Sandra S. Navarro Books

For most of us, we are not what we eat. Rather, we are formed by memories of food made in the kitchens of our childhood. A recent dinner guest commented on my apron. "Old school," he said. My guest's comment triggered thoughts of my mother during my mid-century childhood. This book highlights aspects of my mother's cooking and kitchens which seem antiquated, interesting, or even amusing today, fifty to seventy years hence.

The Schenck family’s 1918 and 1919 cross-country trips in a Hudson Super Six took place when roads were unpaved, signage was minimal, and communication from home was restricted to hit-or-miss General Delivery. Meals could be procured along the way by hunting and fishing. An historic drought in Texas, bandits at the Mexican border, massive wildfires in the Idaho, and a quicksand river in Nevada are among the highlights of this Ohio family’s road trip adventures.

Stories about Ohio pioneers, early settlers and their nineteenth-century descendants, stories previously hidden in family archives and forgotten in public records, come to life in this remarkable collection. The reclaimed narratives spotlight family strife, canal building and tragedy, opposition to a courtship, a run-away child, death in a county poorhouse, preservation of prized meerschaum pipes, an abused woman's escape, and the evolution of a village hotel and country schoolhouse.