Timeline

1700–1859 ∼ Early American Eating

African slaves adopt New World foods to African cuisine (1700s) / Vegetables and fruits are an important part of the American diet (1700s) / Americans eat seven times more meat than bread (1790s) / Spanish recipes are adopted as Americans occupy the Southwest (1830s) / William Graham, father of the Graham cracker, crusades for eating brown bread (1830s) / Mechanization of tin can production inaugurates factory canning (1849) / Children’s Aid Society of New York begins a school meals program (1853) / Borden invents canned milk (1856) / Mason and Bell jars improve canning (1858) / Great American Tea Company pioneers supermarkets (1859)

MILESTONES: Eli Whitney invents interchangeable parts, making mass production possible (early 1800s) • Cult of Domesticity inspires women to protect the family from moral decay (1830–1880) • First use of anesthetic (ether) on humans in the U.S. (1842) • Women hold first Women’s Right Convention in Seneca Falls (1848)

1860&ndash...