THE GLORIOUS FOURTH

The Founding Fathers (and Mothers) would not recognize the way we celebrate a lot of holidays these days, but they’d fit right in at a Fourth of July party.
Food and fireworks were at the center of early festivities too, if a lot looser on the safety rules.
It was just as John Adams would have wanted it – in a letter to Abigail, he called for massive nationwide celebrations including parades, shows, illuminations and more. The new country took his advice and Independence Day quickly became an excuse for a grand summer party.
Mr. Adams, though, would not have approved of the way the festivities evolved in New York; Tammany Hall, the infamous political machine, ran the party for most of the 19th century, providing feast and fun in return for votes and clout. Originally, the festivities were a sort of big open street fair with food booths near City Hall.
The neighbors didn’t much like that and spent several decades working to stamp out the party. Eventually, they succeeded – in handing over the event to Tammany Hall. One late 19th century writer observed with a distinctly disapproving sniff that it had become a holiday for little boys and the political machine.
Whoever was running it, though, everyone could still agree that food and fireworks were the center of the party.
Some things are familiar; plenty of people still mark the Fourth with a pig roast. Pickled oysters, not so much. It made sense at the time, though. Oysters were not in season in the summer, at least partly because of the possibility of illness from contaminated water, so the only way you were going to get a fast and simple meal of oysters was to preserve them.
Another treat is something we still enjoy – but not on July 4th: egg nog! While we associate it with the winter holidays, egg nog was actually a year-round festive drink in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It was a special-occasion treat because of the huge amount of eggs – and especially the sugar and spices, both of which were expensive and sometimes hard to get. Not to mention the rum or brandy.
Lobster was also often on the menu. And it’s worth remembering that for a very long time, lobsters were poor people’s food because they were plentiful and cheap.
For dessert? Pineapple – very exotic at least until the late 19th century – and various puddings. Thanks to unreliable refrigeration, ice cream was a very high-end delicacy until the late 19th century. (That’s a whole other post!)
So what about the fireworks?
Well, that’s the scary part. Remember that writer who called it a holiday for little boys? He meant that the boys were setting off the fireworks. In the days before federal safety standards, no one thought much of allowing the little guys to run around with firecrackers. Before you clutch your pearls, though, don’t forget that a lot of us grew up waving sparklers around, and they’re not exactly harmless.
Leaving the pyrotechnics to the pros is no great loss – I’ll vote for the Macy’s Spectacular every year! And the eggnog? Well, maybe if you make it into ice cream!

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