Keeping Hearth & Home in Old Alabama is a "how-to" book, but not for you. Drawn from a wealth of authentic Victorian-era books and magazines, it is like the book your great- or great-great grandmother might have read at age 17 to prepare herself for the etiquette of courting, to learn how to conduct herself in public, and to learn what would be required of her during marriage. Later, she might have read the same book through all over again, for ideas about how to arrange the parlor and how to direct her children's playtime. It's also the book she would have grabbed off the shelf the first few times she needed to butcher and prepare a hog, make cologne, clean her finest church silk, or make a syrup to treat her baby's nagging cough. Finally, she could depend upon it to provide sure-fire recipes for the most common edible dishes - and disease remedies - of the day.So welcome to the family household in old Alabama. Come indoors, pull up a fireside rocker, and discover how the everyday rituals of a bustling nineteenth-century home can bring history to life more vividly than ever.

Average Customer Review: ( 2 customer reviews )
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.

KEEPING HEARTH AND HOME IN OLD ALABAMA by Carol Padgett.
Menasha Ridge Press, Birmingham, Alabama. 2002. ISBN
0-8732-522-2.

At first glance, this seems to be one of those pre-packaged
books of old-time advice and recipes that could be reproduced for
each state in the Union--just change the name "Alabama" to
whatever state you want to insert.

However, though this is a wise marketing strategy, this book
is somewhat personalized for Alabama, making it worthwhile for
the historical footnotes it contains, as well as for its
entertaining recipes and bits of wisdom.

Where else would you be reminded that, because of the power
of "White Privilege," many old Southern recipes developed by
black slaves and domestics were credited to the white families
who passed them down the generations? This is something to
ponder.

Where else would you find advice from Harriet Beecher Stowe
on how to boil water properly? Where else would you learn that
asbestos is best in protecting your stove from setting the house
on fire? And you'll be grateful to learn that a dining table
"should be firm and solid and not so shaky that the guests fear
some catastrophe." So much for the advice I got from my wife:
always carry a matchbook to dinner, in case the table wobbles and
you have to level it.

In other words, this is a browser's book, a book for the
waiting room or the bath room. You can pick it up and learn
something totally useless almost anywhere in the book--and once
in a while you'll be startled with a useful piece of information:
"Many children form habits which are not nice, such as spitting
on the floor...and yawning." We have to be thankful for small
improvements over the past century.

--Jim Reed, author of DAD'S TWEED COAT: SMALL WISDOMS HIDDEN COMFORTS UNEXPECTED JOYS Learn more at: jimreedbooks.com