Cook Book. [Compiled by the] Abigail Phelps Chapter D. A. R., Simsbury, Connecticut 1907.

Hartford, Conn. The Smith-Linsley Company, 1907.

Octavo (22 x 15 cm.), 47 pages. Table of contents. FIRST EDITION. A charitable cookbook; an efficient collection of two hundred forty recipes, none attributed, with concise instructions and separately listed ingredients. Abigail Phelps Rusks serves as inaugural sally, described as "over a hundred years old." Quenelles of Fish merits notice. Some local allegiance surfaces (among the bakers): Massacoe Spice Cake, Roxbury Cake, Simsbury's Old Fashioned Loaf Cake, Simsbury Light Fruit Cake. Simsbury, in Hartford County, traces its official origins as a Colonial town to 1670. The Abigail Phelps Chapter, organized in 1893, was named for Abigail (Pettibone) Phelps Strong (1706-1787), the mother of three Revolutionary War military officers. (The form of her name connects her to her sons, before she took the name of her second husband, David Strong, sometime after 1771.) The chapter remains vigilant today, identifying and maintaining memorials and cemetery markers and raising funds for educational scholarships. In stapled, black-titled blue wrappers; some light fading, bottom corner of front panel with small chip. One page with markings in ink (appears to be approval of the Velvet Cream recipe), otherwise clean. Near fine. Scarce. [OCLC locates one copy (Schlesinger Library); not in Cook, Brown, or Cagle].

Price: $150.00