Category: Vermont

Maple Sugaring in Film – Early 20th Century Examples

One of the most interesting ways to study the history of maple sugaring is to watch it in action in vintage films. There are a number of films available to watch online and others available in libraries and archives in the maple sugaring region.

Although the black and white films depicting sugaring activities, both in the sugarbush and in the sugarhouse were generally staged or “directed,” taking away a certain degree of spontaneity  and authenticity, they still provide a useful glimpse of the methods, technology, and landscapes in use at the time.  Most of these films include scenes of men and boys gathering sap from pails on trees, boiling in kettles in the open air and in evaporators in sugarhouses, as well as finishing and bottling. Many films also illustrate sugar on snow parties and enjoying maple syrup on pancakes.

What follows is a listing and links to a handful of early 20th century maple sugaring films, mostly from the 1920s and the silent film era.

Huntley Archives

The Huntley Film Archives includes a 9:37 minute black and white silent film titled Film 371 dating to 1920.

Huntley Archives maple sugaring film.

 

Prelinger Archives

The metadata from the Youtube post claims that this 14 minute silent film from around 1925 titled “Maple Sugar” was from the  Library of Congress’ Prelinger Archives; however, I have not been able to find this film in the Prelinger’s online listings, so I cannot confirm that is the source.  It appears from this same youtube info that this film was produced by the Mogull Brothers.

Pelinger Archives maple sugaring film.

 

British Pathé Archive

British Pathé, an online newsreel archive includes a short 2:29 minute clip depicting scenes from sugarbush titled Maple Syrup Harvest (ca 1920-1929).

British Pathé film on maple sugaring.

 

Library and Archives of Canada

The Library and Archives of Canada has made available an 8:14 minute color film from 1941 titled “Maple Sugar Time”.

Library and Archives of Canada maple sugaring film from 1941.

 

Northeast Historic Film

Another film I am especially familiar with is a black and white silent film shot on silver nitrate stock in the sugarbush, sugarhouse, and factory of George Cary in 1927. The film is archived at Northeast Historic Film in Bucksport, Maine and was donated for stabilization and preservation as part of the Philippe Beaudry Collection.  The film is extremely deteriorated in some sections but overall is clear enough with windows of very clean images, to see what was being documented and displayed. This film is not available online in its entirety and there are severe restrictions on its use, but there is a 4:45 minute sample clip of the film on the Northeast Historic Film website and many still photos taken the same day as filming have been published over the years. Copies of the film for public viewing have been donated to the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum, the archives at the Fairbanks Museum and Planetarium in St. Johnsbury, the Vermont Historical Society archives, and the Special Collections at the Bailey Howe Library at the University of Vermont.

Through my ongoing research on George Cary and the Cary Maple Sugar Company, I have found this film and its history especially interesting. As a result I have dug a little deeper into the story of how and where this film was made.

Here are a number of stills from the Cary film followed by an excerpt about the  film from my recently completed book on George Cary titled,  Maple King: The Rise and Fall of a Maple Syrup Empire, which will be available for purchase in spring 2018.

     

    

    

    

 

Excerpt from Chapter Four of Maple King: The Rise and Fall of a Maple Syrup Empire –

Movie Making 

Wishing to display both the evolution of sap gathering and maple sugar making as well as the modern process employed by the Cary Maple Sugar Company, George Cary arranged for a silent moving picture to be made in 1927. The film included outdoor scenes from the sugarbush and sugarhouses at Cary’s Highland Farm, along with action shots of processing and packing syrup and sugar in the Cary Company plant in St. Johnsbury. Today, a copy of the film, which was originally shot on 35 mm nitrate stock, has been archived in the Philippe Beaudry Collection at Northeast Historic Film, a repository in Bucksport, Maine.[i]

The silent moving picture, along with an extensive collection of still photographs of the same sugarbush and sugarhouse scenes as featured in the film, were shot over several days by well-known photographers Harry and Alice Richardson of Newport, Vermont. The Richardson’s were widely regarded for their many outdoor and studio photographs of the Northeast Kingdom in Vermont, including a number of colorful novelty postcards. It was announced as early as 1926 that the Richardson’s would be making a moving picture for the Cary Maple Sugar Company.[ii]

Scenes in the sugarbush focused on three romanticized periods in the history of maple sugaring; Native American sugaring, nineteenth century Euro-American/Euro-Canadian sugaring, and early twentieth century Euro-American/Euro-Canadian sugaring. For the telling of the Native American story, Cary hired a full-blooded Penobscot Indian named John Lewey from Old Town, Maine. Mr. Lewey was accompanied by his son Roy Lewey. Posing in the snow in a full-feathered Plains Indian-style headdress, buckskins, and polished leather dress shoes, Lewey is shown tapping a few maple trees, gathering sap with wood pails from wood troughs, and boiling sap in a large iron kettle suspended from a tripod in front of a newly constructed log cabin. Sap was gathered from about one hundred split log wood troughs fed by hand carved flat wood taps.[iii]

The nineteenth century methods of sugaring featured a Yankee farmer played by Albert Leland, himself a sugarmaker from Barton, Vermont. Leland was dressed for the part, complete with wide brimmed straw hat, a thick full-length beard, and high boots. Equipped with a shoulder yoke and two wooden gathering pails, Leland was shown hustling from tree to tree collecting sap from wood collecting pails set on the ground and transporting it to a gathering tank pulled by oxen through the snow.[iv] A young Richard Franklin, son of Earl Franklin, a Cary employee, was shown leading a pair of steers with a goad stick, while in another scene, Mr. Cary himself appears driving a different pair of oxen along a road in the sugarbush.

Twentieth century sugaring was depicted both with the collection of sap in covered galvanized metal pails hung from the trees along with the cutting-edge Brower Sap Piping System. In one scene a man is shown installing the Gooseneck section of the Brower pipeline in a taphole in the tree. Later he is shown connecting sections of the pipeline along their wire supports, while in another he is walking along and checking the metal pipeline for leaks.

There are also numerous scenes of Cary’s Highland Farm sugarhouses in action with steam billowing from the cupola, men feeding the boiling arches and drawing off syrup. Other men are seen moving barrels of syrup, along with gathering and unloading tanks of fresh sap pulled on sleds by teams of Cary’s prized oxen.

Besides the footage of the sap gathering and syrup making process in the sugarbush and sugarhouses, the filmmakers also shot footage inside Cary’s St. Johnsbury plant. Such shots included a worker filling wooden boxes lined with waxed paper on a conveyor line with thick hot maple sugar from an overhead vat as well as a room full of hundreds of such boxes of sugar in a warehouse cooling. In contrast to the dirt and soot of the scenes from the sugarbush and sugarhouses, the shots from the plant interior feature employees clad in all white smocks and hats working with processing and automated packing equipment in a sterile-like white painted and polished interior. Shipping boxes labelled “Highland Pure Maple” are shown being nailed together and one scene a worker displays a can of “Highland Pure Maple Syrup”.

One-part marketing tool and one part educational materials, the film was likely shown in theaters as a short before feature films began. A few years after the shooting of the film, a reporter from the Caledonian Record who had been on hand to document the movie making told of his delight at seeing the film while in a movie house in Seattle, Washington. The reporter was even more shocked to see a few seconds of himself on the film where they had captured close-up images of him drinking fresh sap from a metal collection pail behind a large tree.

 

Notes        

[i] The Cary silent film was donated as 2,600 feet on four reels to Northeast Historic Film in 1997 by Philippe Beaudry of Longueuil, Quebec for safe and secure archiving. The reels included footage of the Vermont flood of 1927 and is archived under the title “Cary Maple Sugar Company –outtakes” in the Philippe Beaudry Collection at Northeast Historic Film. The film has been converted to VHS and DVD masters for safe handling and reproduction. Unfortunately, restrictions on reproducing still images from the film coupled with the often poor quality of the images on the deteriorating film prevent the display many of the various scenes from the film, in particular scenes from the interior of the Cary plant and activity at the Stanton (now Jones) and Waterman (now Newell) sugarhouses (see Chapter Five). However, many of the still photographs made by the Richardson’s at the time of filming the moving picture display the same scenes in better quality. Copies of the film in DVD format are maintained at the Vermont Historical Society, UVM Bailey Howe Library, the Fairbanks Museum and Planetarium Archives and the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum for educational purposes.

[ii] Florence A. Kendall, “Moving Pictures of Maple Sugar Making,” The Vermonter, Vol. 31, No. 9 (1926).

[iii] Lois Goodwin Greer, “America’s Maple Sugar King: George C. Cary,” The Vermonter Vol. 34, No. 1: 3-8 (1929); “Real Romance in VT. Maple Sugar Making : Three Epochs in Its Development Shown in Cary Camps” Unknown Newspaper, April 7, 1927. News clipping found in photocopy version of Cary Family Album in the George C. Cary Papers, Fairbanks Museum Archives (St. Johnsbury, VT).

[iv] “Real Romance in VT. Maple Sugar Making: Three Epochs in Its Development Shown in Cary Camps” Unknown Newspaper, April 7, 1927. News clipping found in photocopy version of Cary Family Album in the George C. Cary Papers, Fairbanks Museum Archives (St. Johnsbury, VT).

First Federal Government Report on Maple Sugar – C.T. Alvord – 1863

In searching for detailed descriptions of maple sugaring methods and equipment from specific periods of time in our past, one of the most interesting publications comes from a piece by C.T. Alvord titled The Manufacture of Maple Sugar. Alvord’s report appeared in the first Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for 1862 which was published in 1863 by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C. This was the first official agricultural related report of the newly formed United States Department of Agriculture, which was organized by law in 1862.

C.T. Alvord was Calvin Thales Alvord (1821-1894) a lawyer, progressive farmer, and sugarmaker who lived his whole life in Wilmington, Vermont. Alvord was a regular contributor to the farming and agricultural journals of his time such as the Country Gentleman, American Cultivator and Rural New Yorker, providing insights and opinions on everything from growing grass seed, to raising lambs and prized short horns, and of course maple sugaring. In fact much of what he wrote for the Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for 1862 was previously published by him in volume 15, number 19 of the Country Gentleman in 1860 under the title “Sugar Making in the Olden Time.”

What is especially interesting about Alvord’s 1863 report is that he starts off with a description of what a typical sugaring operation was like about 25 years earlier, circa 1835, before bringing the reader up to date on what was the state of the art around 1860.  Alvord’s description of sugaring in the early 1800s emphasized the use of multiple iron kettles for long nights of boiling,  V-cuts and U-shaped wooden slat taps transitioning to tubular wooden spiles in drilled holes, and rough split log collection troughs transitioning to wooden pails on the ground or hung on spikes. The sugaring camp featured crude shacks in the woods for storage and shelter for the people when boiling but not for actually protecting the kettles or sap. Of course the product of those times was exclusively maple sugar.

Related to that, Alvord’s report is useful in showing how much maple syrup, or maple molasses as they sometimes called it, was being made by the early 1860s. It shows that the shift away from sugar production was well underway prior to the Civil War. In fact Alvord notes “…many farmers are now making ‘maple sirup’ to sell, instead of maple sugar. At present prices it is thought to be more profitable to make sirup than sugar.” It is interesting that he put the words “maple sirup” in quotation marks, when using that word choice instead of molasses as if it was a new word for the sugarmaker’s vocabulary. Alvord goes on to say that in recent years the maple sugarmakers in his area of Vermont have “to some extent” been making maple syrup instead of maple sugar and putting it up in wooden kegs and metal cans holding from one to four gallons.

Alvord’s 1860s description is important in that it shows how early much of the technology of the late 19th century was in use. With the exception of the flat pans on brick arches being replaced by evaporators with baffles and drop or raised flues as well as the shift to cast iron spiles and sheet metal collection pails, very little improvement was seen in the technology for the next 40 or so years. Even the sugarhouse described by Alvord was little changed in layout and form by the turn of the century.

Alvord even describes a kind of pipeline of grooved wooden slats laid end to end to direct sap from a gathering point higher in the sugarbush down to the sugarhouse. Recognizing the drawbacks of the open wooden pipeline for debris and snow and rain to affect the sap, Alvord notes that there were even examples of tubular tin “leading spouts” as he called them which was a “great improvement on the wooden spout. It can be used as well in stormy as in pleasant weather. It is made in the form of a tube or a pipe, in lengths of eight feet. The size of the tube generally made is one-half inch, and costs thirty-seven cents per rod; one end of these spouts is made a little larger than the other, so that the ends will fit tight in putting them up.” This description of a metal pipeline notably predates the invention and use of the better known Brower Gooseneck metal pipeline by a good 50 years.

A PDF of the entire report can be viewed and downloaded from the link above with the Alvord chapter found on pages 394 to 405.

 

 

New Book – Meanings of Maple: An Ethnography of Sugaring

In August 2017 an important and interesting new book by the title Meanings of Maple: An Ethnography of Sugaring was released for purchase by the University of Arkansas Press. Written by Professor Michael A. Lange of Burlington, Vermont’s Champlain College, this book takes a sweeping look at the many ways maple is made meaningful in people’s lives. When using the term maple, the author is referring to the broader world of maple sugaring or all things that go into and come out of the making of maple syrup in a modern context.

As an anthropologist, Lange’s ethnographic approach is based on many years of speaking with, observing, and interacting with a broad cross section of the maple producing world.  His research and analysis is written from the perspective of Vermont as the center of the maple universe, some might say for obvious reasons, and the book is as much an exploration of how maple has meaning or is made meaningful to Vermont and Vermonters as it is about the meanings of maple in general.

This is an incredibly thoughtful book, in the truest sense of the word. This book is full of thought and ideas and shows that Lange has taken the time to really think about how and what makes maple meaningful to people both in and out of the maple producing environment. It is a book that will force any reader to think a little deeper and a little differently about some aspect of maple than they probably had in the past. It is one of those gems that forces one to admit that they hadn’t really thought about something that way before and to be glad that you were brought to see the maple world a little differently.

It is not a details book that is heavy with facts and figures or case studies and, at times, is somewhat lacking in a broader geographic and historical context especially regarding the modern role of Quebec in consideration of some of the categories of meaning. But that really doesn’t matter and frankly it would be great to see someone tackle a similar project from the point of view and grounding of the Quebecois traditions and meanings. This is not to say that the book is lacking in accuracy, far from it, rather it is to emphasize and applaud that its focus is more philosophical and its strength is in its narrative.

I strongly encourage anyone with an interest in the maple world, regardless of the connection to Vermont, but especially if they are connected to Vermont to pick up this book. It is not a book that you will necessarily “learn” something new from but it is a book that will even strengthen maple’s meaning that much more and help you better appreciate and understand what you think you already knew.

The book can be purchased from the University of Arkansas Press in paperback for $27.95 or hardbound for $69.95.

The Era of Plastic Sap Collection Bags

Prior to the modern method of collecting maple sap with flexible tubing there was an earlier attempt to put plastic to use as sap collection bags. The first reusable plastic sap collection bag was invented by Everett I. Soule of the George H. Soule Company the well-known maple equipment manufacturers out of St. Albans, Vermont. Following the Soule Company’s primary brand name for their King evaporator, when the bag came on the market it was sold as the King Sap Bag.

Clip from a 1956 advertisement for the Soule Company King Sap Bags.

Everett Soule began developing and experimenting with his bag idea in the mid-1940s and by October 1950 had perfected a design for a 13 to 15-quart bag that was then distributed to Soule Company equipment dealers around the country for sale and first-time use in the 1951 sugaring season.

The King bag was made of a transparent, heavy plastic called vinylite that was said to be the same material used by the Air Force for the packaging of food and water drops to soldiers. The bags were simple to use and did have the advantage of being cheaper than new pails and covers and when flattened for storage took up considerably less room than an equal number of pails. The top had an open flap that allowed one to pivot the bag on the spile to empty the collected sap without taking the bag off the tree, at least in theory.

Examples of the uniquely shaped clear plastic King Sap Bags hanging from maple trees very full of sap.

The transparent plastic allowed one to easily see the sap volume in the bag and did allow sun through to provide some ultraviolet light that arguably led to reduced microbial development and clearer, cleaner sap. Use of the bags required one to employ a hookless spile, such as the Soule hookless spout. When first introduced in 1950-51, prices for the bags were for anywhere from 69 to 89 cents each for lots of 100 or more with 100 Soule spouts also available for $8.00. Although these were said to be made of a durable plastic that could withstand the extreme weather conditions of the tapping season and the significant temperature fluctuations, it was still early in the use of plastics. The late Bob Coombs informed me that the cost of the King Sap bag was actually more like $1.25 a bag and they tended to get brittle and crack and split after a season.

Everett I. Soule’s 1960 design drawing for Canadian patent 598853.

Everett I. Soule obtained a patent in Canada for his sap bag (CA 598853) in May of 1960, but it does not appear that a US patent was ever secured, despite marketing language of patent pending. At the time of his invention, Everett I. Soule was the president of the George H. Soule Company, having taken over as president in 1938 following the death of his uncle and company founder, George H. Soule in 1937. Along with his brother Raymond L. Soule, Everett continued run the family owned company and himself became a prominent individual in the maple industry for many years. Following his death in 1964 the Soule Company was sold to Leader Evaporator Company, including the manufacturing and sale of the King Sap Bag. Under Leader’s ownership the printing on the exterior of the bag was changed from George H. Soule Co. to Leader Evaporator Co., Inc.

Initially, the maple industry showed great enthusiasm for this radical invention and introduction of plastics, then a post-war technological wonder that was sweeping the world. In an industry that previously was limited to wood and metal, plastics showed great promise, but it was the arrival of flexible tubing at the end of the 1950s that a meaningful shift in technology was to come.  The King Sap Bag continued in production into the late 1960s, but by the 1970s it was essentially abandoned.

Image of Reynolds Sap Sak in use. Photo credit: www.mapletapper.com

However, another variation of the plastic sap collection bag came along a few years later and has had a more lasting impact, especially among backyard sugarmakers and hobbyist. Unlike the reusable King Sap Bag that was washed, dried and stored at the end of the season, this bag was a single season disposable model that hung on a metal frame. Invented by Adin Reynolds of the Reynolds Sugarbush in Aniwa, Wisconsin in 1958 the Reynolds Sap Sak first became available for commercial sale in 1966.

Design drawing from Adin Reynolds’ 1967 United States patent 3,304,654.

The Reynold Sap Sak was distinctive with its bright blue bags, although it is possible to use a clear plastic bag as well.  Unlike the King Sap Bag, the Reynolds bags were simple, thin and very inexpensive plastic bags that were designed to be thrown away at the end of each season.  The thinner bags were a little more prone to splitting when the sap froze on cold nights and squirrels were known to gnaw through a few corners, but the extremely low cost of bags made the occasional installation of replacement bags acceptable. Like the King Sap Bag, the Reynolds Sap Sak also worked best with a hookless spile, since the metal cover was designed for fit over the spile and have its weight supported directly by the spile.

Front cover of 1967 equipment supply catalog from Reynolds Sugar Bush prominently presenting the Reynolds Sap Sak.

The Reynolds Sugar Bush initially promoted their bag through their Wisconsin equipment dealership and in 1967 Adin Reynolds was awarded a patent for this invention. In time, with its popularity and demand it began to be carried and supplied by nearly all maple equipment dealers. The Reynolds Sap Sak is still sold and in use across the U.S. and Canada but probably sees greatest use in the upper Midwest where it was first introduced. It is also possible that for the smaller scale producers not choosing to use tubing there is less of a concern for appearance or a romanticism about the aesthetics of sugaring in Wisconsin or Minnesota or Michigan that one might find in New England and a blue plastic bag is a perfectly acceptable way to gather sap.

References

“Everett I. Soule,” The Burlington Free Press (Burlington , VT) August 17, 1964, 9

“Everett I. Soule Takes New Post,” The Burlington Free Press (Burlington, VT) January 4, 1938, 6.

“George H. Soule, Leader in Maple Industry, Is Dead,” The Burlington Free Press (Burlington, VT) May 10, 1937, 2.

“J. Elmer Lepley Sells Plastic Maple Sap Bag,” The Republic (Meyersdale, PA) October 26, 1950, 2.

R.C. Soule, “What is New in Maple Sirup Equipment”, Report of Proceedings of the Conference on Maple Products (Philadelphia, PA, 1950) 28-29.

Lynn H. Reynolds, Reynolds, Maple and History: Fit for Kings, (Reynolds Family Trust: Hortonville, WI) 1998.

“Sap Bag is New Wrinkle in Maple Sugar Industry,” Battle Creek Enquirer (Battle Creek, MI) April 16, 1951, 14.

 

 

When Towle’s Log Cabin Was a Maple Syrup Company

Note: Readers interested in the history of the Log Cabin Syrup company will want to read a more recent blog post and article available at this link.

By Matthew M. Thomas

As one of the most iconic syrup brands in U.S. history, Log Cabin, has the dubious honor today of containing zero maple syrup. But that wasn’t always the case.

1904 Towle’s advertisement featuring Log Cabin Penoche Syrup.

In fact, at the turn of the last century, the syrups in the lineup of the Towle Maple Products Company included both a real maple syrup known as Towle’s Log Cabin Selected Maple Syrup as well as their more popular blend of cane and maple syrup referred to then as simply Towle’s Log Cabin Syrup and Towle’s Log Cabin Camp Syrup. From 1904 to 1909 there was also a fourth syrup called Towle’s Log Cabin Penoche Syrup, which was made from cane sugar and marketed for candy making. It is not entirely clear what amount of maple syrup was going into Log Cabin’s cans and bottles in the early years of the company, which was started in 1888 by a St. Paul, Minnesota grocer named Patrick J. Towle. As discussed below the first Log Cabin tins likely contained a significant amount of pure maple syrup with a shift towards a blended syrup in the early 1900s, before transitioning to a fully blended cane and maple syrup.

Reportedly, the earliest blended Towle’s Log Cabin Syrup originally contained about 45 percent maple syrup but it was probably more like 25 percent, which is printed on the label of some cans and bottles from the 19-teens. By 1950, the percentage of maple syrup had been reduced to about 15 percent, and as recently as 2002 the Log Cabin Company confirmed to me that their syrup contained some maple syrup but refused to disclose in what percentage. Today the ingredients list on a bottle of Log Cabin Original Syrup contains absolutely no mention of maple sugar or syrup.

Excerpt from 1905 Towle’s advertisement featuring the paper red label of Log Cabin Maple Syrup and the black label of Log Cabin Penoche Syrup.

The official company history, often repeated in the years after the company was purchased in 1927 by General Foods is that Patrick Towle began marketing a blended syrup from the very beginning. However, the truth is harder to discern. A closer examination of packaging, advertisements, and newspaper accounts from that era question the accuracy of this story. Instead, one might argue that a convenient narrative was developed and promoted later in time around the image and personality of Patrick Towle and his iconic Log Cabin label that supported the uniqueness and originality of the Log Cabin product.

Very early (circa 1888-89) Log Cabin Pure Maple Syrup one quart metal tin with paper label. Notice the company name of Towle & McCormick, St. Paul, Minn, a precursor to the Towle Maple Syrup Company and later the Towle Maple Products Company.

Towle got his start as a grocer in Chicago under the name P.J. Towle & Co., selling coffee, tea, and spices. Unfortunately, lax attention to the books and leniency with delinquent customers left Towle owing creditors about $100,000 in early 1888. After going bankrupt and settling the claims against him with a federal judge in Chicago, he moved to St. Paul where he entered into a partnership with Thomas F. McCormick and in mid-1888 and began selling Log Cabin Pure Maple Syrup. The arrangement with McCormick was short lived and the dissolution of their partnership was announced in the St. Paul Globe in April 1889. The following week the Towle Syrup Company was incorporated for the sale of Towle’s Log Cabin Maple Syrup. Trademark protection for the iconic Log Cabin logo was applied for in November of 1894. By the early 1900s the company was known as the Towle Maple Syrup Company and with the expansion in 1910 beyond St. Paul and into Vermont, as discussed below, the company was renamed the Towle Maple Products Company.

James W. Fuller’s 1897 design patent for the log cabin shaped syrup tin.

The first log cabin shape metal tin used by Towle was patented in 1897 by James W. Fuller, a salesman for Towle, and was covered in paper labeling. Before that, Towle used a tall rectangular metal tin can in quart and half gallon sizes for packaging maple syrup. The early cabin shaped tins with their paper labels claim that the contents were maple syrup and included a claim of purity that offered a $500 reward if someone found evidence of adulteration in their maple syrup, even though they were most surely a blend.

Image of late 1890s Towle’s Log Cabin Maple Syrup metal tin with paper label and certificate of purity on back.

In the years between 1904 and 1909, and especially after greater enforcement of labeling laws with the Pure Food and Drugs Act of 1906, magazine advertisements by Towle list three distinct syrup products, differentiating between cane syrup (Penoche), blended syrup (Camp), and real maple syrup (plain Log Cabin).

Based on the language in their advertisements and packages, it appears that the packaging of pure maple syrup by the Towle’s Syrup Company ended around 1909, after which the company focused its attention on only selling their cane and maple syrup blend as Towle’s Log Cabin Syrup. This change happened to coincide with a fire in December 1909 that  destroyed the top two floors of their St. Paul plant, and in response the company opened a processing and packaging plant in St. Johnsbury, Vermont.

In April 1910, Towle’s Log Cabin Maple Products Company opened a canning and bottling facility in St. Johnsbury in what had been the main facilities of the Cary Maple Sugar Company, adjacent to Ide’s Mill on Bay Street. George Cary, who was purported to be a member of the Board of Directors at Log Cabin sold to Towle the maple syrup bottling portion of his business at the time and focused his energies on buying bulk maple sugar.

Postcard image of the St. Johnsbury Bay Street waterfront circa 1911.
Close up of the Towle’s Log Cabin Syrup building adjacent to Ide’s Mill on Bay Street.

Log Cabin soon after updated the Cary facility, adding a new boiler and eight large boiling kettles, and by 1911 was operating year-round from seven in the morning until midnight most evenings. A November 1911 article in the St. Johnsbury Caledonian provided the following description of their modern operation –

The maple syrup which has been purchased from the farmer is placed in two 250 gallon and four 150 gallon copper kettles. This sugar is remelted by steam until it has reached the correct specific gravity and then it is pumped through a filter press which removes any dirt or nitre which may be in the sugar, into four large storage tanks which have a capacity of 550 gallons each. Then, as needed, it is piped downstairs to copper kettles where it is reheated by steam and then passes into the filling machine which fills six receptacles of any kind at the same time. From there the syrup passes to the capping machine which automatically caps the can or bottle with the crown stopper or to another machine which corks the receptacles as the case may be.

By 1912, Log Cabin was doing one million dollars worth of business out of their St. Johnsbury facility. This level of growth and activity necessitated abandoning the old Cary plant in 1913 and moving down the street to a vacant 50 by 150 foot, two-story brick fireproof building, known as the Pillsbury Baldwin Plant. From this new plant Log Cabin could load as many as twelve railroad cars a day.

In spite of the company’s rapid growth, with the death of P.J. Towle in 1912 and a subsequent reorganization of the company by his sons, Log Cabin’s St. Johnsbury operation was shuttered in 1915 and moved back to St. Paul. During the period of Log Cabin’s short but significant residence in St. Johnsbury, nearly all of their national advertisements, syrup cans, and syrup bottles noted that St. Johnsbury, along with St. Paul were the location of its refineries and packing.

Although today the maple industry looks upon Log Cabin Syrup with a reasonable amount of disdain and distate for its promotion of pancake and table syrups with absolutely no maple ingredients, the beginning years of Towle’s Log Cabin were situated within the maple industry as a buyer, packer, blender, and marketer of pure maple syrup. While still a family owned business in early 1900s the company also had a short-lived presence in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, the often cited Maple Capital of the World. Over time, with changes in ownership and emphases on maximum profits over maximum flavor, Log Cabin gradually reduced and ultimately abandoned both its inclusion of maple syrup and its connection to the maple industry.

Originally posted August 31, 2017

Revised February 17, 2020 ad November 4, 2021.

 

References

“Announcement,” The St. Paul Globe (St. Paul, MN) April 12, 1889.

Hovey Burgess, “The Blended Maple Sirup Industry”, Report of Proceedings of the Conference on Maple Products (Philadelphia, PA, 1950).

Business Activity – Towle Maple Products Company Working Overtime,” St. Johnsbury Caledonian (St. Johnsbury, VT) November 8, 1911.

Edward T. Fairbanks, “Business Notes – Maple Sugar,” The Town of St. Johnsbury, VT; A Review of One Hundred Twenty-Five Years to the Anniversary Pageant 1912 (St. Johnsbury, VT.: The Cowles Press 1929).

“Greater Vermont Notes,” The Burlington Free Press and Times (Burlington, VT) April 17, 1913.

“Heavy Failure: Patrick Towle of Chicago, Goes Under – Anthony Kelly of Minneapolis, the Largest Creditor,” Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN) January 25, 1888.

Clair Dunne Johnson, “I See By the Paper…” An Informal History of St. Johnsbury, VT, (Cowles Press, St. Johnsbury, VT 1987) 224.

Norman Reed, the Log Cabin Syrup Tin—A History, Tin Type Magazine, 1981 (Denver, CO) 1-12.

“P.J. Towle Dead,” The Retail Grocers Advocate, September 20, (1912), 31.

“P.J. Towle Passes Suddenly,” Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN) September 7, 1912.

“P.J. Towle Confesses Judgement,” Chicago Tribune (Chicago, IL) January 25, 1888.

“St. Johnsbury Vermont” Western New England Magazine, June No. 6 (1913): 272.

“To Leave St. Johnsbury – Towle Maple Products Company to Open Factory in Chicago,” St. Johnsbury Caledonian (St. Johnsbury, VT), December 30, 1914; “News of the State,” Essex County Herald (Guildhall, VT), February 12, 1915.

“Towle Maple Products Company Has Leased Pillsbury Baldwin Plant,” St. Johnsbury Caledonian (St. Johnsbury, VT), March 13, 1913.

James Trager, The Food Chronology: A Food Lover’s Compendium of Events and Anecdotes, from Prehistory to Present (New York, Henry Holt and Company, 1995) 326.