In August 2017 an important and interesting new book by the titleMeanings 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.
One interesting and important way to understand and tell the story of the history of maple sugaring is through the remains of past sugaring operations. Recording and investigating these sites and artifacts from maple sugaring’s past falls into the realm of what I like to call sugarbush archaeology.
For many folks when the idea of archaeology is brought up they immediately think of studying past human behavior before the time of written records, and that certainly covers a lot of the focus of archaeology. However, archaeology is not solely limited to the pre-writing segment of human history and also includes consideration of our material remains from more recent periods in time.
Just about everyone that has spent any time in or around a sugarbush which has been in use for a few generations or more is probably aware of the location of an old sugarhouse or boiling camp. If it is fairly recently retired or abandoned, it may be a standing ruin or relic, but if it was left many more years ago, chances are it has been reduced to a simple scatter of twisted metal, an irregular foundation or collections of stones, or a mounded patch of ground in the woods. Those remains are now artifacts and features of an archaeological site. The heritage of sugarmakers is certainly preserved in things like the photographs and collections of antiques and ephemera that line the wall of many sugar houses. But there are other artifacts, sometimes very big artifacts, of maple sugaring that we can also preserve and learn from.
While there are some written records describing early maple sugaring activities, the further one goes back in time, the fewer and fewer records there are and what is written is generally lacking in detail or description. For example, in the western Great Lakes region in earlier times when Euro-Americans were still settling the land and access to use of the woods was more open and with fewer limits, it was not uncommon to set up a sugarbush and boiling camp where ever it was deemed best. This may have been private land, it may have been unclaimed public land, it may have been tribal land or even tax forfeiture land.
Photo of nested kettles in abandoned Native American sugaring camp.
Today, archaeologists find a variety of sites in the forest that mark the past location of all sorts and scales of maple sugaring, from the simplest boiling camp that may have been a single kettle used for one season to the former location of a sugarhouse that contained multiple evaporator where thousands of gallons of syrup were made each season.
Most of the work being done that identifies maple sugaring archaeological sites happens on federal, tribal, state, and county lands where there are rules in place directing land managers to look for archaeological and historic sites like these and take those places into account when managing those lands. But maple sugaring sites are all over, and there are undoubtedly many many times more sites on private lands and in current sugarbushes that any of these public lands.
Photo of the unloading ramp and sugarhouse at the Grand Island sugarbush shortly after abandonment.
I’ve worked for many years as a field archaeologist in the woods of northern Wisconsin, Michigan and Minnesota and have recorded dozens and dozens of maple sugaring sites. Most of these sites were the remains of small short lived boiling camps with simple stone and earthen arches and an associated scatter of metal artifacts. But every now and then there was an opportunity to work with a more substantial site. For example one interesting site was the remains of the Cleveland Cliffs Mining Company’s sugarbush on land now managed by the Hiawatha National Forest on Grand Island in Lake Superior off the shore of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.
Photograph of the remains of the sugar house on Grand Island from east side of site looking west.Map of archaeological remains of Grand Island sugaring camp.
The company operated a commercial sugaring operation for xx years before they closed shop and abandoned everything in place in 19xx. Unlike a lot of sugarhouses, when they closed they just walked away and essentially left the evaporators and equipment behind. I was able to photograph and map what was left of the decaying sugar house which was presented in a 2003 article in the Michigan Academician.
Other researchers have also looked at maple history from the lens of the archaeological record, with two notable publications being Keener, Gordon and Nye’s 2010 article on the Petticrew-Taylor Farmstead in Ohio and David Babson’s 2011 doctoral dissertation on late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century sugaring sites in Lewis County, New York.
While the study of abandoned commercial sugaring sites is fascinating, a great deal of my attention has been spent working on identifying and understanding the remains of sugaring activities associated with Ojibwe and Potowatomi Native American communities from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Most people who are less familiar with those Indian communities, including sugarmakers from New England, are often a surprised to learn that maple sugaring continues to be an important part of the seasonal activities of Indian people into the twentieth century. This is in part a legacy of the Indian maple production being a subsistence activity for family and community consumption and largely operating outside of the mainstream realities the mainstream market economy. It is also a relic of a government assimilation policy that discouraged Indian people from continuing their traditional gathering activities, often forcing Indian people to quietly carry out their sugaring.
Map of remains of Native American boiling arch at McCord Indian Village in northern Wisconsin.
While working as an archaeologist for the Lac du Flambeau Ojibwe Band in northern Wisconsin we recorded dozens of abandoned sugaring camps both on and off the reservation. A great deal of this research was published in an article in 2001 in the Wisconsin Archeologist which presented an overview of the kinds of sites we were finding and the material remain left behind like metal cans, pails, birch bark containers, and metal and wood taps for sap collection as well as kettles, chains, and hooks for boiling sap.
Map of remains of storage structure and associated artifact scatter at Lac du Flambeau sugar camp LDF-081.
Learning as much as we could at the sites at Lac du Flambeau was a springboard to being asked to help record and interpret many more Native American sugaring sites in northern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Much of that work was presented in a 2005 article in the Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology about the remains of tell-tale U-shaped boiling arches at known and suspected Native American communities. Both of these articles were largely aimed at helping the practitioners of professional field archaeology better recognize and appreciate this often overlook and misunderstood cultural resource.
Our limited understanding of the history of Indian sugaring has been an important reasons and motivation for me to focus on recording and interpreting these sites. There are many of non-Indian archaeological remains of sugaring to investigate as well; however, the supporting documentation and historical information related to those sites is a bit more robust. Also because many of the Euro-American sugaring sites were established on lands that continue to be held in private ownership, often as sugarbushes to this day, they may be in a better position to be preserved and protected.
When talking about the early years of maple sugaring in North American, curious and knowledgeable people invariably bring up the question of who made maple sugar first, Native peoples or the Euro-Americans and Euro-Canadians that came to the new world. That’s a very interesting question and one that archaeology should be able to help answer. Wading into the origins debate, as I refer to it, is a curious topic and not unlike opening up a political can of worms. People are very sure of what they have come to believe is the truth, regardless of what evidence they are presented. However, I will save my thoughts on that topic for the moment and dedicate another post to tackling that in the future.
What is important to consider and appreciate in looking at and managing a stand of maple trees, be it a current or past sugarbush and on private or public lands is that the the land has a story to tell. Often times this story is not recorded any where else and may no longer even remain in the minds and memories of those that worked those woods. What looks like trash or ruins does have meaning if you look at it from a certain light. Likewise the old roads, fence lines, scarred trees, and signs of different cutting histories and forest management are part of the unwritten record of sugarbush archaeology. Where we can we should take the time to consider, document, learn from and maybe even preserve what remains of the past years of sugaring.
REFERENCES CITED
Babson, David W., “Sweet Spring: The Development and Meaning of Maple Syrup Production at Fort Drum, New York.” (doctoral dissertation, Syracuse University, 2011).
Keener, Craig S, Stephen C Gordon, and Kevin Nye, “Uncovering a Mid-Nineteenth Century Maple Sugar Camp and Stone Furnace at the Petticrew-Taylor Farmstead in Southwest Ohio.” Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology 35, no. 2 (2010) 133-166.
Thomas, Matthew M., “The Archaeology of Great Lakes Native American Maple Sugar Production in the Reservation Era.” The Wisconsin Archeologist 82, no. 1 (2001) 75-102.
Thomas, Matthew M. and Janet Silbernagel, “The Evolution of a Maple Sugaring Landscape on Lake Superior’s Grand Island.” The Michigan Academician 35, no. 2 (2003) 135-158.
Thomas, Matthew M., “Historic American Indian Maple Sugar and Syrup Production Boiling Arches in Michigan and Wisconsin.” Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology 30, no. 2(2005) 299-326.
The Conference on Maple Products began in 1950 under the guidance of Dr. Charles O. Willits and with the support of the United States Department of Agriculture’s Eastern Regional Research Laboratory. At this time the maple industry was coming out of a bit of a post-war slump and there were no national or international maple syrup organizations or annual meetings. Some individual states and provinces had organized maple associations with annual meetings that occasionally brought researchers, producers, and industry representatives together but the industry as a whole was largely unorganized.
The Eastern Regional Research Laboratory opened in 1939 in Wyndmoor, Pennsylvania, a suburb or Philadelphia. With a newly completed doctorate in analytical chemistry, Charles O. Willits was one of the first researchers to come on board at the laboratory. Being concerned with the decline of the maple industry at that time, Willits and a collection of his colleagues at the lab proposed a long-term program of research to examine and improve the production and utilization of maple products. Willits also recognized the equal importance of making their research results known and applicable to the maple industry.
The Conference on Maple Products was envisioned as a place to present and report on current research of the laboratory as well as the work of other government and academic research units and industry representatives in a face-to-face manner with stakeholders and leaders of the maple industry and encourage dialogue and discussion. Held every three years, there were eight gatherings in total, with the first seven in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania near the Eastern Regional Research Laboratory and the last meeting in Boyne Falls, Michigan in conjunction with the National Maple Syrup Council.
C.O. Willits retired from the Eastern Laboratory in 1969 and with him, the maple products research program at the Eastern laboratory gradually wound down. Without their leader and with the newer National Maple Syrup Council (to later become the North American Maple Syrup Council) supporting research, regular conferences, and face to face meetings; the tri-annual Conference on Maple Products held its land meeting in 1971.
Fortunately, the proceedings for all eight meetings are well preserved and can be viewed as PDF documents online. These proceedings contain an interesting collection of reports presented at the meetings and in some cases the transcripts of the discussions that followed. Presentations were from across the maple industry, including updates from the packing industry, policy makers, new technology, historical summaries, and new and developing research. You can find these conference proceedings at the following links on www.archive.org.
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.
An outstanding new publication recognizes the Bellechasse region of Quebec as home to a strong community of maple producers and for its important contributions to the technological developments of the modern maple industry. This book was released in 2016 and is written entirely in french with the title L’histoire de l’acériculture et des sucriers de Bellechasse: Berceau Technologique Mondial Acéricole, 1716-2016. This title translates in english to The history of the maple industry and maple producers of Bellechasse: The Technological Cradle of the Maple World, 1716-2016.
Réjean Bilodeau, the author and sugarmaker from Saint-Damien, Quebec, undertook the book as a project to occupy his time in his retirement years. However, with one book down Réjean is only getting started. The cover of this book indicates it is Tome 1, or volume 1. Réjean has told me he is working on volume 2 at the moment which, at another whopping 600 pages, he expects to have finished and for sale in 2018.
The book is divided into six chapters and covers over 300 years of maple history in the Bellechasse region with a special focus on the people who made this history come alive, be they producers or inventors or equipment manufacturers. More recent history focuses on the contributions of IPL and CDL and the Métiver and Chabot families, the role of Cyrille Vaillancourt and the creation of La Coop Citadelle among many other topics and dozens of producers and sugarbushes.
At 740 pages with 400 illustrations and weighing in at over six pounds this book is no light read. In fact, it is incredibly dense with detailed research, interviews and first-hand accounts and memories from sugarmakers in the Bellechasse region. One thousand copies of this self-published book were produced and many have already sold.
Réjean Bilodeau proudly displays a copy of his fantastic new book.
As noted above, the book is completely written in French, although with the wonders of today’s modern technology such as Google Translate and other similar apps for smart phones it is now possible to use the camera on a mobile phone to take a snapshot/scan of a page and translate the text on the page in mere seconds. The quality and accuracy of such translations is sufficient to understand the text, but it is true that at times the translations lose the nuanced meanings of certain phrases, idioms, and clichés.
I purchased my copy of the book through the Canadian maple equipment dealer CDL for $50 US plus $29.91 for shipping. Try contacting CDL in Quebec to place an order by email or phone at 418-883-5158 ext. 337.
Those interested in contacting Mr. Bilodeau directly who speak or write in French can reach him by email or by telephone at 418-789-3664.
A current project I am researching involves an examination of the history of the early years of the use of flexible plastic tubing for the gathering and movement of maple sap. This research looks at the evolution of earlier pipeline systems leading up to the first experiments and prototype taps, tubing and fittings before diving into the more specific events leading up to the patents and introduction of marketable products of the 1950s and early 1960s. A focus of the research and story is the role and interaction of the three primary inventors and promoters of early tubing – George Breen, Nelson Griggs, and Bob Lamb.
From a historical point of view, as something that primarily take place in the 1950s, the origins and evolution of plastic tubing is a fairly recent story to tell; however, enough time has passed that none of the key individuals are still living. Despite that fact, as this research has progressed I have been lucky enough to interview various family members of all three of these men, as well as other knowledgeable folks in the maple world with their own connections, stories, and information to share. Nevertheless, I am still looking for a little more detail and corroborating information, most notably related to Bob and Florence Lamb’s back story and their initial introduction and engagement with the maple industry and developing their version of plastic tubing, spouts and fittings.
I am sure there are many individuals out there in the maple world that have had their own interactions with these men and women over the years, not to mention their own experiences with early adoption of plastic tubing. If you are one of these folks and would like to share anything that you think might is relevant, informative, or just plain helpful, I’d love to hear from you. Please drop me a note at maplesyruphistory@gmail.com or use the comment form on this website.
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.
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.
As the longest standing publication for the maple industry, this archive of past issues is a treasure trove of information on what was happening and important to the maple industry in the second half of the twentieth century.
Beginning with Volume 1, Number 1 published in January 1962, one can review industry and production reports, examine advertisements, and read commentaries that trace the trends and issues of previous years. One can also follow through time new directions in research, changes in technology and equipment, and the ups and downs of marketing and policy.
For many a review of past issues of the digest may seem like a fairly recent walk down memory lane since many current maple producers were active during much of the era covered by these earlier issues. For others, these are a tightly dated, rich and detailed source of information on the maple industry’s more recent past.
Preserving and telling the maple history story as complete and accurately as possible relies on a wide range of sources of information, artifacts, and contributors. Sugarmakers have always had a strong affinity for collecting and preserving the material objects and antiques that help tell the history of maple syrup and sugar. There are a number of great museums specifically dedicated to housing and presenting myriad tools, devices, and equipment, as well as honoring those that have made significant contributions to the industry. What we have seen less of is the sharing and organized preservation of the documentary history; the photos, written and paper records, and past publications. I would argue there is a growing need for greater consideration and attention to creating, maintaining, and contributing to an archive or archives focused on the maple syrup industry.
It is easy to say or think that one’s old records or files or photos or even objects are not really important or of no interest to anyone in the near or distant future. But you’d be surprised what folks miss after its gone. Such items, be they from a small mulitple-generation maple producer or a large corporate packer or equipment manufacturer, become the bedrock of the industry’s history. While it may seem like people understand and know their history and someone will always remember the past, memories fade and change, and people come and go, figuratively and literally. You can’t and don’t necessarily want to preserve everything, the challenge of course is knowing and deciding what is valuable and might be worth preserving.
Archival materials related to maple history most certainly do exist and can be found in varying amounts in the archives of most state historical society libraries in the maple producing regions. Although I am less familiar with the archives in adjacent Canadian provinces, having never heard of an archive dedicated to the maple industry, I assume that the situation is somewhat similar to in the U.S. In some cases local county or community historical societies have provided space and resources for the storage and access to maple related archives and select collections. As an example, the Fairbanks Museum and Planetarium and later the St. Johnsbury History and Heritage Center have provided preservation services and access to the George C. Cary Papers in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, keeping this important collection in the same town where George C. Cary’s maple sugaring empire flourished.
In the mid 1980s, the Vermont Maple Industry Council worked with a collection of people mostly affiliated with maple research at the University of Vermont (UVM) to form a Maple History Committee and tasked them with compiling “historical information on the folklore, production methods, and economics of the Vermont maple industry and make it available . . . for use in teaching children and others”. A great deal of material was collected and put on file in the Special Collections and Archives at the UVM Bailey/Howe library with a particular focus on the research contributions of individuals associated with the University of Vermont. This committee was a great idea and a great start but it was too short lived. Unfortunately, the individuals that formed the backbone of the committee at UVM moved on to retirement and in many cases passed away and in time the committee was no longer active.
More recently, the University of Vermont libraries Center for Digital Initiatives in conjunction with the UVM Proctor Maple Research Center has taken a more modern approach to preserving a part of their history and some of the materials of the Maple History Committee by scanning and putting online a Maple Research Collections. This includes digital copies of the many articles, reports, and photographs that stemmed from the years of research at the Proctor field station as well as digital copies of maple related reports that appeared in early editions of the University of Vermont Agricultural Extension Bulletins. This is a great example of using digital means to preserve and share a portion of the archives from UVM’s important maple research legacy.
I recently had the pleasure of meeting with folks at the Leader Evaporator Company in Swanton to discuss maple history and learned of their own long term project to review their many historic business records, catalogs and reports and document their corporate history. It was fantastic to see that they were tackling such an important project since the Leader Company’s history is in many ways an overview of the history of maple equipment manufacturing and dealers in the United States. In discussing their work, I asked what they thought they might do with all the historic, largely paper material they had assembled about the company, to which they said, “that’s a good question and we haven’t really thought about that yet”. This really hit home that not only is there a need to provide resources and space for the safe and organized preservation and study of the documentary record of the maple industry, there is also a need to recognize its equal value and importance alongside the preservation of the maple industry’s historic places, artifacts and objects, and stories.
Museums dedicated to maple history do a relatively good job preserving, displaying, and interpreting the material remains and objects of sugaring. For the most part their focus has not been in the area of preserving the paper, photos, and other ephemera found in most archives. Preserving such materials takes the right kind of space, as well as financial resources and human resources, not to mention a way of making these materials available to researchers and interested people. After all, that is the point, preserve these materials so we can study and know and tell the maple history story. However, maintaining an archives may not fit within the means or the varied missions of these museums.
Is this a call for a dedicated maple history archives? Not necessarily, although the idea has merit. Perhaps there is simply a need to improve the understanding and integration and access to what already exists in established archives and to push for more concerted effort to curate, preserve, and share those records that remain and continue to be discovered out there amongts the maple syrup community. This is the history and legacy of individuals, families, companies, institutions, and an entire industry. As with a lot of things, one has to ask oneself what is it worth to preserve the history of an industry and who should be the ones doing it?
For the maple history fan interested in old equipment catalogs and the evolution of maple syrup technology, the Canadian equipment manufacturer Dominion & Grimm has made available a nifty collection of their catalogs from years past.
The catalogs in these full color scans cover most decades of the twentieth century and are presented as downloadable PDF files. Also available on the Dominion & Grimm website is a short history of their company which began as a Canadian wing of the G.H. Grimm Company of Ohio under the direction of a cousin of Gustav Henry Grimm.
Initially manufacturing and selling Champion Evaporators patented by G.H. Grimm, the Canadian Grimm Company was an independent affiliate of the Ohio Grimm company until it was purchased by the Dominion Evaporator Company in the 1950s, becoming the Dominion & Grimm company of today. It’s wonderful that Dominion & Grimm saw the value in preserving and sharing a record of their products and sales publications.
An excellent historical companion to the Dominion & Grimm story is the 1987 history of the G.H. Grimm Company by past owner and president Robert Moore and published in Volume 17, number 4 of the Rutland Historical Society Quartery. This company history traces the successful evolution and ownership of the G.H. Grimm Company from its Ohio beginnings in 1880, through its move to Rutland, Vermont in 1890, on to its sale in 1983. Moore’s article is a much appreciated corporate history of one of the most influential and important companies in the invention and manufacturing of maple syrup evaporators, spouts, and other equipment.
