Living History Day At Curtiss House

Colonial days came to life at the Matthew Curtiss House on Main Street last Sunday when docents from the Newtown Historical Society demonstrated the complex art of cooking a complete meal over an open hearth.

The docents started a fire in the large open hearth, prepared food using authentic colonial “reciepts,” used the beehive oven, and demonstrated various cooking tools and techniques. In colonial times, most dwellings were constructed with a massive masonry fireplace, usually four to five feet high, for the purpose of wood-fire cooking as well as for warmth. A good wife provided her family with a great variety of delicacies cooked there including stews or “spoon meat,” roasted game, crusty breads, biscuits, and even desserts.

Outside, in the back yard of the living history museum, Joe Magnarella demonstrated the art of blacksmithing, working over an open flame to show actual forging techniques used from 1740 to 1840.

Mr Magnarella started as a tool collector in the mid-1960s, and gradually moved beyond collecting to concentrate on the blacksmith trade about eight years ago, working from the Century Museum and Collectors Association’s permanent forge at the Rhinebeck (N.Y.) Dutchess County Fairgrounds. In order to take his show on the road, Mr Magnarella developed a traveling forge so he might give demonstrations to a wider audience.

Costumed guides escorted guests through the Matthew Curtiss House, sharing stories about daily life in early Newtown and information about the 18th Century house-museum.