Home Tags Posts tagged with "taxes"
Tag:

taxes

Brownie Wise, The Brains Behind Tupperware

by

In 1950, Earl Tupper was sitting in his Leominster, Mass., office struggling with how to get his business off the ground when Brownie Wise called.

He never met Brownie Wise, but she phoned to tell him about a party. What happened next changed every kitchen in America.

Brownie Wise

Brownie Wise

Earl Tupper was born in Berlin, N.H., in 1907. His family moved to Lowell, Mass., where Earl grew up. He took a failed stab at a tree maintenance business. By 1946, Earl had his own  firm in Leominster, making and selling plastic containers for storing food.

Birth of Tupperware

At the end of World War II, DuPont had distributed blocks of polyethylene to plastics companies. It had  mass produced the stuff for war uses, but it hoped to find new uses for the material.

Tupper had a stroke of genius. He contacted DuPont and asked if they would send him a sample of the polyethylene before they added stiffening agents to it. The pliable plastic was exactly what he was looking for, and he shaped it into sealable food storage containers. The containers had a characteristic ‘burp’ when sealed: Tupperware.

Tupper had his plastic bowls selling in hardware and department stores, but they didn’t sell well – everywhere except one little Florida company that couldn’t get enough of his bowls. Why? he wondered. And so he contacted the company called Tupperware Patio Parties, run by Brownie Wise.

Brownie Wise

Brownie Wise was Tupper’s opposite, outgoing and vivacious. Born and raised in Georgia, she had married a Ford executive and moved to Dearborn, Mich. There, her marriage soured and she divorced.

She worked as a sales representative for Stanley Home Products, a Massachusetts-based company that sold cleaning goods through in-home sales parties. Brownie Wise quickly spotted the opportunity Tupper was missing.

His product needed a personal touch for people to understand it. At an in-home party, the product could be thrown on the floor to demonstrate its durability and tossed around to show how light it was.  Sales reps could also show firsthand the Tupperware ‘burp’ that seals in the flavor of food.

Brownie Wise moved to Florida and started her patio parties company. At that point Earl noticed how much product she moved. During their first phone conversation, Earl invited Brownie to visit him in Massachusetts. Once they met, he knew she was right.

In the home, there would be no inhibitions or distractions. Housewives could picture his modernistic designs right in their own kitchens. And the sales force was there for the asking.

Tupperware Parties

After getting a taste of economic freedom during World War II, many women wanted something other than homemaking. Tupperware sales parties were perfect.

Earl and Brownie created Tupperware Home Parties Inc., and Brownie became vice president. Earl would make the product, Brownie would sell it.

Over the course of several years, Brownie created a whole new kind of sales network, one that relied on fun sales conventions. She called them jubilees and filled them with skits and awards. Blenders and other kinds of incentives were added to the commissions, and a whole new type of sales structure rose up. Brownie’s all-woman sales force – taken for granted at home – reveled in the praise and celebration at their annual ‘sales jubilees.’

By 1958, business was booming. If only Brownie Wise and Earl had been able to continue their partnership, we can only wonder what might have been. Instead, she got bossy and arrogant. He got jealous and testy. Even though he paid to promote Brownie’s image as a whole new style of female executive, he resented people viewing her as the reason for Tupperware’s success.

Posing with a television at a Tupperware jubilee, 1955.

So, without notice, Earl fired her and sold the company to Rexall Drug Stores. He then divorced his wife and moved to Costa Rica so he could avoid taxes. Tupperware rolled right along without either of them.

At first, Rexall talked of scrapping Brownie Wise’s innovations, like the sales jubilee.  But employee after employee told the new company president that such a move would be a disaster. Rexall backed off and didn’t mess with success.

Tupperware Phoenix

By the start of 2020, stock analysts left Tupperware Brands for dead because they saw too much debt and excessive costs. The company, though, cut costs and flourished during the COVID-19 pandemic, as people stayed home and cooked more. In December 2020, the financial news network TheStreet called it one of the best stocks of the year, noting, “Shares fell as low as $1.25 in March and recently closed at $36.64.”

Women are still holding Tupperware parties and attending jubilees in countries around the world.

Historic Thanksgiving Foods now in paperback! Click here to buy on Amazon.

 

Images: Brownie Wise By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33209984. Tupperware By Melissa Highton – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=107261339. Tupperware assortment by By Mark Larson – https://www.flickr.com/photos/30792886@N00/3544195739/in/photolist-6pbVV6-cmeS8W-2LD5j4-3cTjz8-7G6C7f-efnHD-efnNX-3ycmba-3ycd3H-5fPENe-9MucPJ-5bt2L1-5kvsKf-6PYFv-49yf1M-w2DHU-7AYtpX-5krceZ-7tT9ou-dCeab2-4uWcqu-tYPJV-9VpsFB-4Zzu1U-4z2aJm-4qADX-7D4Psn-8nznXp-nnCoK-dD7A4a-btBHP9-7df4Kq-nnCij-dzijSo-5r5nta-5ETEW3-9kU7WF-6PYFu-4vVdGx-3ankiN-7EYAVh-7EUKRT-5ARNme-4JWVWK-5AW4W7-5ARMKR-6J7sFQ-5ARN6e-6NFim4-5ARNGZ-2Vo5E5, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=28295511.

This story about Brownie Wise was updated in 2023.

 

7 comments 2.3k views
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail

Rules for Living From an Old Massachusetts Farmer

by

Jared David Busby was a 78-year-old Massachusetts farmer who had the solution to ending the Great Depression: Work.

So he told his granddaughter, along with other practical suggestions, such as ‘keep a pickle barrel’ and ‘go to bed before midnight.’

New England farmhouse

New England farmhouse, a familiar sight to the old Massachusetts farmer.

Charlotte Busby interviewed her grandfather on Feb. 24, 1939, for the Federal Writers Project. He was 78 years old, born in the Berkshires. He had lived in Warren, Mass., for more than 40 years.

They sat in his kitchen as he made tea. She told him to dunk his doughnut if he wanted to.

“Catch me dunking, or using a bowl instead of a cup, if you can,” he said. “I dare you to catch me. I’ve got on my company manners.”

The Old  Massachusetts Farmer

Charlotte Busby described her grandfather as a notable figure in the business and political life of the town. Many called him ‘Jerry.’ The old Massachusetts farmer was likable, witty, a philosopher with little formal education, but a vigorous mentality, she wrote.

“Though very dear, he seems to know what is going on, is much interested in public questions and is well read. He spends considerable time at his small radio, despite its poor quality and static. Jerry subscribes to four newspapers and reads magazines also.”

His whimsical expression reminded her of Mark Twain.

“He lives alone and enjoys himself,” she wrote. “His health is usually good, his eyes are bright, his white hair thick and flowing. Though Jerry’s shoulders are stooped, his arms show strong muscles and his shapely hands apply themselves to many tasks.”

Hard Work

The old Massachusetts farmer told his granddaughter work, hard work, was the solution to the Depression:

“Everyone should work, in the first place, and work hard,” he said.

He complained about too much play, too much gambling and speculation. “The panic was caused by the people depending on the country,” he said. “It should be vice versa. The country should depend upon the people.”

And then the old Massachusetts farmer got very specific about what to plant, what to keep in the cellar, what to give children and when to go to bed.

Jerry thought every family should try to own their own home and a little land. Farmers should plant a garden and raise enough vegetables to last through the winter.

“A wife should can everything possible,” he said. “There should be a salt pork barrel and a pickle barrel. If possible, have two cows, and hens enough to have one’s own eggs. Feed the hens some grain and, mostly, table scraps.”

A Good, Fat Pig

“Always raise a good, fat pig to be killed at Christmas time,” the old Massachusetts farmer said. “A good heifer calf can be raised cheaply, with some work. The bull calves can be fattened, and eaten when cold weather sets in.”

He further advised planting apple, pear and peach trees.

Have a strawberry and raspberry patch, and if possible, an asparagus bed. Be sure to get a good job and keep it. If machinery replaces men, men must walk barefooted looking for something else.

You know I think I’m a socialist.

“Be on time and work early and late,” he said. “This money will pay taxes, insurance and repairs, buy regular food not otherwise provided for, and clothes. Don’t make use of installment plans in buying anything. Have the cellar full of fruit and vegetables, such as potatoes, cabbage, turnips, carrots, parsnips. Have plenty of stews; buy a few pounds of good meat and cook up a quantity of vegetables.

“Buy or cut fuel for the winter in the summer and have it ready before it is needed. Dress children simply and warmly and have them in the care of a doctor and dentist, at regular periods.”

For the Young Massachusetts Farmer

Girls, he said, should learn to cook and sew. Boys should learn to cut wood, take care of a garden, milk a cow and hunt and fish.

“Give the boy a boat and a dog and a gun, if he acts sensible,” he said. “Teach him to use carpenter’s tools. Give a girl a sewing machine.”

Jerry believed girls need a college education as much as boys so both could become wage earners.

“Have parties at home. Don’t buy an automobile unless it is necessary, or you can afford the luxury of owning one. Rise early and go to bed before midnight. The best sleep is before midnight.”

With thanks to the Library of Congress WPA Life Histories from Massachusetts. This story about the old Massachusetts farmer was updated in 2022.

7 comments 1.3k views
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail

In 1765, Rebels Sacked the Boston Mansion of Thomas Hutchinson

by

Thomas Hutchinson, the lieutenant governor of Massachusetts, had one of the finest homes in Boston – until August 26, 1765.

On that night violence boiled over in response to the British plans to impose the Stamp Act on the colonies. The tax would have applied to all official papers in the colonies. Hutchinson, though, wasn’t necessarily the right person to protest.

The early incarnation of the Sons of Liberty had already taken out its anger on Hutchinson’s brother-in-law Andrew Oliver, Massachusetts’ future tax stamp administrator.  On this night a mob wanted to continue the protest, though their anger went beyond Oliver.

Thomas Hutchinson

Thomas Hutchinson in 1741

Protesters began gathering around a bonfire on King Street, drinking and discussing what to do next. They first went to the home of Mr. [Charles] Paxton, marshal of the court of admiralty and surveyor of the port. Paxton calmed the crowd and invited them to a nearby tavern for a barrel of punch. While he saved his own home, he fueled the growing crowd for their next stop.

They broke into the home of William Story, register of the court of admiralty, and destroyed his papers along with some of his belongings.

Mobs, Once Raised…

William Gordon told the story in his 1788 History of the Independence of America:

…he first movers in the affair meant mainly an assault on the house of the deputy register who, by various mal-practices, had made himself highly obnoxious to persons doing business in his office. But mobs, once raised, soon become ungovernable by new and large accessions, and extend beyond their intentions far beyond those of the original instigators.

“Crafty men may intermix with them when they are much heated,” he noted, and direct the mob to do something other than their original intent.

The mob proceeded to the house of Benjamin Hallowell, comptroller of the customs for Boston. There they broke in and tore through his papers. This time, they expanded their activities, taking clothing, money and liquor from his cellars, which they proceeded to drink. This fueled the crowd for their final stop of the evening, the home of Lieutenant Governor Thomas Hutchinson.

The Thomas Hutchinson House

Someone had warned Hutchinson of the mob’s approach. By the time the crowd arrived, Hutchinson had already sent most of his children away and barred his doors and windows. A few moments before they reached his house, Hutchinson’s daughter persuaded him to leave.

The Thomas Hutchinson house before the mob got to it.

The rioters smashed through his front door with an ax and poured into the house through all available doors and windows. Once inside, they took everything they could move: clothes, silver, paintings. Seeking shelter at one neighbor’s house, Hutchinson had to scamper through the gardens to a house more distant when he learned the mob searched for him.

By four in the morning, “one of the best finished houses in the province has nothing remaining but bare walls and floors. Gentlemen of the army, who have seen towns sacked by an enemy, declare they never saw such fury,” Gordon recorded.

The Damage Done

Thomas Hutchinson would describe the event in a letter:

“Not contented with tearing off all the wainscot and hangings and splitting the doors to pieces they beat down the Partition walls,” he wrote. Though that alone cost them two hours, they cut down the cupola and lantern and began to take the slate and boards from the roof.

Only the approaching daylight prevented them from totally demolishing the building. “The garden fence was laid flat and all my trees &c broke down to the ground. Such ruins were never seen in America,” he wrote.

They carried off about £900 sterling in money and emptied the house of everything including family pictures, plate, household furniture, his children’s and servants’ clothing. They did leave a part of the kitchen furniture. Otherwise they left not a single book or paper in the house. The mob scattered or destroyed manuscripts and papers he’d collected for 30 years, plus public papers in his custody,

Hutchinson in 1750.

He had taken off his coat and put a ‘thin camlet surtout’ over his waistcoat before fleeing. The next morning, the weather turned cold and Thomas Hutchinson had to ask his host to borrow a coat.

His plate and clothing later turned up around town, but the mob had smashed all his furniture, cut open the beds and thrown the feathers out of the windows.

“The next evening I intended with my children to Milton but meeting two or three small Parties of the Ruffians who I suppose had concealed themselves in the country and my coachman hearing one of them say there he is, my daughters were terrified and said they should never be safe and I was forced to shelter them that night at the castle.”

Thomas Hutchinson

Many bore special dislike for Thomas Hutchinson. He had pushed a law that abolished local currency, requiring gold and silver as acceptable forms of payment.

In addition, as a judge he actively helped the collection of the taxes by issuing writs of assistance. Those gave the holder the legal right to search the property of people suspected of avoiding payments.

Thomas Hutchinson Field, where his house stood until the 1940s. It’s on the National Register of Historic Places.

One dark rumor held that the mob targeted Thomas Hutchinson’s house because it contained papers that might alter the grant of lands in the Kennebec region of Maine (then part of Massachusetts) to the New Plymouth Company. Regardless, Hutchinson abandoned his house and moved to his country home in Milton. His city home thus became one of the first casualties in the American Revolution.

Voice of Reason

Thomas Hutchinson, actually, was something of a voice of reason on the British side. He would later record that he had tried to convince Britain to weigh carefully whether England wouldn’t be better off granting the colonies their independence. He believed that maintaining and protecting them cost far more than their worth in terms of trade. Hutchinson saw the empire and its impudent colonies slowly locking themselves into intractable positions that would inevitably lead to revolution.

Margaret Hutchinson, 1750

Later he would record:

I did not approve of the Stamp Act; but I never had seen an opportunity since the repeal of it when Government could have conceded to the claims of America, without admitting their principle of total independence.

He always thought taxing America inadvisable, he continued. “But as a servant of the Crown, I thought myself bound to discountenance the violent opposition to the Act, as it led to the denial of its authority in all cases whatsoever, and in fact, had brought on the Rebellion.”

Still, the loss of his property embittered him. He distrusted Massachusetts residents after that night and grew more supportive of oppressing the budding rebels.

This story about Thomas Hutchinson was updated in 2022. 

Image: Governor Hutchinson’s Field by By Jameslwoodward – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7996417. Margaret Hutchinson By Billy Hathorn – Old State House Museum in Boston; painter not identified, 1750, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=34177268.

25 comments 3.4k views
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail

The ‘Loyal Nine’ Christen the Boston Liberty Tree

by

Andrew Oliver discovered on August 14, 1765 that he had made a terrible career move – a decision that ultimately gave birth to the Liberty Tree of Boston, an important symbol of revolutionary fervor in the Massachusetts Colony.

When Parliament passed the Stamp Act in March of that 1765, Oliver, secretary to the province of Massachusetts and brother-in-law of future governor Thomas Hutchinson, won the appointment of tax stamp administrator for Massachusetts.

liberty tree 3

A 1774 British print depicts the tarring and feathering of Boston Commissioner of Customs John Malcolm in front of the Liberty Tree of Boston.

Though he did not favor the act personally, Oliver went along with the new job. The act required that documents, such as newspapers and contracts, bear the stamp showing taxes had been paid on them. This was something of an escalation of the disagreements between the colonies and the crown.

While England had long sought ways to make the colonies pay their own way, the Stamp Act would have teeth. Wills, contracts and other documents would have no legal weight if they were not written on paper that bore the official stamp. Being the administrator of the tax stamps would be a powerful and lucrative position.

The colonists had a long history of sliding around many of England’s trade rules that were designed to raise revenue, but the stamp act, colonists feared, would be hard to get around. No stamp and a contract could be ruled invalid. Making matters worse, the tax had to be paid in British Pounds Sterling.

Access to hard currency was always a problem in the colonies. And by refusing payments in either local currencies or other forms, the colonies could find themselves hard pressed to have enough British money available to meet their needs.

The Liberty Tree

Though the tax as proposed was relatively modest, the more forward thinking colonists realized the amounts could be raised at will once the precedent of a tax was established. And the merchants who were skilled at avoiding British laws realized that their skills could soon be rendered worthless.

These merchants in Boston were the early forerunners of the Sons of Liberty, and a group of them formed a political organization called “The Loyal Nine.” They set about fending off the Stamp Act. Their protests went public on August 14, 1765, when they hanged Andrew Oliver in effigy from a tree at the corner of Orange (now Washington) and Essex Streets.

On that day, the Liberty Tree was born. At first, the officials didn’t know exactly what to make of the protest. They debated responding and removing the dummy from the tree. But they concluded that taking action would provoke a response when the protest was meant to be peaceful. They were wrong.

The protesters had every intention of driving their point home. As the day wore on, they took the dummy down from the tree and proceeded to march to a building Oliver had constructed at his wharf. Believing that the structure was intended to be part of the Stamp Act enforcement, the group tore it down.

They then proceeded to Oliver’s home, where they burned the dummy and ransacked his offices. Oliver resigned. He told the Loyal Nine that he would not enforce the Stamp Act.

Death of Andrew Oliver

Similar tactics were employed elsewhere in the colonies, and soon the King found himself with no way to implement the tax. Though later repealed, it had set some important precedents. Among them: the establishment of the Liberty Tree as a rallying point for the Sons of Liberty and their followers.

It would serve its purpose for 10 years. Both the Patriots and the British troops used it as a scene for tar and feathering. The British used it to make their point when handing out punishments to the rebels.

The tree was a rallying point for patriots right up until its end, during the siege of Boston in 1775. In 1776, the British troops chopped it down in a show of defiance before they fled the city. Andrew Oliver, by then, was no longer around to care about the tree.

After his elevation to lieutenant governor when Hutchinson assumed the governorship in 1771, he died in 1774. The Sons of Liberty had grown much larger by that point, and were so boisterous that few of Oliver’s family dared attend his funeral for fear of attack.

This story last updated in 2022.

11 comments 1.1k views
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail

Calvin Coolidge – Silent Cal or Cheap Cal?

by

Calvin Coolidge — Vermont native, Massachusetts governor, president of the United States — may have been misnamed. He was known as a stoic man of few words. Silent Cal, they called him. A better name might have been Frugal Cal.

Calvin Coolidge meeting with labor activist Mother Jones

Calvin Coolidge meeting with labor activist Mother Jones

Son of a farm and store-keeping family, Coolidge grew up working hard for every dollar he had. So maybe that’s why he didn’t like to waste money – whether it was his own or the people’s.

Cross described Coolidge as a man “who never let loose a nickel unless he had to.” And on this point, he was indisputably correct. He cut taxes four times as president.

As lieutenant governor in Massachusetts, he stayed at a one-room, dollar-a-day rooming house in Boston, ignoring the Statehouse crowd that urged him to loosen his purse strings.

As president, he had protracted battles with the White House housekeeper over the costs of dinners. Once he famously insisted that six hams for 60 guests were too many. And even pennies were important to the president.

Official White House portrait of Calvin Coolidge

Calvin Coolidge, Lousy Tipper

In her book, My Thirty Years Backstairs at the White House, White House maid and seamstress Lillian Parks Rogers recalled how Coolidge dispatched a servant to pick up newspapers. He then expected his change on the servant’s return.

“If they thought it was a tip, they would soon find out differently, because the President would go around saying, ‘Somebody owes me seven cents.’ And he meant it.”

No one ever defeated Calvin Coolidge in an election. Perhaps this was part of the reason.


For more quotes from and about Calvin Coolidge, click here. This story was updated in 2022. 

14 comments 1.3k views
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail

1816: The Year Without a Summer

by

The year 1816 was known as ‘The Year Without a Summer’ in New England because six inches of snow fell in June and every month of the year had a hard frost.

Temperatures dropped to as low as 40 degrees in July and August as far south as Connecticut. People also called it ‘Eighteen Hundred and Froze to Death’ and the ‘Poverty Year.’

The Year Without A Summer had a far-reaching impact. Crop failures caused hoarding and big price increases for agricultural commodities. People went hungry. Farmers gave up trying to make a living in New England and started heading west. Politicians who ignored the melancholy plight of their constituents found themselves out of office.

And to this day, scientists don’t agree on what caused the bizarre weather in The Year Without a Summer.

Year Without a Summer

There were warm days in the spring of 1816, but they were followed by cold snaps. In Salem, Mass., for example, it was 74 degrees on April 24. Within 30 hours the temperature dropped to 21 degrees.

Thomas Robbins, the East Windsor, Conn., bibliophile, noticed the late spring. He wrote in his diary, ‘the vegetation does not seem to advance at all.’

On May 12, strong winds and freezing temperatures from Canada killed the buds on fruit trees. Inch-thick ice formed on ponds and streams from Maine to Upstate New York. By the end of May, corn plants froze in central Maine.

Then on June 6, 1816, six inches of snow fell on New England. Clockmaker Chauncey Jerome wrote in his autobiography that he walked to work that day in Plymouth, Conn., wearing heavy woolen clothes, an overcoat and mittens.

Chauncey Jerome

Chauncey Jerome wore mittens in June during the Year Without a Summer.

Flurries fell in Boston the next day, the latest ever recorded. The snow was 18 inches deep in Cabot, Vt., on June 8.  On June 11, a temperature of 30.5 degrees was recorded in Williamstown, Mass. Frozen birds dropped dead in the fields. Some Vermont farmers who had already shorn their sheep tried to tie their fleeces back on, but many froze to death anyway.

Benjamin Harwood, a Bennington, Vt., farmer, wrote in his diary that it rained all night then began to snow from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.

The heads of all the mountains on every side were crowned with snow. The most gloomy and extraordinary weather ever seen.

And then it got warm again.

More Cold

Temperatures seesawed up and down throughout the Year Without a Summer, bringing hope on warm days that the crops could be harvested after all. Then sharp cold spells brought despair.

On June 22, for example, temperatures reached 101 degrees in Salem, Mass. But July 4 was cool. Chauncey Jerome wrote it was hard to feel patriotic while watching men play quoits in overcoats.  Then a northwest wind brought a three-day cold spell, with 30-degree temperatures in northern New England, 40 degrees in Hartford and New Haven.

Gov. William Plumer

Gov. William Plumer blamed God for the Year Without a Summer.

The frost destroyed the bean crop in Franconia, N.H., and bean, cucumber and squash crops in Kennebunkport, Maine.  Young plants grew so slowly they were vulnerable to frost, and farmers harvested so little hay they had to slaughter their livestock or feed them oats and corn.

As depressing as the second severe cold spell was the drought that enveloped most of the United States, including New England. “I never saw our street so dry,” complained a minister in East Windsor, Conn.

Gov. William Jones of Rhode Island issued a proclamation designating a day of public ‘Prayer, Praise and Thanksgiving,’ noting the ‘coldness and dryness of the seasons’ and the ‘alarming sickness.’ New Hampshire Gov. William Plumer believed the weather was God’s judgment in the earth and urged people to humble themselves for their transgressions.

Fear of famine began to grow during the Year Without a Summer.

Hard Frost in August

Early August was sunny and warm. Farmers planted new crops hoping the growing season might last beyond the first frost in October. On Aug. 13th and 14th, a cold spell froze the corn crop north of Concord, N.H.

On Aug. 20, a short, violent storm struck Amherst, N.H., signaling a steep drop in temperature: 30 degrees within a few hours. It snowed in Vermont. In Maine, farmers wrapped rags around their plants to protect them.

At least the wheat, rye and potatoes were holding up, staving off famine. In Ashland, N.H., Reuben Whitten was able to grow wheat on his south-facing farm. He shared it with his neighbors. After he died in 1847, his neighbors paid for his gravestone and later erected a monument that read:

A pioneer of this town. Cold season of 1816 raised 40 bushils of wheat on this land whitch kept his family and neighbours from starveation.

Hopes of salvaging what remained of the corn crop were dashed by a severe frost on Aug. 28.  Maine and New Hampshire farmers cut up whole fields of corn for fodder.

Rev. William Fogg of Kittery, Maine, summed up the Year Without a Summer: ‘Crops cut short and a heavy load of taxes.’

There were reports of people eating raccoons, mackerel and pigeons.

It warmed up again in September, as usual, but then at sunrise on Sept. 26 in Hanover, N.H., it was 26 degrees. Snow fell throughout the region, and a killing frost froze crops in the field and apples on the branch.

Nettles and Hedgehogs

The drought caused wildfires to break out in the woods throughout New England. Fires in western New York produced so much smoke that sailors were blinded on Lake Champlain.

The Year Without a Summer was especially hard on the poor. The New Hampshire Patriot reported on Oct. 22, 1816, that ‘Indian corn, on which a large proportion of the poor depend is cut off. ‘ Vermont farmers lost much of their livestock, and Vermonters foraged for food such as nettles, wild turnips and hedgehogs.

Daniel Webster

Daniel Webster lost his bid for reelection during the Year Without a Summer.

Three-quarters of the corn crop was lost during the Year Without a Summer. Prices soared for wheat, grains, meat, vegetables, butter, milk and flour. In Maine, the price of oats tripled and potatoes doubled. Hay was 180 a ton in parts of New Hampshire, six times its usual cost.

The Year Without a Summer brought widespread famines in Europe as well. The bad weather forced a group of poets to remain in their rooms in Switzerland. To avoid boredom and entertain the group, Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein.

Making maple syrup

At least the Year Without a Summer had been good for producing maple syrup. Vermonters traded syrup for fish, which is why they called 1816 the Mackerel Year.

Members of Congress seemed insensitive to the suffering of the people and voted to double their own salary. It didn’t go over well. Nearly 70 percent of incumbent U.S. representatives were voted out of office – including Daniel Webster.

After the Year Without a Summer,  Josiah Meigs, commissioner general of the Land Offices, in 1817 began a more systematic approach to observing weather phenomenon. He ordered the 20 Land Offices to take thrice-daily recordings of the temperature, winds and precipitation.

The Frigid Zone

Author Samuel Goodrich visited New Hampshire, observing:

At last a kind of despair seized upon the people. In the pressure of adversity, many persons lost their judgment, and thousands feared or felt that New England was destined, henceforth, to become part of the frigid zone.

goodrich

Samuel Goodrich

The next year started out cold as well, convincing Northeast farmers to migrate to the Midwest.

Rev. Samuel Robbins in East Windsor, Conn., wrote, ‘We have had a great deal of moving this spring. Our number rather diminished.’

At the time, many reasons were given for the weird phenomena: sunspots, deforestation, great fields of ice floating in the Atlantic, Benjamin Franklin’s lightning rod experiments and, of course, the wrath of God.

Many people believe the Year Without a Summer was caused by a massive volcanic explosion on Mt. Tambora in Indonesia, killing 15,000 instantly. Soon after, another 65,000 perished of disease and starvation. The volcanic ash and debris thrown up into the stratosphere is thought to have blocked the sun and caused a gradual lowering of temperatures.

Lee Foster, NOAA meteorologist, notes that climate data shows 1816 was part of a mini ice age lasting from 1400 to around 1860. The era had unusually harsh winters, short growing seasons and dry weather.


With thanks to The Year Without Summer: 1816 and the Volcano That Darkened the World and Changed History, by William K. Klingaman and Nicholas P. Klingaman. This story was updated in 2023.

69 comments 11.4k views
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
Newer Posts
Older Posts

Subscribe To Our Newsletter

Join our mailing list to receive the latest artciles from the New England Historical Society

Thanks for Signing Up!