Association of Ice Cream

“Dolly Madison, A Quaker Girl” was on the shelf back home.  It’s an old hard cover version that must have been my mom’s or even my grandmothers’ when she was young.  (OK.  My grandmother would have bought it for my mom when she was young as this copyright is 1944).  And it registered as one of those essential, early American names, that I simply couldn’t place as anything other than that.  Who was she, beyond the association of ice cream?  The description of her as a Quaker made it all the more intriguing, because I knew enough to know that her denomination wasn’t something I was otherwise cognizant of and her particular faith wasn’t why she was famous. 

The book was written for a young reader, which isn’t usually the material we choose, but after a few rough-hewn, guy novels in a row, I was ready to try something the featured candle making and sewing.  Dolly is bouncing around in pre Revolutionary War Virginia.  She’s a Quaker and her mom doesn’t want her to adorn herself in a fancy way, but her grannie slips her some jewelry.  Her father owns slaves and decides to set them free.  Then pop decides to move the family to Philadelphia to be around more Quakers.  But the book as we reached the mid point, wasn’t helping much to discern why it is she was famous.

Looking on line, I was reminded her Madison, was the same Madison as our fourth president, James Madison.  I couldn’t say much about his presidency, beyond the fact that the War of 1812 took place on his watch.  Hadn’t realized he was Jefferson’s Secretary of State, or that Dolly had served Jefferson, the widower, as a stand-in first lady.  Now I know that immediately before the burning of the White House, she had grabbed the famous picture of George Washington and bought it out with her rather than leave it to the British flames.  And of course, that when she was first lady, she served ice cream. 

This biography, interestingly, never dwells upon all that she did as the first lady.  Rather we learn about how she became that woman.   This is, I’ve now confirmed, part of the “The Childhood of Famous American’s” series and appealing to young people the books’ concentrate sensibly on who these people were when they were young before they achieved their fame.

Glancing through, this list from 1944, there are at least one third of these “famous” countrymen of mine whom I’ve never heard of.  I was never exposed to James Whitcomb Riley, “The Hoosier Poet” nor learned that Bedford Forrest was a Confederate Civil War general.  “Mad” Anthony Wayne, the Revolutionary War commander isn’t anyone I can remember from my American History textbooks.  Seventy some years on what makes a “famous” American has certainly proved mutable.  I suspect that Sacajawea and Booker T Washington who I’m glad to report were on the list in ’44, might still remain today.  The Hoosier Poet meanwhile might not make the cut in 2017.   But I am intrigued by what I didn’t know as well as by how much less my own children know of the American narrative. 

Tuesday, 02/14/17