Recipes For Disaster?–

Fighting Off Felons And Other Adventures In The Kitchen

By Nancy K. Crevier

I always thought that a felon was some character moldering in a jail cell until I was thumbing my way through a 1937 copy of The White House Cookbook published by the Saalfield Publishing Company. Not only does this “Comprehensive Cyclopedia” dedicated to the wives of US presidents include intriguing recipes of the time such as Calf’s Head Soup, Scrapple, and Baked Oyster Plant, along with photographs of the heads of states’ better halves, and hospitality, health, and household tips, but some even more curious recipes appear at the back of the book. It was a “Recipe For Felons” that gave me pause.

“Take common rock salt…then pound it fine and mix with spirits of turpentine in equal parts; put it in a rag and wrap it around the parts affected.” (Remember, I am still picturing some sad soul locked away forever. )

“As it gets dry put on more, and in twenty-four hours you are cured.” Wow. Put more turpentine on the felon? Was that how they managed life sentences for criminals in the olden days?

At this point I pulled out the Merriam-Webster. A second dictionary definition defines “felon” as “a painful infection at the end of a finger or toe,” which made far, far more sense than my original addled thoughts. I had to read on to find “Another Way to Cure A Felon,” and that clarified my suspicions that we were not discussing crime and punishment.

“Fill a tumbler with equal parts of fine salt and ice: mix well. Sink the finger in the center, allow it to remain until it is nearly frozen and numb; then withdraw it, and when sensation is restored, renew the operation four or five times…” I will admit I have never tried it, but just off the top of my head, I would have to say it seems a cruel punishment for an already injured digit.

 “Health Suggestions” fills several pages in this cookbook and offers an interesting peek at life when science was still nascent and good health was pretty much the whim of nature.

We know today that the common cold is the result of one of hundreds of rhinoviruses. We dose ourselves with massive amounts of vitamins and minerals, decongestants and antihistamines, and antibiotics when bacterial infection sets in. We understand the necessity of washing hands to cut back on passing along the cold virus. But 70 years ago, colds were attributed to lack of pure air, poisoned blood, and exposure to the cold. Germs were not yet part of the general public’s lexicon.

“In passing from warm, crowded rooms to the cold air, the mouth should be kept closed and all the breathing done through the nostrils only…” suggests The White House Cook Book. That, along with sleeping with an open window, are harmless enough remedies, but other therapies of that age might raise an eyebrow.

“A flannel dipped in boiling water and sprinkled with turpentine laid on chest as quickly as possible will relieve the most severe cold or hoarseness.” Turpentine was also recommended “inwardly three or four drops on a lump of sugar” as a cure for the croup.

Highly flammable and irritating to skin and nasal passages, turpentine is generally thought of in 2007 as a solvent. But while the internal use of turpentine is held in disregard today, small amounts of it continue to appear in cold remedies intended for external use. So our ancestors were not too far off the mark with the poultice, at least.

“Relief for an hour or so may be obtained by slowly dissolving , and partially swallowing, a lump of borax the size of a garden pea, or holding about three or four grains in the mouth for ten or fifteen minutes….”

“For a cold in the head nothing is better than powdered borax sniffed up the nostrils.”

A look through several websites and dictionary definitions finds borax, made up of sodium, boron, oxygen, and water, listed as a laundry boosting agent and an uncertified pesticide. Internal consumption is not recommended, surprisingly enough.

Powdered alum, or potassium aluminum sulfate, was widely used a hundred years ago to induce vomiting and as an additive in several health remedies. Sore throat? Alum and honey dissolved in sage tea can bring relief, as can a gargle made up of equal parts borax and alum. Alum was commonly recommended to ease the coughing associated with whooping cough and croup.

Other relatively harmless cure-alls include, “Sufferers from asthma should get a muskrat skin and wear it over their lungs with the fur side next to the body.” For relief from a sore throat, “Cut slices of salt pork or fat bacon, simmer a few minutes in hot vinegar, and apply to throat as hot as possible.” Ow and eew. There is probably a suggestion for scalded skin somewhere in the cookbook, too, I suspect.

I have been accused by certain family members of using “salad dressing,” my own combination of fresh garlic and warm olive oil, to cure my earaches. So I felt a tiny bit redeemed when I came across the White House Cook Book cure for an earache. “Take a bit of cotton batting, put on it a pinch of black pepper, gather it up and tie it, dip it in sweet oil, and insert it in the ear.” Of course, considering the source, I should probably not feel too puffed up about my little concoction.

“Tobacco smoke, puffed into the ear, has often been effectual,” states this old-time annal, and I can actually attest to that, having experienced it first hand. As a child, I suffered frequently from earaches, and I have vivid memories of my grandfather sitting me upon his knee, a Camel cigarette burning in one hand while the other held me close and he gently puffed smoke into the aching ear. Granted, I always ended up at the doctor’s office the next morning for a dose of penicillin, but for the moment, the smoke from his cigarette was at least as healing as the comfort he offered.

The most curious health recipe I came across, though, was one for “Hunter’s Pills.”

 “Saffron one grain, rue one grain, Scot aloes two grains, savin one grain, cayenne pepper one grain. Mix all into a very thick mass by adding sufficient syrup.” This mixture was then formed into pill shapes and dried, with the adage to, “Dose, one every night and morning as long as occasion requires.” Most mysterious of all, is the final line of the recipe: “This recipe is worth ten times the price of this book to any female requiring the need of these regulating pills.” Hunter’s Pills? Females? What?

It is easy in the light of scientific discovery to chuckle at the follies of the past. But who is to say that in another few decades our own solid knowledge will not crumble beneath new findings? Zinc, anyone?