Bad News from Bay City

Today I received a long-awaited letter (well, six weeks, but in this age of texting and email, it seemed an eternity) from the Bay County (Michigan) Historical Society.

Some of you may remember that I had written to them in an attempt to find out more about Mrs. Grace Osborn, author of Cakes of Quality and How to Make Them, published in Bay City, Michigan in 1919.  I wrote about her in an earlier post, calling her the Patron Saint of Cakes.

The disappointing news was that Maureen McDermott, the research librarian at the Butterfield Memorial Research Library, was unable to find any information about Mrs. Osborn, who I speculate that, despite her haughty tone, was an impoverished matron attempting to make a living baking cakes and publishing a cookbook.

I won't give up my search for Mrs. Osborn, but I'm not sanguine that I'll find anything much.  Meantime, she lives on through her recipes and just today, fellow blogger Sarah Lohman posted about Mrs. Osborn's Puff Cake.