I had a welcome surprise the other day. I received an email from a stranger who was cataloguing a huge collection of antique cookbooks. He read my blog posts about my great grandmother’s cook booklets and said he ran into copies. We exchanged a few emails. He said he was impressed and they were a good representation from that era. We’re talking late 1890s to early 1900s.
I mentioned there was one booklet that I didn’t have. “16 Studies in White and Gold,” which are egg recipes. He scanned and emailed it to me. A week later he said he found an extra copy, asked for my address and mailed it to me! I was thrilled. Since he doesn’t have “Sick Room Necessities,” I scanned it for him. Also, I found several letters and photos of Nellie’s as well as her husband’s obituary, scanned those and sent them to him. (FYI, Nellie went by her married name as a cook booklet publisher extraordinaire, Mrs. De Witt C. Owen. Her real name was Ella Upton Leighton Owen.)
Nellie’s husband De Witt was first a printer and then a newspaper publisher. Eventually they left Dixon, Illinois for the “far west” moving to Anacortes, Washington where he was publisher of another newspaper. They settled in Marysville, Wash. when he took over that town’s newspaper. My namesake grandmother Elizabeth Owen was their only child. When my mom Mary Ella (named after her grandmother) grew up in Marysville, Nellie lived next door. She was in my mother’s memory a loving and kind grandmother, the most nurturing person in my mom’s life. Nellie died in 1948, so I unfortunately never met her.
Nellie was a strong woman and set the type herself for her cook booklets that she sold across the nation for 10 cents each. Her market was ladies’ church auxiliaries. The booklets were used as fundraisers, much as our kids sold gift wrap to raise money for their school. My aunt told me that at times, Nellie supported her husband and daughter with her cook book sales.
If you want to read more about Nellie and her cook booklets, I wrote about her HERE.
Here’s an except from “Sick Room Necessities:”
Have a wonderful Easter weekend! Any plans to celebrate Easter, Passover or Spring?
I found a few photos of Ella Leighton Hunter (Hunter was her maiden name, Nellie was her nickname) in an old family photo album. It includes photos of Rose Hunter and A.J. Blethen. Blethen founded The Seattle Times and the family still owns the paper generations later.
I found postcards from Rose Hunter Blethen writing that she was looking forward to seeing Ella at Christmas. Ella was adopted into the Hunter family after her parents died. Dr. Hunter, Rose’s dad, thought Ella was so cute and always thought well of her. She was adopted as a young child. I’m enjoying researching our family heritage and am impressed that as a journalism major, I’ve got lots of newspaper history in my blood!
How nice to get a copy of that cookbook. She sounds to me like a determined woman, given that she did her own typesetting. That was probably the secret to her success. Do you ever try her old recipes out?
It was so exciting to get a cookbook to make my set complete. I’ve found several of her recipes are ones I learned growing up like clam chowder and oxtail soup. My mom taught them to me and she must have learned them from her mom or her grandmother, the cookbook author. I’m going to try some that I don’t know.
There is a blogger that writes about old recipes. I will have to find her name and blog for you as I’m sure you would enjoy her blogs and she would be interested by this, also!
Thanks! I appreciate that. This new friend of mine sent me links to several Facebook sites that are all about antique cookbooks. I had no idea that there were so many published back in the 1800s and early 1900s. It was a cottage industry.
https://ahundredyearsago.com/
Thank you!
Wow, how wonderful for you, Elizabeth! You really do have newspaper in your blood! I love the way these old photos look, she was very pretty! Thanks for sharing this, its so fascinating! 😍
I’m so glad you enjoyed it. It was so exciting to hear from this stranger. Also, it got me motivated to republish these books. Thanks to my photography class, I now own a good scanner that is helpful for the project.
FYI, part of my last photography class was learning how to restore old photos. That’s why I got a scanner. We used Adobe to improve the scanned in old photos.
To learn of the ties that bind you and Nellie through paper and pen is so interesting and fun. What made me gasp out loud however was her image. You and she share many similar facial features for sure. It is her eyes though, Liz! You ‘have’ her eyes. Physically beautiful of course, but the journalistic view through them is powerful.
Happy birthday, dear friend. I’m so thrilled that you read my blog! Thank you for the kind, sweet comment. Nellie was beautiful. She was also the most loving person in my mom’s difficult childhood. Isn’t the writing background interesting? I feel like our lives may be destined more by genes than we realize.
Oh, what a fun surprise. Where did this man run into Nellie’s cookbooks? And isn’t that fun that your writing about her cookbooks led to him finding you? Wonderful!
He made my week. He’s cataloguing a collection of 50,000 cookbooks. My great grandmother’s cookbooks were a few books in the collection. He must have been looking online for information about Mrs. De Witt C. Owen and ran across my blog. It’s been fun corresponding with him and I finally have the last cookbook for my complete set. I’ve been purchasing them on ebay and book collectors sites for the past decade. I had a few from my mom as well.
That’s so awesome!
It is! I’ve also made a new friend!
How amazing! I love these little snippets of history and the connections they foster. Thank you for sharing!
Several years, I had mentioned that my grandmother was the youngest passenger of the Graf Zeppelin and a fellow blogger reached out and offered to search for articles, which she provided! It was really neat.
I’m happy you enjoyed my surprise this week. It really got me motivated to do more research on my family. I called my aunt to verify the adoption of Nellie and how she was connected to the Blethens. Isn’t it interesting where a blog post can lead you or others? Wow. How exciting a fellow blogger reached out to you about your grandmother. That’s quite the story about the Graf Zeppelin.
How great that you could exchange missing booklets! I recall reading about Nellie before. This was a nice follow up.
I’m glad you enjoyed it. I’ve learned more about Nellie and spent time reading through a file my aunt and mom left me full of letters and photos from her life. I thought about you and your research as I read through it.
Wow, I’m impressed that your great grandmother authored cookbook booklets. It was very nice of the stranger to make copies of some you didn’t have and give them to you. It’s wonderful that you now have the complete set.
It is so interesting to me. Also, this stranger to me I now consider a friend. He not only made copies for me, but sent me an original from the 1890s to complete my collection of my great grandmother’s set. Isn’t that amazing?
I’m so happy to have a blogger friend recommend your site to me. I’m looking forward to explaring more!
And, I look forward to exploring your blog more. It sounds like we have some similar interests.
That’s great news. I hope you enjoy my blog, too.
A wonderful family story Elizabeth
I’m glad you enjoyed my family history. I’m so excited to learn more.
This is indeed good news for you. Tracing family history and members is a difficult task. I’m glad you’re being successful.
It’s so interesting to me to learn more and to have a stranger reach out.
Very true- and in a way an affirmation of your great grandmother’s efforts.
The person who sent me the missing cookbook said he’s going to write a post about Nellie and her cookbooks. I hope to learn more from him, because he’s immersed in antique cookbooks. He said that she was instrumental with her work in that field.
How amazing.
It was a nice surprise this week.
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Absolutely amazing, Elizabeth! Wow! thank you so much for sharing with us. Sending big hugs! 💝💝💝
It was a special gift to receive the missing book from a complete stranger! What a delight. It also motivated me to find out more family history. I’m glad you enjoyed the story!
Loved it! More, please! Xo! 😘❤️😘
I plan on republishing the cookbooks and including a story about Nellie. This is a project that my husband’s aunt suggested to me years ago. 💕
I love it…so good! ❤️😘❤️
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how cool!! my daughter and I are headed to Amsterdam in a few hours!!
Have a great time! I can’t wait to see your photos.
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Wow. She is very impressive! So many cookbooks. (Or even booklets–very impressive!!)
How sweet to find someone else who has the wherewithal to do the deep dives on Nellie’s history.
I am so excited to have a complete set of her booklets. Each one is about 16 pages. They have hand stitched bindings or are tied with ribbon. My new friend and I are emailing each other with information about Nellie.
Really interesting.
I’m looking forward to this new friend’s post about my great grandmother. He’s doing research and I may get new info.
That was definitely a pleasant surprise. Nice that you were able to exchange material.
It was a special treat and motivated me to go through my box of great-grandmother’s cookbooks and a hundred-year-old plus photo album and use my scanner.
That’s pretty cool! A lot of good memories, I bet.
I’m learning more about my mom’s side of the family. Mom passed away a couple years ago, so I call my aunt, mom’s little sister, to fill in details. My great grandmother lived next door to my mom and aunt while they were growing up.
I still remember my great-grandmother. I was in college when she passed, she was 103. So I have stories about her. It’s great to go back and reflect on the lives of those who came before us.
You’re so lucky your great-grandmother lived to 103 and that you knew her! Nellie died in 1948, but my grandfather’s mother I remember. Mom would visit her and take my brother and me. But it was before I was in kindergarten. I have a few pictures of us together.
It was incredible that she lived that long and that I was able to spend time with her.
That’s great that you were able to meet her, even if you were little.
You are fortunate. Yes, I’m enjoying connecting with my family and learning more. I do remember those visits with my grandfather’s mom. He died when my mom was a freshman in college, so I didn’t know much about that side of the family
How nice of him to contact you and send the cookbook! 🥰 A treasure to have. I have been on the Whatnot auction site and have seen 1800’s cookbooks being sold. I have really enjoyed finding old books of all kinds.
There are several cookbook sites on Facebook. One is for antique cookbooks that he introduced me to as well. We’ve been corresponding now for several weeks. I was so excited to get the final cookbook to complete my great grandmother’s set.
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