The Tradition of Maple in Vermont
Introduction
For over 200 years, Vermonters have tapped maple trees and boiled away the moisture to create syrup and other sweet tasting goodies. Sugaring is the first sign of the season's agricultural awakening, and it is this tradition of hard work to tap, collect and boil down sap that has made maple sugaring the Vermont Chamber of Commerce's first Great Vermont Tradition for the spring of 2008.
Every spring, Vermonter flock to the woods for their annual rite of passage - sugaring. Even when snow is still on the ground, the call of the maple trees becomes irresistible. As the first batches of sap begin to boil, the sweet smell of maple drifts throughout the valleys. Shortly after, festivals and tastings pop up all over the state.
Today, through a tradition of industry and innovation, maple sugaring is now a multi-million dollar, high-tech business that is an important part of Vermont's working landscape. Maple is much more than just a delicious ingredients, it's a vibrant industry that supports many generations of Vermonters. Companies, such as Leader Evaporator, play an important role in the industrial development and innovation within the maple industry.
Recipes using Maple (PDF files): Summer Strawberry Salad, Maple Crème Brulée, Maple Glazed Winding Brook Farm Lamb Chops with Vermont Vegetable Salad, and Sauté; and Vermont Apple Shortcake with Cold Hollow Apple Cider & Maple Mascarpone Cream.
Maple History Time Line
New England Maple Museum in Pittsford, Vermont www.maplemuseum.com/history.html says, “Maple sugaring has been an early spring tradition in Vermont ever since the Eastern Woodland Indians discovered that maple sap cooked over an open fire produces a sweet sugar. An old Iroquois legend describes the accidental discovery of the sugarmaking process. A hunter returned to his dwelling and found an enticing sweetness in the air around the kettle in which his mate was boiling meat. The fluid in the kettle, he learned, was sap and had been collected beneath a broken maple limb. To make their sugar, the Indians would cut a slash in the maple tree and collect the sap as it dripped out. Logs were then hollowed out, and filled with the fresh sap. White-hot field stones were then added to cause the sap to boil. The Indians would process the sap through the syrup stage to end with crystallized sugar, which did not spoil when stored. When the first European settlers arrived, the Indians traded maple sugar with them and eventually taught the settlers the secrets of the maple sugaring process.
Other legends describe accidental discovery, but the story varies slightly. Below are some other dates believed related to the history of maple sugaring.
- 1540 First written observation of North American maple trees, by Jacques Cartier, French explorer traveling up St. Lawrence River. 1557 First written record of maples in North America yielding a sweet sap, by French scribe Andre Thevet.
- 1606 Marc Lescarbot describes collection and 'distillation' of maple sap by Micmac Indians of eastern. (Histoire de la Nouvelle).
- 1788 Quakers promote manufacture and use of maple sugar as an alternative to West Indian cane sugar production with slave labour.
- 1790 "Maple Sugar Bubble" grows, with high hopes among national leaders that a home grown alternative to slave-produced cane sugar from the British Caribbean had been found. Key advocates include Thomas Jefferson, Dr. Benjamin Rush and Judge James Fenimore Cooper.
- 1791 Dutch company buys 23,000 acres of Vermont land and attempts to hire local workers to make sugar to compete cane from West Indies. Project fails; Vermonters prefer to work their own land. Thomas Jefferson and George Washington discuss plans to start "maple orchards" on their Virginia plantations. Most trees die or fail to thrive; Jefferson remains a maple booster.
- 1810 Augers coming into popular use to drill holes for wooden spouts or sap spiles. Crude gashings or "boxing" techniques becoming obsolete.
- 1818 Maple sugar selling for half the price of imported cane sugar.
- 1858 Early patent for evaporating pan to D.M. Cook of Ohio.
- 1859 Eli Mosher patents first metal sap spouts.
- 1860 Peak maple production year: 40 million pounds of sugar and 1.6 million gallons of syrup, from 23 states reporting to USDA.
- 1861 Maine Board of Agriculture reports flat-bottomed pans are better than kettles for boiling sap.
- 1872 Early evaporator design work described by Vermont inventor H. Allen Soule.
- 1875 Introduction of metal sap buckets.
- 1884 Early patent for sugar evaporator, G.H. Grimm, Hudson, Ohio.
- 1888 Leader Evaporator Co. founded, Enosburg Falls, Vermont. Will later popularize "drop-flue" design and become dominant maple-equipment supplier. http://www.leaderevaporator.com/.
- 1889 Small Brothers of Dunham, Quebec, begin producing evaporator with crimp- bottom pans invented by David Ingalls. Precursor design to modern Lightning evaporator.
- 1890 G.H. Grimm Company, major supplier of evaporators, buckets and spouts, moves from Hudson,Ohio, to Rutland, Vermont.
- 1891 McKinley Bill attempts to promote maple sugar manufacture by offering two-cent-per-pound bounty to producers. Bureaucrats and small farmers wrangle, and the effort fails.
- 1893 Vermont Maple Sugar Makers' Association formed; instrumental in setting industry-wide standards.
- 1904 Cary Maple Sugar Company incorporated in St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Became largest wholesale sugar company in North America.
- 1905 U.S. Pure Food and Drug Act makes adulteration of maple syrup with glucose illegal.
- 1916 Metal sap-gathering tubing invented by W.C. Brower, Mayfield, New York. Proves impractical-prone to freezing at night, leakage and vulnerable to damage by deer.
- 1935 Vermont institutes spring Maple Festivals; 134 towns stage events; 1,200 maple frosted cakes are submitted for judging.
- 1940-1945 Maple prices frozen at $3.39 per gallon during World War II. Production suffers..
- 1946 First commercial power-tapping machine marketed. Proctor Maple Research Center near Underhill, Vermont founded by University of Vermont.
- 1959 Plastic sap-gathering pipeline system patented by Nelson Griggs, Montpelier Vermont.
- 1965 Maple leaf, a unifying symbol for both English and French Canada since 1800, becomes central image on new national flag of Canada.
- Late 1970s Reverse-osmosis technology introduced to concentrate sugar content of sap before boiling.
- 1982 Severe local dieback or decline of sugar maples noted in Quebec. Provincial scientists begin searching for causes.
- 1985 Sugarmaker Gordon Richardson's Piggy-Back unit introduced by Small Brothers Company as the first of a new-generation of evaporator attachments to enhance performance "naturally".
- 1988 North American Maple Project begins studying health of maple trees to determine progression, if any, of maple decline.
- 1997 Changes in sap tubing technology offer "permanent" tubing which can be left in the woods year-round without stretching.
- 1999 Introduction of the "health spout", using a smaller hole in the tree, which can be drilled by cordless drills. A smaller hole heals faster.
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