The "So Is It Fannie or Fanny? Story

It was an ordinary day.  I had just posted another "Help" post on "The Lancastrian", one of Lancaster, Pennsylvania's "go-to" Facebook pages.  I had read a post on the website that featured a question about Fannie Farmer.  The spelling of the name just didn't seem correct so I did some "Googling" and found there were actually two women with the same name, only spelled differently.  Naturally the one who I happened to know was Fanny Farmer who was a candy maker while the other, Fannie Farmer, actually Fannie Merritt Farmer,

Fannie Merritt Farmer

was an American culinary expert whose Boston Cooking-School Cook Book was a widely used culinary text.  Hey, they both were associated with something you can eat, so I didn't feel bad.  A Facebook question by Ms. Market asked if anyone had a photo of the Fanny Farmer store in downtown Lancaster, PA?  I opened my blog and found I had a photo that I had posted with a story about her first candy store in Rochester, NY, but had no other photo to share.  Wasn't long before someone posted a photo of the storefront in downtown Lancaster.  

Fanny Farmer candy store in Rochester, NY

As soon as I saw the photo I remembered visiting the place as a child.  Fanny Farmer, the candy maker, was actually a candy manufacturer and retailer that was started in Rochester, New York by Frank O'Connor in 1919 and grew to over 400 stores, one of which was in downtown Lancaster, PA.  Fanny Farmer wasn't really a person, per se, as Fannie Farmer was.  Actually, Fanny Farmer Company was named in honor of culinary expert Fannie Farmer who had died four years before Fanny Farmer was started and who had absolutely nothing to do with candy.  Got it straight so far.  

Fanny Farmer candy store in downtown Lancaster was located
behind the street light in the center of the photograph.

Fanny Farmer was a candy store named after Fannie Farmer the culinary expert.  Could be they didn't have room on the sign above the door for an "ie" so they just used a "y".  The owner of Fanny Farmer after Mr. O'Connor was John D. Hayes who slashed prices during the Depression to keep the stores open and during WWII self-imposed rationing to endure adequate candy for the armed forces overseas.  In 1955 he was named "Candy Man of the Year".  

The Fanny Farmer logo.

What made all this so unique was that John was blind.  The chain of stores became the largest candy retailer in the country, but due to poor strategies, filed for bankruptcy.  As for Fannie Merritt Farmer, she was a culinary expert who was born in 1857 in Boston, Massachusetts.  She suffered a paralytic stroke at he age of 18 while attending high school.  

Fannie Farmer teaching her trade.

For several years she was confined to her family's home in Boston, unable to walk.  During this time she took up cooking and eventually turned the house into a boarding house with a reputation for quality meals.  At the age of 30 and now able to walk once again, she enrolled in Boston Cooking School.  There she learned what were then considered the most critical elements of domestic science (cooking) including nutrition and diet, convalescent cookery, techniques of cleaning and sanitation, chemical analysis of food, techniques of cooking and baking and household management.  

The original Fannie Farmer Cookbook

She eventually became the assistant director of the school and then the school principal.  In 1896 she published her book, The Boston Cooking School Cook Book which introduced the concept of using standardized measuring spoons and cups as well as level measurement.  The book had 1,850 recipes and essays on housekeeping, cleaning, canning, nutrition and drying fruits and vegetables.  Bet it took two people to lift it!  The printer didn't think she was going to sell many copies so he limited the first edition to 3,000 copies.  It became so popular that it has gone through quite a few printings and is still available in print over 100 years later.  

A box of candy features Fannie's photograph.

A few of the standardization's were: a piece of butter the size of an egg or a teacup of milk.  Also began telling that a cupful is a measured level, and a tablespoon is a measured level.  She later developed books for the sick and convalescent which had information on cooking for people with diabetes.  She was asked to lecture at Harvard Medical School and began teaching diet and nutrition to doctors and nurses.  She died at the age of 57 in 1915 and had boxes of candy named after her a few years later.  That would make any person turn over in their grave.  Hey, at least she has something named in her honor.  Hope that happens to me someday.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.

While singing for the St. James Episcopal Church choir I was given a paraffin choirboy and my dad, who also was a member, got a larger one.  My collection can be seen above.  After Christmas, when we put them on display, I put them in the closet next to our upstairs bedroom.  The following year, after a scorching summer, found them melted together.  I was heartbroken.

The bottom of one of the melted choirboys tells where Mr. McConnell, the choirmaster and organist, bought them.