- catalog number
- 76-FT-04.0016A
- accession number
- 315132
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Man sitting at diner counter
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- ca 1960s
- photographer
- Uzzle, Burk
- ID Number
- PG.72.12.023
- accession number
- 2003.0044
- catalog number
- 72.12.23
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
The Mandarin letterhead and envelopes
- Description
- Off-white letterhead and envelope with words in red. On the envelope in the upper left corne, the title of “the mandarin” appears and the address is displayed below “900 North Point Ghirardelli Square San Francisco, Ca. 94108.” On the letterhead, in the upper left corner, the title of “the mandarin” appears and the address and phone number appears right below “900 North Point Ghirardelli Square San Francisco, Ca. 94108 (415) 673-8812.”
- A letterhead is the heading at the top of a piece of stationary, usually signaling the name and contact information of the company. An envelope is the packaging stationery that encloses the letterhead. The letterhead was first known as “letter paper” in the late 19th century. In the beginning of the 20th century, letterheads were customized to fit typewriters. By the 1940s, many companies began to place their logos on letterhead.
- The Smithsonian holds several letterheads and envelopes from different locations of Mrs. Cecilia Chiang’s restaurant, The Mandarin. The letters and envelope signal a formal business culture and the reliance of correspondence through the post office. These letterhead and envelopes certainly take us back to a time before computers and the internet.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- 2013.0127.05b
- accession number
- 2013.0127
- catalog number
- 2013.0127.05b
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Dessert Fork
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1838
- ID Number
- DL.62.0169O
- catalog number
- 62.0169O
- accession number
- 238990
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Tart Baking Tray Mold
- Description (Brief)
- Nordic Ware, a family-owned manufacturing firm in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was founded in 1946 by brothers Dave and Mark Dalquist, as “Plastics for Industry.” In 1950, the brothers bought Northland Aluminum Products, a small firm with a line of “Nordic Ware” products including griddles and steak platters. The same year, Dave Dalquist created a cast aluminum, fluted cake pan and trademarked it as the “Bundt” pan. The company continued to grow its product line to include specialty baking and cookware items, including the microwave turntable. Nordic Ware is notable due to its history of product innovation through engineering, and its continued production of cookware in the United States.
- Nordic Ware used this mold to cast its tart baking trays. The mold is made of heavy metal and has 12 2.75-inch diameter fluted cavities. Nordic Ware used its metal-casting ability to produce a variety of metal goods such as this tray for making tarts. The second image shows the unfinished back of the mold.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- maker
- Nordic Ware
- ID Number
- 2007.0034.08
- catalog number
- 2007.0034.08
- accession number
- 2007.0034
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Bertolli Chianti Bottle
- Description
- Americans of the post-World War II era were not wine drinkers. In the 1950’s, wine consumption was generally confined either to a few well-traveled people near each coast who associated wine with fine dining, both customarily French, or to members of ethnic communities who had long drunk both homemade and imported wines with foods common to their community. Infrequent wine consumers often drank “Chianti” at inexpensive Italian-American restaurants where they consumed their spaghetti and lasagna with wine from familiar straw covered green bottles (fiaschi) placed on the red checked tablecloths. The same bottles, once emptied, served as candleholders and decorative touches in these neighborhood gathering places, and these same straw-covered bottles of Italian wine were often among the few wines available at liquor stores throughout the country.
- Students, communards, beatniks, and Italian-American restaurant goers alike used the emptied Chianti bottles, with their peasant straw fiaschi, from the 1950’s through the 1980’s, both as cheap drink, lighting, and decoration until the availability of better quality American and European wines changed their drinking habits.. In 2012, the little straw covered Chianti bottles, with their residue from the many hours of candlewax dripped down their sides, are available in second hand stores and online purchasing centers for those who keep a sentimental attachment to the decorative markers of their youth.
- This particular bottle, date 1950, was purchased on e-Bay by just such a sentimentalist, a museum curator who remembered long hours spent in the 1960’s reading poetry with friends, discussing politics, and drinking cheap wine from bottles such as this one.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1950-1970
- ID Number
- 2011.3054.01
- nonaccession number
- 2011.3054
- catalog number
- 2011.3054.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Two men and two women at dinner table
- Description (Brief)
- people at Christmas; Two men and two women sitting at rectangular dinner table; table has a white tablecloth with flowers on it and a turkey sits at the center of the table; buffet with mirror over it on back wall, can see faint reflection of the photographer in the mirror
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date printed
- 1963-01
- date made
- 1962-12
- ID Number
- 2019.0012.0020
- catalog number
- 2019.0012.0020
- accession number
- 2019.0012
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Dessert Fork
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1838
- ID Number
- DL.62.0169R
- catalog number
- 62.0169R
- accession number
- 238990
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Apple Crate Label
- Description (Brief)
- Labels are an important marketing device. They often go beyond merely identifying contents and are designed to help establish brand distinction and generate customer loyalty for a largely interchangeable product.
- This Eatum brand apple crate label was used by the Albertson Company Inc. of Yakima, Washington during the early 20th century. The lithographed label has a blue background with an image of two red apples still on the branch in the center. The apples came from the Wenatchee Valley region of Washington that claimed to be the “Apple Capital of the World.”
- Location
- Currently not on view
- referenced business
- S. Albertson Company Inc.
- ID Number
- 1979.0441.109
- accession number
- 1979.0441
- catalog number
- 1979.0441.109
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Tupperware® Wonderlier® Bowl
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1993
- date purchased
- 1993-04-13
- party sponsor
- National Museum of American History
- maker
- Tupperware
- ID Number
- 1993.0257.13
- catalog number
- 1993.0257.13
- accession number
- 1993.0257
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Stoneware jug
- Description
- The Remmey family began producing pottery in New York City in 1735, when John Remmey I emigrated from Germany. His grandson, John Remmey III, took over the family business in 1793, continuing to produce some of the finest stoneware made in the United States at the time. The somewhat lopsided incised leaf design on this jug reminds us that each piece was made and decorated by hand.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1791-1831
- maker
- Remmey III, John
- ID Number
- 1977.0803.105
- accession number
- 1977.0803
- catalog number
- 1977.0803.105
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Man and woman standing at counter
- Description (Brief)
- hand colored stereograph; a woman wearing a blue/purple dress, brown shawl and a bonnet is standing in profile at a food counter/bar, she has her right arm resting on the counter; a man wearing a bellboy uniform is standing opposite her in profile with his left arm resting on the counter, talking to the woman working behind the counter; champagn and wine bottles on shelves in background; a young girl wearing a light green dress, pink shawl and a blue sun hat hanging around her neck is standing in front of counter with a man mostly out of frame at left; another man is working behind the counter and has his back to the photographer
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 19th-early 20th century
- ID Number
- 2012.3033.0425
- nonaccession number
- 2012.3033
- catalog number
- 2012.3033.0425
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Grape Scissors
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1904 or 1914
- ID Number
- 1977.0918.49
- accession number
- 1977.0918
- catalog number
- 1977.0918.49
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Russian Beef Borsch
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1968-1970
- author
- Waters, Alice
- ID Number
- 2016.0085.22
- accession number
- 2016.0085
- catalog number
- 2016.0085.22
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Child's Knife
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1850
- maker
- Bailey and Company
- ID Number
- DL.65.1437B
- catalog number
- 65.1437B
- accession number
- 70138
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Kenmore™ Corn Popper
- 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
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Whole Wheat Bread
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1968-1970
- author
- Waters, Alice
- ID Number
- 2016.0085.29
- accession number
- 2016.0085
- catalog number
- 2016.0085.29
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
-
Henry Thorne & Co. Candy Tin
- Description
- This red and cream colored tin with royal seal and a picture of Prince Philip and Queen Elizabeth in an oval frame once contained candies produced by Henry Thorne & Co., Ltd. This tin was designed to be a souvenir for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.
- Henry Thorne began his business in the 1830s as a mustard and chicory shop in Leeds, England. In 1971 the business closed.
- Chocolate had been known and treasured by Native Americans in Central and South America for thousands of years prior to the arrival of the first Spanish explorers in the late 1400s and early 1500s. Cacao beans were so highly prized by Mayans and Aztecs that they were used as currency in many areas of the Americas. When first taken back to Europe by the Spanish, the chocolate drink continued to be produced exclusively for the enjoyment of royalty or the extremely wealthy. As the cacao bean gradually made its presence known throughout Europe, it still remained trapped in this exclusive section of society well into the 19th century.
- The chocolate trade to North America began more than 300 years ago, primarily centered in or near major port cities of the time, such as New York City, Boston, Philadelphia and Newport, RI. Due to lower transportation costs, chocolate was often less expensive in the Americas than in Europe and therefore had a broader consumer base. The Industrial Revolution radically changed chocolate production and helped propel it into the hearts and stomachs of the working class. Instead of being a labor intensive product, it became entirely machine made reducing costs even further in the late 19th and early 20th century. During this time, chocolate went from being something a person drank to being something to eat, finally becoming a treat for the masses.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- AG.77-FT-15.0019
- catalog number
- 77-FT-15.0019
- accession number
- 283681
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
Pages
Filter Your Results
Click to remove a filter:
- data source
-
topic
- Food 2147
- Furnishings 528
- Agriculture 414
- Crate Labels 378
- Food habits 255
- Food Culture 241
- FOOD: Transforming the American Table 1950-2000 233
- Advertising 160
- Photography 160
- Household Tools and Equipment 97
- Wine and wine making 81
- kitchen 79
- Children 70
- Sushi 66
- Beverages 63
- Kitchen utensils 63
- Plastics 57
- Manufacturing industries 56
- Industrialization 50
- Art 49
-
object type
- Labels (identifying artifacts) 380
- Flatware 220
- Spoons 122
- Photographs 71
- Molinillo 68
- Knives 66
- Lids 57
- Forks (flatware) 48
- Cutlery 47
- Prints 40
- Containers 38
- Cans (containers) 37
- Lithographs 32
- carbro print 31
- Toasters (cooking and heating devices) 28
- gelatin silver print 27
- Toaster; Electric 26
- container, food 23
- Tumblers (drinking glasses) 22
- porringer 20
- date
- place
- culture
-
set name
- Home and Community Life: Domestic Life 726
- Domestic Furnishings 528
- Work and Industry: Agriculture 438
- Agriculture 414
- Crate Labels 378
- Work and Industry: Food Technology 354
- National Museum of American History 285
- FOOD: Transforming the American Table 1950-2000 233
- Food: Transforming the American Table 216
- Advertising 160
- Photography 160
- Work and Industry: Photographic History 160
- Work and Industry: Asian Pacific American Business 106
- Sushi 66
- Home and Community Life: Ceramics and Glass 61
- Work and Industry: Agriculture and Natural Resources 52
- Industry & Manufacturing 50
- Art 49
- Work 43
