Parish Aid Cookbook Contributors, # 1: The Alt-Müller Ladies

Several of the recipes in the Parish Aid cookbook (circa 1914) that I described last week were contributed by A.W. Alt-Müller and a Mrs. Alt-Müller. I decided to trace as many of the contributors as possible, not only as a genealogical exercise but as a way of confirming the date of publication. My primary sources were the US Census and the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

The Alt-Müller family was easily located in both the 1900 and the 1910 census; they do not appear in the 1920 census (as far as I can tell). In 1900 the head of the family is Mary H. Alt-Müller, a 71 year old widow, born in New York to Scottish-born parents, who had had 8 children of whom 4 were still alive. With her resided her three daughters, Anna W. age 48, Mary A. age 42, and Helen K. age 39. Helen was the only one who worked; she was a teacher of elocution.

As soon as I read that I knew who the "H.K.A." was who had written the frontispiece poem about the Parish Aid recipes. Helen Kate Alt-Müller was a teacher of elocution for many years at the Packer Collegiate Institute.

Packer was founded in 1845 as the Brooklyn Female Academy (it was not coed until 1972) and is located in Brooklyn Heights at 170 Joralemon Street. Helen Kate taught drama as well as elocution. In 1895 she "had the sole direction of the 'Russian Honeymoon,' given by the Packer girls." [Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Mar. 22, 1895, p. 5]

The father of the three Alt-Müller sisters was Dr. Georg Altmüller - the name did not split off and hyphenate until after 1869 (when the Eagle mentions that Dr. George Altmüller of Glen Cove treated someone at an accident scene). He emigrated to the US in 1846. In 1850 George married Mary A.C. Veitch (who was 22 years old to his 41, a nineteen year difference) at the Garden Street Dutch Reformed Church in New York City (Manhattan). The census of that year shows them living at Glen Cove, until 1917 a part of the town of Oyster Bay, then in Queens, now in Nassau County, on Long Island, where they would remain until the early 1890s. Glen Cove was, from the 1850s on, a resort town. New Yorkers would stay in the many hotels there, travelling on steamboats from lower Manhattan.

George and Mary had 8 children, according to Mary's entry in the 1900 census. I've located five of them:

1. Anna Wilhelmina, born about Jan. 1852

2. Charlotte H., born about 1854, died young

3. Mary Adele, born about Dec. 1857

4. Helen Kate, born about Aug. 1860

5. George H., born about 1863, died July 12, 1879 at Glen Cove. Buried at St. Paul's Episcopal Church Cemetery.

The family had a considerable amount of money. When Dr. Altmüller died in 1885 the Eagle ran a short item on his will, which stated that "the whole estate, which is quite large, is given to Mrs. Altmüller and the children." When the "Alt Müller property" in Glen Cove was sold in 1891 it brought the family $7500, which enabled them to buy a house at 118 Park Place, in the 9th Ward of Brooklyn. This was in Park Slope, where St. John's Episcopal Church - as in the Parish Aid cookbook - was located at 139 St. Johns Place, near the Alt-Müllers' house on Park Place. It would make sense for them to attend St. John's as not only was it local but they had been attending an Episcopalian church in Glen Cove. Here is a link to the Parish History page on the St. John's website.

By 1910 Mary (Veitch) Altmüller had died and the household at 118 Park Place was headed by eldest sister Anna, who was 55 years old. Her sisters Mary Adele and Helen Kate (ages 49 and 40) still lived with her - as did the boarder from 1900, William F. Fraser, an elderly (58 in 1910) bachelor who was a cashier for a dye factory.

As I go through the St. John's cookbook (and I am pretty sure now that this is what it is) I am struck by how many recipes were credited to "Mrs. Alt-Müller," "A.W.A." (Anna Wilhelmina Alt-Müller) and of course Helen's poem at the front. If the cookbook dates from 1914, however, Mrs. Alt-Müller would not have been alive to contribute them; perhaps this is an earlier edition of the 1914 St John's Parish Aid cookbook I saw in listed for sale on line.

As I investigate some of the other contributors, I may be able to shed more light on the publication date - as well as on other tangential but interesting bits of social history.

To wind things up, here is one of the Alt-Müllers fancier recipes. This one is credited to Anna Wilhelmina, who seems to have been the main chef of the family (Helen Kate handled the dramatic arts):

Regent Punch

One pound of loaf sugar or rock candy, 1 large cup of strong black tea (made), 3 wine glasses of brandy, 3 wine glasses of rum, 1 bottle of imported champagne, 2 oranges (juice only), 3 lemons, 1 large lump of ice.

It sounds very bracing, doesn't it? Just the sort of thing to have when you are entertaining the society matrons of Park Slope.

See here for the original post on the mysterious cookbook.

Image from NYPL Digital Gallery of Packer Collegiate Institute. Below is a map showing how close St. John's Episcopal Church (at 139 St. Johns Place) and the Alt-Müllers' house at 118 Park Place were.


View Larger Map

Sources:

1850 US Census, Oyster Bay, Queens, NY [need citation here, will edit; also need to locate Altmüllers in 1860].

1870 US Census, Oyster Bay, Queens, M593_1081, p. 371, Image 225 [transcribed as Altmaller].

1880 US Census, Oyster Bay, Queens, Roll T9_919, FHL 1254919, p. 418.3000, ED 294, Image 0545.

1900 US Census, Brooklyn 9th Ward, Kings, Roll T623-1048, p. 8B, ED 114.

1910 US Census, Brooklyn 9th Ward, Kings, Roll T624_960, p. 4B, ED 176, Image 460.

New York Evening Post, July 3, 1879, death of "George Altmuller" (no umlaut - though the umlaut is used in the cookbook) son of Dr. George Altmuller of Glen Cove, from New York Newspaper Extracts, 1801-90 (Barber Collection), Ancestry.com.

New York Passenger Lists 1820-1957 (Ancestry.com); Georg Altmüller arrived 11 Sept. 1846 in New York on the "Sir Isaac Newton" dep. Hamburg; Georg was age 38, Doctor Medicine, from 'Doldenburg' [sic]; next passenger listed is a John Altmüller age 35, Merchant? from Lübeck.

1850 marriage record from IGI [Batch M506301, extracted from the records of Garden Street Dutch Reformed Church, NYC, 1812-53]

Brooklyn Daily Eagle citations:

George Alt Müller obituary, Oct. 13, 1885, p. 5.

"Dr. Alt Müller's Will," Oct. 24, 1885, p. 6.

Item concerning sale of Alt Müller property in Glen Cove, 15 Mar. 1891, p. 2.

Item concerning Helen Alt-Müller's dramatic instruction at Packer, Mar. 22, 1895, p. 5.

[The untitled items are part of larger collections of local gossip and news in particular sections of the paper].

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GScid=2214711&GRid=23471346&

http://saintjohnsbrooklyn.org/AboutUs/history.dsp

http://www.nassaulibrary.org/glencove/History%20of%20Glen%20Cove.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packer_Collegiate_Institute