As part of the Dominion & Grimm maple syrup equipment manufacturing company’s Virtual Spring Event, they have put together and shared a great video tracing their origins and history. You can see the video in English at the Youtube link below. There is also a French version available at this link.
It is with great pleasure that this website has been given permission to share an English translation of an interesting and important article tracing the role of Cyrille Vaillancourt and the Georges L’Hoir Company in the manufacturing and adoption of aluminum sap collection pails and the effort to eliminate lead from maple syrup in Quebec.
The original article, written in French by Quebec historian Pierre Prévost, appeared in the Winter 2018 edition (Volume 30, No. 1) of Au fil des ans, Revue de la Société historique de Bellechasse (the Journal of the Bellechasse Historical Society). You can view the original article in French on pages 23 to 28 at this link. For those interested in Quebec maple history, the Winter 2018 edition of this journal contains many other articles, all in French, related to the history of the maple syrup industry in the regional county municipality of Bellechasse, Quebec.
Many thanks to the author, Pierre Prévost, to the President of la Société historique de Bellechasse, and to the editor of the journal for agreeing to my request to translate and share the article on this website.
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L’Hoir Comes to the Aid of the Sugarmakers
By Pierre Prévost
Au fil des ans, Revue de la Société historique de Bellechasse (Winter 2018) Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 23-28.
On April 10, 1936, American customs officers blocked three wagons of maple products shipped by the Quebec maple sugar Cooperative. Lead contamination is involved, the heavy and toxic metal that causes dreaded effects on the nervous system. Research performed in Vermont a few months earlier indicated the presence of lead in sap collected from maple trees. Since this observation, federal inspectors are vigilant and strict.
Americans want quality
Since 1906, the Pure Food and Drug Act prohibited the sale of contaminated food on American soil. Americans had been burned in the 1920s by Canadian maple sugar that was often of poor quality and in which was sometimes found oat bran, brown sugar, and even pebbles. The minister of Agriculture of the time, Joseph Edouard Caron, then appointed Cyrille Vaillancourt to organize Quebec maple syrup producers and promote the production of quality sugar and syrup. On May 2, 1925, the “Cooperative of Quebec maple sugar producers” was born and a campaign to educate the maple industry was in full swing. In the fall of 1928, Plessisville located at the center of the maple syrup region, became home to the packaging and processing factory. Vaillancourt brought the maple industry to a level never before seen, and in the 1930s even managed to break the monopoly on purchasing Quebec syrup held by American George Cary. This time the problem is quite different and Vaillancourt must remedy it.
Cyrille Vaillancourt, 1946. Source: Historical Society of Alphonse- Gardens.
The chemists of the Plessisville laboratories do not give up. They find the presence of lead in the shipped syrup and, powerless, appeal to their colleagues from all walks of life. They get the support of Elphège Bois, director of the Department of Biochemistry at Laval University, who, after some experiments, manages to solidify the lead and extract it from the unsaleable syrup. The seized cargo is subjected to the treatment and the purified syrup is allowed to proceed Chicago.
However, the problem of contamination with lead oxides is found to occur in the early stages of maple syrup production, a bitter conclusion of the chemists from Plessisville. Lead is likely entering syrup from the collection and storage of sap. Spiles, sap pails, evaporation equipment, transport containers and tanks are targeted, because tinned iron and solder release a tiny amount of heavy metal when in contact with maple sap and syrup, which are acidic in nature, with a pH between 3.4 to 6.6. Aluminum would be the ideal replacement material but is too expensive for maple syrup producers. The main concern of Cyrille Vaillancourt, the manager of the maple sugar cooperative is to find a manufacturer capable of producing good quality aluminum buckets with a two-gallon capacity.
In a random conversation, Cyrille Vaillancourt hears about the director of a specialized stainless-steel factory located in Liège, Belgium. There was a big report in the news a few years earlier about Professor Auguste Picard who was the first researcher to access the remotest part of Earth’s atmosphere. In the meantime, with a restructuring of the Food and Drug Administration in 1938, Washington was tightening its control of food in the United States.
The expertise of L’Hoir
Auguste Piccard pose in front of the sphere manufactured at L’Hoir. This inventor is known to be one of inspirations for the author Hergé’s character of the teacher Sunflower. Source: Federal Archives of Germany.
Originally from Switzerland, Auguste Piccard (1884-1962) became an expert in physics and went to university in Brussels to teach. In 1929, Piccard submitted a daring project to the national scientific research fund recently founded by King Albert. Seduced by the idea of exploring the stratosphere in a balloon, the organization granted him the 400,000 Belgian francs required for the experimental manned flight in the upper atmosphere. Piccard needed a lightweight sphere made from a sufficiently robust aluminum that could withstand an environment where the pressure is only a tenth of that measured on the ground.
Piccard went to meet Georges L’Hoir, who then ran a beer can manufacturing factory in Angleur, on the outskirts of Liège, the cradle of the zinc industry and a former world capital of the steel industry. L’Hoir saw no problem with the request despite not knowing what the 2.1 meters in diameter and 3.5 millimeters thick sphere was intended for. This sphere will become the pride of L’Hoir and will help spread their notoriety throughout the world. “This is the first time that we’ve make a beer barrel in this shape! “(Reply by Georges-Armand L’Hoir to Auguste Piccard)
A first test set for September 14, 1930 was postponed due to adverse weather conditions. Early on the morning of May 27, 1931, near Augsburg, Germany, Auguste Piccard, assisted by engineer Paul Kipfer, took off inside the aluminum capsule supported by a balloon that had to expand to a diameter of 30 meters.
Ascending at the rate of half a kilometer a minute allowed him to realize the first pressurized flight while climbing to 15,781 meters, a height never previously reached by a living being and the first of a series of world records assigned to Piccard. Despite some pitfalls, the crew travelled 1,800 kilometers and finally landing on a glacier in Austria, before the reserves of oxygen ran out. Their return to civilization was triumphant and the news toured the globe.
Auguste Piccard returned to Georges L’Hoir’s factory to have a second, improved version of the capsule manufactured: the first having been battered by the squalls of wind during its second test, its tightness was no longer insured. On August 18, 1932, Piccard rose again into the stratosphere, this time with the Belgian engineer Max Cosyns. They reached 16,940 meters altitude.
Georges-Armand L’Hoir in Canada
Portrait of Georges-Armand L’Hoir. Source: Society for the History of Lévis.
The exploits of Professor Piccard caused a sensation on all continents and the notoriety of Georges L’Hoir followed in their wake. Cyrille Vaillancourt had found the man for the job to supply millions of revolutionary sap pails. He communicates with the Belgian manufacturer to let him know what he is seeking and sends him samples. A few weeks pass, other samples come back with a written proposal then they wait. To their surprise, in May, Georges-Armand L’Hoir arrives in Lévis, a few days before the royal couple, and knocks on Cyril’s Vaillancourt’s door. It is not L’Hoir’s first visit to American soil, since he monitored the production of buses intended for Belgian government during the Great War. On this trip he wanted to come back to America to establish a new factory. It is said that he was courted by the citizens of Kitchener, Ontario who were ready to build him a factory to accommodate his machinery. The ball was now in the camp of the people of Lévis, and Vaillancourt, administrator of the Caisse populaire de Lévis, worked out some scenarios.
Note: Lévis is a city in eastern Quebec, Canada, located on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, opposite Quebec City. A caisse populaire in Quebec is most similar to a what is called a credit union in the United States.
With the support of his counterpart Valmore de Billy, president of the Caisse de Lévis, Cyrille Vaillancourt submits a proposal to his colleagues to build a factory for the production of aluminum sap pails in Lévis. The credit committee deliberates and considers two financing scenarios for this project: either a group of citizens endorses Georges-Armand L’Hoir for a loan of up to $ 20,000; or the Caisse builds the factory at its own expense and L’Hoir would rent the facility at cost plus 5% interest. The leaders of the Caisse choose the second option considering that L’Hoir is a recognized industrialist, who has a strong credit rating with banks in Belgium and France, and on the condition that he agrees to stay in Lévis if he wants to expand his factory. A disbursement up to up to $ 20,000 is allowed for the construction of a factory of about 180 feet by 40 situated on reclaimed land by the river, a little downstream from Hadlow Cove. L’Hoir will have to pay monthly rent while the Maple Syrup Cooperative guarantees the purchase of all the sap pails as long as their price and quality are maintained.
Around 1960, these ladies work to complete the assembly and the polishing of aluminum spiles. Source: Company History of Lévis.
The idea of living in a traditional Quebec house that was the birthplace of the poet Louis Frechette quickly seduced the Belgian industrialist. A factory built behind the attractive house would benefit from a dock and access to the Canadian National Railway. Georges-Armand L’Hoir probably made the best choice since a highly militarized Nazi Germany was threating Liège which is only a few away kilometers from the border with Germany.
The Lévis plant is ready to open in the fall of 1939, when the German troops invade Poland, an act which leads to the declaration of war. The metallurgist and his family in retreat from Europe, settled in to their new Quebec home, while the factory receives machining tools and await the arrival of aluminum.
A vast replacement operation
Everything is in place to produce sap pails intended for Quebec maple syrup producers. However, aluminum is scarce since the aeronautical industry requires huge amounts of the white metal for the war effort. This situation goes against the views of Adélard Godbout, the newly elected Liberal Minister who was recently elected in solidarity with Ottawa Liberals who supported the war effort but did not advocate for conscription.
An agronomist by training, Adélard Godbout campaigns for the promotion of trade between Quebec and the United States. To this end, he negotiates with the federal government and the Aluminum Company of Canada (ALCAN) to allow a meager but sufficient share of the aluminum for the L’Hoir plant to meet the demands for new sap pails. Using his influence in Ottawa, the prime minister facilitates a temporary supply which, without it, the L’Hoir factory would have to close its doors. Production at the factory is vital for soldiers since it manufactures military containers, among other things. Almost two years have passed since the American embargo on Canadian maple products when, in 1940, Godbout established a trade delegation from the provincial general assembly to New York to promote and highlight Quebec products.
The next three images show the evolution of the L’Hoir factory originally built in 1939 in the backfilled land, enlarged towards the west in 1940 with a serrated roof to let in natural light, then again in 1950. Source: Historical Society of Lévis.
Aerial view of the L’Hoir factory, after 1950. Source: Historical Society of Lévis.
The country waits in vain for the end of rationing on metals. In the September 1940 edition of the publication L’Abeille et l’erable, Cyrille Vaillancourt announces that the metal controller in Ottawa has rationed 400,000 sap pails to be available for the spring season of 1941. At this rate, he would not see the end of the replacement operation. Vaillancourt had reached an agreement with the two governments to subsidize the cost of the pail replacement program being administered by the Cooperative. The producers must turn in their old sap pails and pay a third of the cost of the new pails with the federal and provincial governments each picking up a third of the remaining cost.
In December 1942, the L’Hoir company obtains a letters patent, and forms a corporation under the name “Les Produits en Aluminium et Acier Inoxydable L’Hoir Inc.” to “manufacture, buy, sell, and import all kinds of products, articles, and merchandise in metal and conduct trade in general and in particular engage in transactions directly or indirectly, to industry or commerce, for objects manufactured from aluminum or stainless steel”. In 1943, Vaillancourt obtains a better position to affect the supply when he became and advisor to the wartime price commission.
When the war is over, aluminum becomes abundant again and industry experiences unexpected economic growth. The L’Hoir factory continues to produce maple syrup equipment as well as lightweight saucepans that are popular with housewives. However, their founder dies in 1948, leaving his son Georges in charge of the company.
During the 1950s, larger and larger objects are coming out of the factory. The factory produces tanks of all kinds and shapes, fixed and mobile, that are intended for different liquids, such as alcoholic beverages, dairy products, vinegars, and other food products. In the case of sap pails, the replacement program comes to an end in March 1960. In all, about 18 million sap pails were made at L’Hoir, before plastic begins to see increased use in the maple industry.
In 1984, the company experienced difficulties and was sold in a last-ditch attempt to save it from bankruptcy. Ultimately, the factory closed its doors and looked for a new tenant and use. The house where Louis Fréchette was born remains uninhabited since 1985 and its fate remains uncertain. On November 11, 2000, Georges L’Hoir died at the Hôtel-Dieu in Lévis. His factory was demolished a few years later and the sale of the property remains unfinished. Ironically, Georges L’Hoir’s Belgian factory in Angleur, near the center of Liège, still partly exists, and is currently occupied by Drytec, a pneumatic industrial company.
“Our home was not precisely rich, but its relative elegance contrasted with most other houses in the neighborhood. I still see her in her frame of old hairy elms, with its green shutters, on a white background, its veranda, and its vegetable garden. “(Louis-Honoré Fréchette)
Thanks to L’Hoir’s expertise, maple products have seen a significant reduction in lead contamination. Since that time, the lead content in maple syrup made in Quebec is tested. If the concentration is too high, above 250 parts per billion, the maple syrup is destroyed. Aluminum sap pails are now antiques. Nevertheless, they are still widely used and recognized by almost any Quebecer whether they are being used for maple syrup or not.
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Pierre Prévost is vice-president of la Société historique de Bellechasse and carpenter-joiner. (Photography : Marie-Josée Deschênes, 2017.)
The Maple Syrup History website is pleased to share the following guest contributor post.
By Brenda Battel
The Battel family has produced maple syrup on its Michigan centennial farm since 1882. That’s when George Battel came from Ontario to settle 80 acres of land that he had purchased from a lumber company. The farm is located six miles northeast of Cass City, Tuscola County, MI.
George Battel stands near the iron kettle he used to boil sap over an open fire. He was the first of six generations to make syrup on the family farm.
In 1882, much of the land in Michigan’s “Thumb Area” was no longer of use to the lumber companies. The Great Fire of 1881 swept through Tuscola and surrounding counties in early September. More than a million acres burned. Hundreds died. Thousands were left destitute. It was the first official disaster that the American Red Cross responded to.
On the future site of the Battel farm, the fire spared a ten-acre grove of sugar maple and beech trees. This is where, six generations later, the family continues the tradition that George started in 1882.
Syrup in the early decades was produced for personal consumption. In the late 1920s, George’s sons (John, George and Daniel) started selling syrup commercially. It sold for $1 a gallon during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The brothers produced 75 to 100 gallons of syrup each spring.
Bob Battel taps a maple tree on the family’s’ syrup farm.
Every generation since has carried on the tradition: the Arthur Battel family (third generation), the Mark Battel family (fourth generation), and the Bob Battel family (5th generation). That includes Bob’s daughters (sixth generation). There are currently three generations working together in the family business: Mark and his wife, Diane; son Bob; his daughters, Addy and Dori; and their mom, Sue.
Bob says he feels a connection to his ancestors every spring.
“You kind of relate with what they did,” Bob said. “Each spring you look forward to the season starting. I’m sure George did too — and John and Dan and Art… You kind of feel connected to the ancestors in the end of February and beginning of March.”
Not only has the current price increased from $1 to $54 per gallon, but production has doubled since the Battel brothers started selling syrup in the 1920s. This is due to technology and efficiency — which are welcome improvements considering the amount of manual labor the task of making syrup entailed in the past.
Technology also allows the farm to be a family operation. Because of tubing, reverse osmosis and an evaporator upgrade, the Battels do not need to hire anyone outside of the family.
“(Production) depends a lot on the weather during the season,” Mark said. Below freezing temperatures at night and warmer days allow for optimum sap flow.
He said that in the early years of the commercial operation, the entire woods didn’t always get tapped. A tree must be tapped in order to harvest sap. A small hole is drilled into the tree so that the sap can flow through a spile, which is placed inside the hole. For more than a century, buckets were hung from the spiles to collect sap.
Twenty years ago, the family invested in a tubing and pump system, which eliminated buckets. Tubes are connected to the spiles. Tubes carry the sap through the woods to a pump station, which creates a vacuum. The sap is pumped into a holding tank near the sugar shack, where it is boiled into syrup. The tubing/pump system allows the Battels to harvest sap from smaller trees. Production increased by a third when the tubes were added.
Mark Battel holds a quart of maple syrup made on the family farm.
Prior to installing tubes, there were about 500 taps in the woods. Today, there are 700. The tubing/pump system didn’t just make it possible to tap more trees. It reduced a lot of labor spent gathering sap. Before the tubes were installed, Mark would drive a tractor and wagon through the trails in the woods. All 500 buckets of sap were manually dumped into the holding tank on the wagon.
Bob’s most vivid syrup-making memory is of his grandfather, Art, driving the tractor and wagon through trails in the woods to collect sap from the buckets hanging from the trees.
Seven years ago, the syrup operation, now known as Battel’s Sugarbush, LLC, invested in a reverse osmosis system.
“It takes some of the water out,” Mark said. “So it reduces your boiling time, and it uses less wood — less fuel.”
In 2020, the Battels upgraded the evaporator, which also makes the process more efficient and further reduces boiling time. The evaporator is 3 feet wide and 8 feet long. It preheats the sap. The fire is also hotter due to a fan beneath the evaporator. Another change is that thick steam no longer clouds the sugar shack. The steam goes from the enclosed evaporator directly up the chimney.
One thing hasn’t changed since 1882. It still takes 40 gallons of sap to boil down into one gallon of syrup. But it takes a lot less time today than it did for George 139 years ago. He used an iron kettle over an open fire. Near the very spot where George boiled his syrup sits the modern sugar shack. It houses the evaporator, reverse osmosis system, wood pile and canning station.
Addy Battel cans syrup for her business, County Line Kids Pure Maple Syrup.
When Addy was 12, she won a grant to launch a new syrup business with neighbor and former business partner, Ethan Healy, who was 13. County Line Kids Pure Maple Syrup taps and gathers 100 of the taps on the farm. They boil, can, market and sell 10-15 gallons of syrup each spring. The kids use small, novelty containers for the finished product. The largest size is a pint. County Line Kids splits the profits with Mark, to pay for leasing the trees and using the facility to boil down and can the product.
Addy, now 18, is attending Michigan State University as a third-generation Spartan. Although Addy still helps in the woods, she passed the responsibility for managing County Line Kids to 15-year-old Dori.
“It gives me experience running a business,” Dori said.
She has been involved in managing the business for a couple of years. “I’ve been helping Addy from the start (of County Line Kids),” she said.
Dori is happy to carry on the tradition that George started in 1882. “It shows how committed everyone is,” she said.
Addy is a proud syrup maker as well.
“I’m proud to be the sixth generation in my family to make maple syrup,” Addy said. “Spending springs in the woods with my family watching the woods come to life is a pretty great legacy to be a part of.”
The sugar shack remains popular as ever with Battel kids like Asher, age 12 and Elias, age 11 (Bob’s sons). It is a spot for weenie roasts and family gatherings. The menu includes marshmallows and s’mores. The boys also help maintain the woodpile.
Bob continues the tradition because he enjoys it and it’s fulfilling. “It’s something to share with my kids,” he said.
The syrup season is short. It usually starts in early March, and lasts four to six weeks, depending on the weather. When the nights freeze and the day temperatures are above freezing, the trees are tapped. The season ends when the trees start to bud.
Other Battels involved in syrup making over the generations include: Annie (George’s wife), Bessie (John’s wife/Art’s mother), Lilian (Art’s sister), Marjory (Art’s wife), John (Art’s son) and Margaret (Art’s daughter).
Over the past 139 years, the tradition has required a lot of hard work, dedication and perseverance from six generations of Battels. Nevertheless, sweet memories abound and are cherished by them all.
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Brenda Battel, Mark and Diane’s daughter, is a member of the fifth generation to grow up on the maple syrup farm alongside brother Bob. She is a writer who lives in Cass City, MI, not far from Battel’s Sugar Bush. She can be reached at brendabattel1@gmail.com.
In a short, thought-provoking article published in the fall of 2020, Dr. Brigit Ramsingh examined a moment in Canadian history when maple syrup and nationalism intersected and the ideas and promotion of food purity (versus adulteration) were equated with promoting the national spirit of Canada.
Dr. Ramsingh’s article reminds us, that while we may see maple syrup as benign and free from political association today, foods and other iconic images have often been used as symbols of nativist identity and cultural association. We are reminded that in the past, and maybe even today, there may be meaning and power in the images and associations of maple syrup that are not always evident at first glance.
A new project was recently launched in Vermont to document the many historic sugarhouses that dot the the state’s rural landscape. Be they abandoned, inactive, or currently in use, the project, led by Dori Ross, a maple syrup maker and founder of Tonewood maple products company, is aimed at creating a well-illustrated record of old sugarhouses, and where possible and appropriate, helping share information on preservation tools and funding opportunities for these iconic symbols of the maple syrup industry.
Sugarhouse Vermont website for documenting historic sugarhouses.
A major tool in gathering information on where these sugarhouses are found is on the Sugarhouse Vermont website where sugarhouse owners can fill out an online form to share details and information on the sugarhouse’s location as a prelude to a more intensive photo and written documentation by the project team.
Dori Ross, Sugarhouse Vermont project leader.
In addition to sugarhouse documentation and creating an inventory of old sugarhouses, another long term goal of the project is to publish a photo history book as a tool to preserve and share the story, beauty, and histories of Vermont sugarhouses. I am pleased to be a part of the project team as an advisor and the project historian and I plan to contribute a chapter on the history and evolution of the sugarhouse for the book. In addition to myself and Dori Ross, our project team has the assistance of Sawyer Loftus, an experienced journalist and University of Vermont student made available through the support of the UVM Center for Research on Vermont.
If you own an old or just plain older sugarhouse, or know where a less well known historic sugarhouse is located, please consider contacting us through the information provided at the Sugarhouse Vermont website. You can learn more about the project at the Sugarhouse Vermont website or read and hear more about it in a recent Vermont Public Radio story that aired on April 8, 2021.
The Vermont Historical Society’s journal Vermont History recently published an article I wrote on the origins of plastic tubing for making maple syrup. Specifically titled, “From Pails to Pipelines: The Origins and Early Adoption of Plastic Tubing in the Maple Syrup Industry,” the article examines the evolution of pipeline and tubing technology for gathering and moving maple sap with special attention to the relationship and interplay of the three men who carried plastic tubing from idea and experiment to commercial reality. The article appears in Volume 89, Number 1, Winter/Spring 2021 and is sent to all members of the Vermont Historical Society.
Unfortunately, since this is the current issue of the Vermont History and is hot off the presses, I am not permitted to share an electronic copy of the article for 6 months. But anyone can join the Vermont Historical Society and get the paper journal mailed to their door as well as online access to all their current and past journals (including this issue), all the while supporting the preservation and sharing of Vermont history.
This fall I will post a PDF copy of this article on this blog, so check back in September to get a copy.
I recently had the honor of doing a joint online presentation about Adirondack maple sugaring with Ivy Gocker, Library Director at the Adirondack Experience – The Museum on Blue Mountain Lake. Specifically, our presentation focused on the history of the maple sugaring operation of Abbot Augustus Low’s Horse Shoe Forestry Company in the Adirondacks 120 years ago.
If you missed it and would like to watch you the program, you are in luck. The Adirondack Museum recorded our ZOOM webinar and has graciously shared it on their website, which you can find at this link or by clicking on the image above. This program was made possible by a partnership between the Adirondack Experience and co-sponsored the Albany Public Library.
This article describes the designs, technology, and patents of the first evaporators for making maple syrup and maple sugar in the late 1850s and early 1860s and the men that were responsible for their introduction. Evaporators provided an advanced, faster, and more efficient way of reducing maple sap to syrup and sugar than the flat pans they replaced and were one of the most important technological advancements in the history of the maple syrup industry.
The article tells the story of well-meaning, but unsuccessful attempt to establish a commercial maple syrup operation on the Grand Portage Ojibwe Reservation in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
The ridge running above Lake Superior in northern Minnesota is known for its high quality sugar maples, with some of the most extensive stands found on the Grand Portage Reservation. Looking for economic development opportunities, the State of Minnesota hit upon the idea of helping start a cooperative commercial maple syrup operation with the members of the Grand Portage Ojibwe community. Click on the article for the rest of the story.
Country Living magazine’s January-February 2021 edition features a one page spread in their What is it Worth section highlighting a collection of antique Log Cabin Syrup tins.
What is especially notable about these collectibles is that four of these tins in the spread are from my personal collection of Log Cabin Syrup memorabilia. In addition I was able to assist the editors with refining the accuracy and details of their short history of the Towle’s Log Cabin Syrup Company. The editors were nice enough to acknowledge my contribution and give this website got a nice shout-out too! It is great to see maple syrup related antiques and collectibles getting noticed and promoted in a national magazine. Click on the image above for a larger version of the page.
The 
