Category: New York

Who Was The Last Slave In Ontario Or Kingston?

levi1Right: Levi Veney, ex-slave who lived in Amherstburg, taken at J. D. Burkes’ store, 1898. Archives of Ontario. Click for large view.

I am not one of those anti-MSM, “the boogiemen are just round that corner now that Democrats are here” sorts of persons that have been so tediously active in the blogosphere in the last 24 hours…but when I heard a self-congratulatory reference in a CBC radio piece suggesting Canada not having a history of race issues as had the USA, it did grate on the ears. Reminded me to switch stations. But it got me thinking…there must have been a last slave in Canada. We traded in human souls with the best of them before a certain date, before the long path to today began. Google Books to the rescue with the 1869 book History of the Settlement of Upper Canada (Ontario), with Special Reference to the Bay of Quinté by Wm. Canniff. where we read at page 574:

…when the British Act of Emancipation was passed, in 1833, setting free the slaves in all parts of the Empire, there was no slaves in Canada, Upper or Lower. Thirty years previous had the evil been crushed in Lower Canada, and forty years before Upper Canada had declared that it was “highly expedient to abolish slavery,” and had enacted laws to secure its abolition…

The story goes on to mention the slaves of of the first Loyalist familes who settled along the eastern shore of Lake Ontario and down the St. Lawrence and, at pages 576 and 577 there is this extraordinary statement:

We have before us the copy of an assignment made in 1824 by Eli Keeler, of Haldimand, Neweastle, to William Bell, of Thurlow, of a Mulatto boy, Tom, in which it is set forth, that the said boy has time unexpired to serve as the child of a female slave, namely, ten years, from the 29th Feb. 1824, according to the laws of the Province ; for the sum of $75. Probably, this was the last slave in Canada whose service closed, 1835.

It appears from that reference and a few others that a child of a slave was a slave until majority during the transitional period. So who was the last one alive? Probably not this gentleman, given Mr. Veney above, but he is worth mentioning now as Canniff did at page 577:

In the Ottawa Citizen of 1867, appeared the following: A BRITISH SLAVE — An old negro appeared at the Court of Assize yesterday, in a case of Morris vs. Hennerson. He is 101 years of age, and was formerly a slave in Upper Canada, before the abolition of slavery in the British possessions. He fought through the American war in 1812, on the side of the British; was at the battles of Chippewa and Lundy’s Lane, and was wounded at Sacket’s Harbour. He is in full possession of all his faculties. He was born in New York State in 1766, and was the slave of a TJ. B. Loyalist, who brought him to Canada. He was brought to this city to prove the death of a person in 1803, and another in 1804.

If he was wounded at the 1812 Battle of Sackets Harbor (there was another in 1813) that means he was at least in Kingston then as the British force was based here, a generation before the Martellos were built. I will have to see if that case is reported, if it actually gives his name.

Jeffery Amherst’s Spruce Beer Circa 1759

amherstI am a bad home brewer. I have had supplies in for months to do a couple of all-grain batches but still they stiff wrapped and wrapped again in plastic in a cool, dark place. I did buy another mash pot yesterday but, given my failure to avoid napping and reading this afternoon, no beer again was made. Yet, beer knowledge expanded as I was reading The French and Indian War, a pretty good read by Walter R. Borneman, and came across this recipe for spruce beer from 1759, taken from an order by General Jeffery Amherst, to be supplied to the British troops moving to take the fort at Crown Point from the French:

Take 7 Pounds of good spruce and boil it well till the bark peels off, then take the spruce out and put three Gallons of Molasses to the Liquor and and boil it again, scum it well as it boils, then take it out the kettle and put it into a cooler, boil the remained of the water sufficient for a Barrel of thirty Gallons, if the kettle is not large enough to boil it together, when milk warm in the Cooler put a pint of Yest into it and mix well. Then put it into a Barrel and let it work for two or three days, keep filling it up as it works out. When done working, bung it up with a Tent Peg in the Barrel to give it vent every now and then. It may be used in up to two or three days after. If wanted to be bottled it should stand a fortnight in the Cask. It will keep a great while.

Yum. You see the key phrase, don’t you: “till the bark peels off”. The British army was using whole branches, not just needles and boughs. Again I say – yum. Google gives us that recipe, too, but give up has more on the brew – in the form of a digitized copy of the 1759 orderly book from Amherst’s expedition north up Lake Champlain, setting out how the army brewed:

Spruce Beer will be Brewed for the Health and Conveniency of the Troops, which will be ƒerved at prime Coƒt ; 5 Quarts of Mollaƒƒes will be put into every Barrel of Spruce Beer ; each Gallon coƒt nearly 3 Coppers. The Quarter-maƒters of the Regiments, Regulars and Provincials, are to give Notice to Lieut. Colo. Robiƒon of the Quantity each Corps are deƒirous to receive, for which they muƒt give Receipts and pay the Money before the Regiments marches. Each Regiment to ƒend a Man acquainted with Brewing, or that is beƒt capable of aƒƒifting the Brewers, to the Brewery to-morrow Morning at 6 o’clock, at the Rivulet on the Left of Montgomerys. Thoƒe Men are to Remain, and are to be paid at the Rate of 1 8 Pence Currency per Day. One Serjt. of the Regulars and one of the Provencials to ƒuper-intend the Brewery, who will be paid is 6d per Day. Spruce Beer will be deliverd to the Regiments on Thursday Evening or Friday morning.

Sweet use of the long “s” HTML, eh what? Let me know if you can’t see them and I will report back to The 1700s Typeface Open Source Beer Recipe Project.

More? OK, Borneman points that “rum and other spirituous liquors” were prohibited under his command but that spruce beer provided some protection against scurvy among other benefits…aka “conveniency”. Here is a 5 gallon clone of the beer for the inconvenienced homebrewer. But not me. I have those other beers I have yet to make lined up first.

Following My Bliss In Oswego, New York

Have I mentioned I really dislike the idea of following your passion? It’s so much based on the immediate and the result. “Follow your passion” is what people are told to entice them into entry position IT jobs that never pan out or pull out the credit card to act on the next spontaneous urge. And it smacks of no respect for idleness. No, bliss is the thing. That cooler draw on the heart. The stuff of naps and toes playing in the tidal zone. The part of you that puts mild ahead of extreme double imperial IPA every time. It was a big day. Out the door at eight with one kid to collect another after their first stay-over. The promise of treats for all was a key leverage tactic. I felt like Ron dragging the kids around – but instead of Brussels, I got to go to Oswego, NY, home of C’s Farm Market and King Arthur’s brewpub.

When we got to C’s a little past eleven, I finally got to meet the blissed out (and maybe, OK, even passionate about beer) Dave and Maria who I have been emailing but missing the face to face on for a few years now. A while ago, they have taken the family fruit market and added a beer selection – then they discovered craft and have kept discovering. What I saw yesterday was easily a doubling of shelf space to fine beer with more focus compared to 2006 on US craft than imports. Peaches were placed in the hands of kids as we talked about the trade and their market. They were happy to report that they have seen a matching increase in sales and even mentioned that there was a happy gang from the Ottawa area that seemed to make the trip two or three times a year to full up the trunk. I left with 54 bottles of various sizes and strengths to replenish the stash including the new-to-me brews like Collaboration not Litigation as well as Old Ploughshare Stout and Red Sky At Night saison from Baltimore’s Clipper City. Future plans include tasting sessions starting in the fall. Sadly, under NY state law you need a special license for growler pours and they don’t issue them any more so that dream may have to wait for a while.

Also maybe a little sadly, things looked like they were not as busy over at King Arthur’s, one of my favorite brewpubs in terms of comfortable design, river mouth location and in-house micro-brew selection. Their dream location near the banks of the river in this historic downtown seem to have been undermined lately by a complete rebuild of the Bridge Street bridge. They are now disconnected from the hotel guests a few hundred feet away on the other bank. This may be compounding the pressures on all small brewers as there were only five beers on offer, three of which were flavoured wheats and none of which offered any level of hoppy bite. With my BBQ burger, I tried their 5% Summer Brown which promised a touch of coriander. I thought this was a great twist on a malty mahogany ale with a bit of licorice and treacle coming through the rich nutty graininess. If I say this had shades of HP sauce you need to understand that in the most positive of terms. Very nice beer.

Meta-Beer-Blogging…Or Watching Troy Watch Phin And Paul

BeerBistro! after all the people go to bed.
I had a great time Friday night. It was fun to meet the Southern Tier guys as well as the very dapper Liliana and Vlado, those great folk behind hosts Roland + Russell (who, by the way, I am starting to think were either two dusty Victorian-era sherry broker gents were secretly offed by L/V on their way up the drinks trade…or are the names of their dogs) but the real fun was being unexpectedly surprised. Greg Clow was kind enough to tell me that by times I am too cranky and – you know what – he’s right. I claim to have an excuse, however, as by times I feel like one of those 19th century astronomers trying to figure out the layout of the canals on Mars. I sort of live in a bubble placed some distance from our beery subject matter. I don’t get to these beer dinners, I don’t have access to a swath of great pubs, can’t just pop out to anywhere for a Rochefort of any degree, my nearest craft brewers are two hours drive away and until Friday I had only met one other person into beer writing face to face. I organize family trips around beer hunting and get sleepy around ten pm, too, so closing down BeerBistro was not what I had expected.

As a result, I build up some presumptions. One was that the beer dinner idea was going to be a bit stiff. You have to understand that I am a BBQ in the back yard in frayed hiking shorts kind of guy. When I walked into the Academy of Spherical Arts in jeans and a ball cap – albeit a lovely Adirondack Brewpub one – and saw folk in Toronto casual (aka eastern Ontario dress-up) I was worried. I couldn’t have been more wrong. The table guests from Southern Tier, The Toronto Star, the LCBO beer and marketing groups and R+R made for great company. And the food and beer matching thing was not as lame uninteresting as I feared. I don’t think I will get too much into obsessing over pairings – as I prefer beer as ingredient than a match – but it was really interesting to see how the chocolate dessert reacted with a raspberry wheat altered the beer drastically, removing the grassiness, highlighting the fruit and making for a palate cleanser. The third course, a variation of what I know as Cambodian “Western Style” yam and chicken curry (my education gleaned from Kingston’s excellent Cambodian joints) was also just dandy with the heat of the ST IPA.


The wall o’whisky and whisky’s friends at The Academy

In the end, the food and beer was just a side show to the gathering over beer. It was really about meeting Troy finally and speaking a bit about his plans for his beer writing whether at his blog or TAPS, the recently revived Canadian beer magazine – that’s him taking a photo of Phin DeMink and Paul Cain; putting a face to the name of Cass, the founder of Bar Towel as well as contributors like Harry; speaking with Sheryl Kirby, partner of Greg over at Taste T.O; talking to Josh in the end for hours about the economic tensions that are affecting where craft brewing is going; reusing my old jokes like the time the grade one teacher asked what Daddy did and was told “my Daddy takes pictures of beer!”

The next day I stopped by Church-Key again, making the 50 km detour to Campbellford to pick up some fine local ales. The day was sunny and warm and, because it was Saturday, there were more cars in the parking lot than I had seen before. People were sitting on the porch drinking samples just enjoying John’s beer. The shop was busy. I grabbed a six each of Northumberland Ale and West Coast IPA and drove on home.

By The Beer Cooler of Wegmans I Laid Myself Down And Cried

wegmans

 A fantastically bad shot of the actual Wegmans from GooglePlex

Not really but there was a moment of near tears – of joy and frustration, that is. What else, after a sensible visit to Fort Stanwix, could make me feel this way other than a beer cooler room in a not particularly recently modernized, middle sized grocery store in Liverpool NY just two hours from my house? Aside from all the macro-brew they offer at honest prices – there, filling half the cooler, was Ommegang, Southern Tier, Victory, Dogfish Head, Middle Ages, Ithaca and a whack of other mid-Atlantic brews in sixes and mixed twelves. There were also way more of our own Unibroue of Quebec than I can get here next door in Ontario as well as imports like Samuel Smith and Duvel. There were even special releases like the Southern Tier’s Un*Earthly which I had back at the hotel watching the UNC game against Louisville – $5.99 for a bomber! All within fifty feet of the cat food in one direction and the fancy cheeses in the other – not to mention a similarly robust selection compared to my visit to a swankier Wegmans in Ithaca last month. Here is their entire beer listing at the Wegmans HQ’s website. A solid grocery including fine craft ales in their everyday line-up at reasonable prices. What else could make a Canadian weep at the sight?

In other CNY news, Party Source is closed on Sunday. Drag. Drove right by on Saturday supper time, saying that I would be back tomorrow. Plenty of time I thought. Nope. But I was able to stop in at Galeville Grocery this morning and pick of a mixed selection of new to me beers. They have a new but limited selection of single 12 oz bottles for $1.59. Found another Kellerbier, Moosebacher, imported by Best Brands International of Georgia so prudently that it only cost $3.69. Note: BBI earns its use of the plural “beers” through also carrying one brand from Brazil.

Stouts: Choklat, Imperial Stout, Southern Tier, New York

Chok-o-la-da. That is how we say it in our house because we met in Poland back in 1991. Gdansk was a hot bed of decent chocolate that was sold for pennies a bar around the Baltic shore towns like the one where we lived. Other than that, I am fairly indifferent to the stuff.

On the nose, is/are there Goldings? Definitely a big cream yeastiness and, yes, dark chocolate. Not cocoa and not milk chocolate. You might even say it’s 75% dark chocolate but that would be pushing my luck. In the mouth, well, it is thick. No other word for it. There is bitter from hop in there, too, replicating good dark chocolate. Yet there is also texture of malt graininess as well as the richness of chocolate malt and a bit of licorice in the finish. Not like chocolate syrup with alcohol added. Quite a thing. Quite an amazing 11% thing.

Once again, Southern Tier is batting 1.000 as far as I am concerned. Huge BAer support.

Three Days And Three Side Orders Of Onion Rings

gpr6I got to tick two new to me diners off the list during this weekend’s central New York, The Glenwood Pines Restaurant in Ulysses down near Ithaca as well as the Crystal Restaurant in downtown Watertown. I think the first place dates in part from the late ’40s while the second is an all-1920’s kinda spot. I never did take a photo of the quite admirable onion rings at Shorty’s, also in Watertown, though. On Friday night, on the way south, we walked into selection of NY state fish fry specials. I had a slab of haddock on a bun the size of your forearm. I wonder where they got the fish? Maybe Norway.

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Saturday at noon, the double Pinewood special, as illustrated, set me back $8.95 and I had onion rings and battered corn nuggets, too. I had no idea what a battered corn nugget was but that was even more reason to try. Turned out to be a little lump of creamed corn in a sweet dough. gpr4Dandy stuff. I was seriously doubtful of my capacity to suck back the burger but it was delightful with a Genny Cream as the kids played the bowling game. A good place for having a beer as kids run around and the food was particularly good diner grub. Again, very reliable onion ring action.

The Crystal Restaurant was a different kind of experience but certainly still a good joint. As I mentioned, it is pushing 90 years and the interior is all original wood panel and tin ceiling with a deep patina of most of those 90 years worth of smoking. gpr7Warning: the angle of the backs in the wooden booths is particularly Presbyterian. Best diner coffee ever anywhere ever. Great smoky bacon and my hot pork sandwich was as creamy bland as the dish demands. The only way you can get me to eat canned peas is on a hot chicken or pork sandwich. A solid finale to a weekend of onion rings, too. The place is also a little quirky, enhanced to a certain degree by the young soldier, an assistant chaplain no less, who was talking on his cell phone in too loud a voice about how he was going to marry someone just to get an increase in his army pay. He seemed to have it all figured out even though the girl, astonishingly, seemed (according to the tale to which all were subject) to actually get wed to the heel.

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The pre-school girls of one family in their church clothes asked to help the waitress clear the table and they carried their own glasses and plates to the kitchen wearing big excited smiles, maybe like they did every weekend. Anyway, even though the place serves a solid all day breakfast and burgers and such, the bar was a stream of cocktails on a Sunday noon. Manhattans and whiskey on ice were the main drinks. Apparently the Crystal makes an old style hot egg nog or flip sort of thing at Christmas that the locals swear by. Here is an archived NCPR report on the place.

Porter Season: Raspberry Porter, Southern Tier, NY, USA

All things have to come to an end and the season of porter is no different. The deep freeze has come here at the east end of Lake Ontario and autumns turning leave and harvest are long gone. Tripels, Christmas ales, imperial stouts and barley wine will be everything until the snow banks begin to recede under the stronger sun ten weeks or so from now.

Southern Tier’s raspberry porter is one of the best fruited beers I’ve had. A strong true and jammy thick raspberry scent pops out from under the cap, the same taste melding with the cocoa roasty malts, soft water and cream yeast in the mouth. A cheesecake of a beer without being phony or overly sweet. The quality confirms again my ever growing suspicions about this brewer. Too many BAers fear small berries.

When Is It Right Not To Blog About Your Beer?

I took no notes. I had the camera but I took no pictures. The photo is from two years ago.

Even though you can blog about pretty much anything if you have a deft eye for the moment, I felt only a little guilty but blogging can get in the way of enjoying and I had such a day of craft beer and Americana yesterday I just had to exclude you for the most part. I didn’t mean to exclude Travis, though. I feel quite badly that I did such a poor job of planning that I didn’t realize the Syracuse football game started at 4 pm instead of the expected noon. As a result, the demands of others and the Sox game rammed into the end of the football squeezing out the chance anticipated visit with Travis to Clark’s Ale House. I am a bad beer blogger but he wins a prize…which I now need to figure out what it could be…

But, as I said, there was much good ale nonetheless. To my mind, Syracuse and its outlying neighbouring counties are one of the hot spots of craft beer in the USA. We ate at the picnic tables outside the Dinosaur BBQ, above, on a warm October afternoon after a good shopping spree at the ever wonderful Galeville Grocery where I snabbed a few new beers to me from Sly Fox, Wagner Valley, Wachusett, Southern Tier (Oats!), Bear Republic (Rye!!) and Rogue (Juniper?!?) as well as the 2007 vintage of Big A IPA from Smuttynose, a past winner of beer of the year around here. As much smoky pork was being eaten, we had fresh well-cellared draft from Middle Ages, Southern Tier, Ithaca, Sacket’s Harbor plus the Dino’s own house beer, Ape Hanger. Best of the day, however, were the samples had at our stop at the refurbished (and very cheery) tasting counter at Middle Ages where we visited last year with Gary’s shoe cam. I tried their new 9% Imperial Porter and was so happy came away with a growler. Their new batch of Winter Wizard was also very nice on tap – a Burton perhaps?

By the way, Southern Tier’s raspberry porter is a cheesecake in a bottle…but in a good way. Notes may follow as part of Porter Season if anyone in this house lets me near another bottle.