My girls and I had a lovely time at the John Walter Museum in Edmonton this afternoon! We had an afternoon of candle making and cookies which was lots of fun!
Since there were so many of us, we broke up into two groups. We started off at John Walter’s second house which he built himself in 1885. I’m always in awe how it’s still standing after all these years!
The wood stove was going, but the air was chilly! My girls and I were ready to learn more about candles and cookies!!
First, we rolled and cut out old fashioned gingerbread cookies. We used the older style cookie cutters which made such tiny cookies!!
I love molasses, whether it’s in taffy, cake or in cookies! We learned at the museum that molasses is a byproduct of sugar refining. Before refined white sugar was readily available, molasses was the primary sweetener for early Edmonton settlers.
After the Great War (1914-1918), the price of refined white sugar dropped and many people switched from using molasses to white sugar. By 1919, the United States was consuming twice as much white sugar than they were in 1880 with most switching from molasses to granulated white and brown sugar (per the information shared by the museum). Today, there’s so many refined varieties of sugar that it is easy to get overwhelmed! I think I like the simpler times of limited selections!
Then, we made rolled beeswax candles. We’ve never made these before and we discovered it easiest when warming the beeswax over the cook stove, rather than with the warmth of your hands, to make the wax pliable enough to roll. It takes time if you want it rolled just right!
Once you have your sheet of beeswax, warm it, place the wick at the end and start to roll. When it doesn’t roll nicely or is cold and feels like it might crack, warm it again and continue to roll. Trim the wick and the candle is ready. You can warm it and secure and open ends.
“When Thomas Edison worked late into the night on the electric light, he had to do it by gas lamp or candle. I’m sure it made the work seem that much more urgent.”
— George Carlin
After we were finished rolling beeswax candles and making gingerbread, our group went to John Walter’s first house which he built in 1875. What’s amazing about this house was he used dovetails for the corners (and no nails!!) and after all this time, it’s still standing!! Not only did he live in this house, but he also ran his general store and ferry business from it. It’s also my favorite house!
We learned that over time, the trees grew around it and it basically was forgot about for several years. When the city was clearing out the trees to make a park, they discovered John Walter’s house!
Here in this house, we hand dipped candles in paraffin wax which was colored blue by crayons. In the 1800’s candles would have mostly been made from tallow because it was easy to have access to it and it was affordable in the Walterdale community. Paraffin wax would have been available in this community later, even though paraffin wax was invented in the 1830’s. By 1834, paraffin wax candles were starting to be produced as a cheaper and cleaner burning candle than tallow. Paraffin wax was patented & produced for customers to purchase in 1850. The only place in Edmonton at this time was Fort Edmonton where you could purchase the essential things you needed. The Fort probably would not have brought in paraffin wax, however, once the city centres opened in the 1900’s, it would have been available to the settlers here.
Since hand dipping candles can be time consuming and tedious work, most settlers would have had candle molds. They’d melt the tallow (or wax if they were fortunate), dip the wick in a couple times then place the wicks into the mold, tie the ends and then pour in the tallow or wax. It was a quicker way to have six candles ready! Once the wax was hardened, the molds were dipped into hot water and taken out of the mold. Then the candles and wicks were trimmed and ready to be used.
Today, we hand dipped the candles. In the large pot is wax and water (about 90% wax and 10% water). Dip the wick into the wax, then the water, then wipe the wick. Wiping the wick straightens out the candle and removes excess water so it makes dipping easier. Repeat – wax, water and wipe! I took time shaping my candle, flattening the bottom and smoothing it out each time I dipped it so it took longer to get a large candle.
“I wanted to buy a candle holder, but the store didn’t have one. So I got a cake.”
— Mitch Hedberg
Here’s our candles. I think in 30 minutes, we got a lot of candles done!
After our cookie and candle making was complete, we headed to John Walter’s last house which was built in 1901 to have hot chocolate and our cookies.
John Walter’s third and last house was purchased as a house kit from a catalogue similar to the Eaton’s Catalogue – the T. Eaton Co. was known for their houses for settlers in Western Canada. You can check out the Eaton’s Plan Book of Ideal Homes here. This was a way to purchase your home in the early 1900’s up to the 1930’s.
His third house is quite fancy. It has a sitting room, parlor, kitchen with a pantry and had a separate set of stairs for the live-in maid though The Walter’s did not have one. Having a house with many modern conveniences of the time like electricity, a phone, water and indoor plumbing was a way for him to show his prosperity. He was a very successful businessman of the time. You can read all about John Walter’s Biography here. It really is all quite interesting. An old story goes that John was friends with a fellow at Jasper House who called John to tell him they were flooding and the floods were coming their way. John was able to warn the community though many houses and his businesses washed away in the flood of 1915.
While we sipped our hot chocolate and nibbled on the gingerbread cookies which had a lovely spiced flavor, we listened a bit to the Victrola record player. This style of record player was made available for purchase between 1919 and 1930 for $150 which equates to about $2700 today. It is a hand crank player. You crank it first, release the brake, place the needle down and the record plays a song. At that time, records only had one song per record. It was quite neat to listen to it. It definitely felt like we were transported back in time!
And that was our afternoon at the John Walter Museum. It was great fun!! I enjoy learning about history in our community and all around us. Every time we come here, I learn something new!
The cookies were delicious — I’ll share the cookie recipe soon! Stay tuned for that post!
You can read a brief history of candles Here. I thought it was rather interesting!!
enjoy from Our City Homestead to yours“Some old-fashioned things like fresh air and sunshine are hard to beat. In our mad rush for progress and modern improvements let’s be sure we take along with us all the old-fashioned things worth while.”
— Laura Ingalls Wilder
