142 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



April, 1907 



and below it a lantern, a steelyard for weighing meat; 

 and, on the shelves, a watering-pot, a Hour scoop, cook- 

 ing utensils, a mortar and pestle, and a coli'ee-mill. 

 Near the old bell on a wire hang dish covers. The 

 dresser on the right is appropriately furnished with 

 useful articles. 



New York being settled by both Dutch and English 

 colonists, the kitchens in the early days were furnished 

 in the Dutch or English style, and sometimes pre- 

 sented a mixture of both races. Many Dutch culinary 

 utensils became necessities, such as waffle-irons, as their 

 dishes found favor on English-American tables. The 

 Dutch kitchen was gradually supplanted by the Eng- 

 lish, and by the middle of the eighteenth century the 

 kitchen of a well-to-do family, of which the Van Cort- 

 landt is a good type, was English in character. 



The influence of the Dutch in New York homes is 

 noted by the New England traveler. Madam Knight, 

 who visited New York in 1707, and recorded 

 her impressions. She was interested in the 

 construction of the houses, which differed 

 from those she was accustomed to in Boston. 

 She particularly noticed the chimney-pieces 

 and the great 



use of tiles. 

 "The house 

 where the 

 vendue was," 

 she writes, 

 "had c h i m- 

 n e y - corners 

 like ours, and 

 they and the 

 hearth w e r e 

 laid with the 

 finest tile that 

 I ever see, and 

 t h e staircases 

 laid all wit h 

 white tile, which 

 is ever clean, 

 and so are the 

 walls 

 kitchen, 

 has a 

 floor." 



Kitchen of the Longfellow House at Portland 



This lining 

 of white tiles 

 shows that 

 the kitchen 

 was Dutch, 

 and, m o r e- 

 over, the in- 

 ventories of 

 the Dutch 

 colonists of 

 New Amster- 

 dam, with 

 their enumer- 

 ation of cop- 

 per, brass, earth- 

 enware, china, 

 porcelain, and 

 great cupboards 

 or cases {Kas), 

 show that the 

 typical Dutch 

 kitchen was any- 

 thing but un- 

 common. When 

 the Dutch 

 kitchen is pan- 

 eled a bed is often concealed in the woodwork, 

 and the kitchen, therefore, serves as a sleeping, 

 sitting, and dining-room, as well as a place for 

 the preparation of meals. This kind of kitchen 

 may be seen to-day in Holland; and in New 

 Amsterdam the kitchens of the Dutch colonists were 

 arranged like those they left at home. 



A good example of a New Amsterdam living- 

 room of the seventeenth century is that of the 

 wealthy Cornelis Steenwyck, who died in 1686. His 

 eight-roomed house was very luxuriously furnished. 

 The "kitchen chamber," evidently the common fam- 

 ily living-room, contained an oval table covered with 

 a woolen cloth, twelve chairs, five of which were 

 Russia leather and three matted, a bedstead with 

 curtains hung on iron rods, a Kas, two small 

 trunks, a chimney cloth, a looking-glass, a glass 

 lantern, three wooden racks for dishes, a "can-board 

 with hooks of brass," and a great deal of linen and 

 earthenware. There was also a "cellar kitchen" 



A Modern Arrangement 

 of an Old-time Kitchen 



