By Bill Young
May 19, 2007 10:16 pm
—
Before I get into this week’s article about the amount of butter listed on the 1850 census, I want to briefly go back to the Trinity River. How many of you saw the article about the 13-foot alligator killed on the Trinity River in Leon County? My mind started thinking about those times when the steamboats plowed up and down the Trinity River with reptiles as big or bigger lying in the shade waiting on some unsuspecting dinner, human or animal, to come swimming by. This gator weighed in at over three times my weight and judging the size of his mouth, he could have polished me off in two or three bites. Don’t think I will ever go swimming in the Trinity River again!
On the 1850 census, milk cows were one of the specific types of cattle listed. Needless to say, milk cows produced milk and in turn cream which if churned, turned into butter. The 1850 agricultural census did not list the gallons of milk produced by any farmer’s herd but the census does list the volume of butter in pounds. Of all of the items both animal and vegetable listed on the census, butter is the only one listed which gives an indication of how the census was actually recorded. In other words, the census was a compilation of the past year’s total production of each item on the census. It was not the total of each item on hand on the day the census taker compiled the information. It is reasonable to make this assumption because butter is a perishable product which could not be stored for any length if time without refrigeration. Granted, small amounts such as a few pounds or maybe as much as 10 to 15 pounds could be kept cool either down in the well or in the spring/well house, but large amounts of butter, as much as 100 pounds or more, would take up a lot of space in the well or spring house. With this thought in mind, it is obvious the amount given to the census taker had to represent a year’s worth of production, not what was actually on hand at that specific moment.
Out of 186 farmers listed on the census, only 14 did not list butter as a product they produced. I would imagine most of the non-butter owners first of all were not true farmers owning little or no land and for sure no dairy cows. Instead they probably had stores or were doctors and lawyers although some of the doctors and lawyers owned land and cattle but others did not.
Unless my memory about cooking is failing me, I think a box, four sticks, is a pound of butter. Can you imagine a pile of butter containing 49,026 pounds of butter? This number is the total amount of butter listed on the 1850 agricultural census. That is a lot of cholesterol, although now days they are saying butter is better for you than the artificial kind. If we take the total amount of butter listed on the 1850 census and divide the number by the total number of farmers who listed butter as one of their products, the average amount per farmer is slightly over 229 pounds. I have compiled a list of the top 10 butter producers and none of these men had less than 600 pounds. At the head of the list was William Ladd with 1,000 pounds. Mr. Ladd also owned an inn in Corsicana for a couple of years in the early 1850s. Four men were tied for second with 750 pounds apiece: C.C. Harris, Jackson Harris, J.T. Barnaby and Elijah Anderson. One man, William Paris, had 700 pounds and the final four men, Samuel Wilson, George Hogan, William Bright and Henry Cook, stated they each had 600 pounds of butter. These 10 men had a combined total of 7,300 pounds or about one-seventh of the total production in the county. Everyone had butter. One item of interest I noted while listing the butter was the number of farmers who stated they had 365 pounds of butter which might indicate they churned one pound of butter per day. Whether they in reality did one pound of butter per day or this was just an easy way of roughly determining their total annual production is not known. I sincerely doubt they went out each and every day to churn one pound of butter. It probably was more related to the daily chore of having to milk the cows both morning and night.
Since we know they produced a lot of butter, what about the milk? Why wasn’t it counted on the census? Where did the milk go? I sincerely doubt all of a herd’s production of milk was consumed by the family of the farmer. Some must have been sold or traded locally. Since I am asking questions, why did they not count the chickens, roosters and eggs on the agricultural census? All were products which could be bought, sold or traded. Another item seen today but not found on the 1850 census is goats. Not a single goat was listed on either the 1850 or 1860 census yet goats can be seen in many fields in the county today.
My wife, Bobbie Jean, may have solved the question I wrote the other day about tomatoes. She said she read somewhere years ago the general population thought tomatoes were poisonous. She said Elizabeth Gillispie also made the same statement. It seems tomatoes and for that matter potatoes belong to the nightshade family. Some plants in the nightshade family are poisonous to humans but tomatoes and potatoes are not. Don’t tell my kids about the tomato problem. All three will not eat tomatoes today and the youngest is 35 years old. Personally I like a good fresh, cold tomato with salt and pepper but I have to watch the salt. The ones grown in hot houses and sold during the winter are rather bland, almost tasteless.
Next week: Cheese, hay and honey, the last three items on the 1850 census.
Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.
Photos
