Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-04-02

way of corn and the other things we
are about to describe.
The corn of the Indians and the
corn of our forefathers was not only
good to eat, but it was worth eating.
That the follies of civilization should
ever have conspired to lay their
destroying hands upon this hfe-sus-
| tanning food is one of the tragedies
| which it is not yet too late to control.
| There is no fiction in the statement
to no purpose. There is no fiction In
! the statement that corn was indeed
the bread of life of the Indian.
DIR. Richard Lasch in his work,
agriculture Among Primitive Peo-
! ple," tells us of the remarkably large
! corn fields of some of the eastern ana
western Indian tribes.
Professor Cyrus Thomas in his
Hand Bood of American Indians
North of Mexico" collects the evil
dence of Cartier, Champlain, Sagard,
Charlevoic, de Tonty, and General
Wayne as to the immense fields OF
corn all over the country
Sagard, quoted by Edwin Wiley and
Irving G.. Rines, of the Library OF
Congress, is on record as saying, with
reference to the Hurons, Il lost my
way quicker in these fields of corn
than in the prairies or forests.
General Wayne, quoted by the same
beheld such immense fields of corn"
There is no question of the extent
to which the Indians cultivated corn
nor of the immense quantities both
standing on the stalk and stored In
the dry ear which the French and
English destroyed during the lndlan
wars throughout the entire territory
of the Iroquois, which is to-day the
State of New York, a cornless waste.
The fact is solemn enough. we
know that it was due to the cultiVa-
ton of corn by the Indians that we
owe the survival of the whites and
that without corn the peopling of
America by the white men would
probably have been delayed a hun
dred years.
1t was from the Indians that the
whites learned the methods of plant
ing, harvesting, storing, and using
corn.
Governor Bradford himself tells us
how in April, 1921, the Indians taught
the colonists of New England how
to "set" corn, how to manure it prop
erly, how to plant it in hills, how to
plant corn and beans together in the
same field, or corn with pumpkins.
The American citizens of 1917 who
would appreciate the profound signifi-
canoe of corn upon the history of the
United States will find plenty of in
spiration in Harshberger's Maize,
Botanical and Economic Study" and
in A. c. Parker's "Iroquois Uses of
Maize and Other Food Plants"
The red men were hardy, tall,
strong. Their physical perfections
were little short of magnificent. They
ate corn daily. But they ate all of it.
They boiled it whole. They made
bread cakes, mush and porridge, they
parched it and roasted ii.
From their skill the early settlers
learned the secrets of Indian pudding,
of Boston brown bread, now only a
relic of the past; of corn dodgers, corn
mullins. johnny cake, hoe cake, ash
cake, succotash, popcorn.
To the fact that corn, squash, and
pumpkin all came from the same field
New England owes to-day its prefer
ence for squash dishes and pumpkin
pie.
To-day we eat only the starch of the
corn, and if we would appreciate how
few of us resemble in physical propor-
tions the magnificence of the corn
eating red man, we need only examine
the percentages of young applicants
rejected by the United States army
on account of physical unhtness."
The old-fashioned coffee mill and
bushel of whole corn are not without
their significance for the future of
America.