Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1468549
68 quite old, but he came out and built a wonderful cooking fireplace. Mother found a scalloped rack that went in the fireplace, from which you'd hang a pot or a roast to cook. Why the collections are important. The cookware and tool collections are what the first settlers in this part of Texas used in everyday life, as far back as 180 years ago. These objects are notable and valuable embodiments of this early farming community and the people that lived here in the 1800s. Your mother and Miss Ima. GEW: One of the main reasons we're here is because Miss Ima was here. Mother was a docent at Bayou Bend. Miss Ima was beginning to collect Texas furniture for Winedale, and she said to my mother, "Virginia, you need to come up here and help me with this because you have so many great ideas." That's why my parents bought this house. My mother wrote one of the first colonial cookbooks in 1975, A Cooking Legacy: Over 200 Recipes Inspired by Early American Cooks, with recipes from this era. Miss Ima encouraged her to write the book. She said, "Oh Miss Ima, I've never written a book before." Miss Ima said, "I know you can do it. Now, you and Muffy McLanahan get together and write this book." And they did, and they donated the proceeds to Bayou Bend. She was so interwoven with Miss Ima. On culinary fame. GEW: PBS found out about mother's colonial kitchen when she began giving cooking demonstrations to elementary-school children in the area. The kids would come out on a bus, she would have the cook fire going, and she would prepare some dove. She was in the kitchen attired as a 19th-century country woman, cooking a meal. She would explain the different implements, how they worked, and where the food came from. The kids would come into the log kitchen, sit in a circle around her, listen, and watch. Then they would all eat the food. Houston's PBS station came out and filmed her in a short. They called the feature "A Day in the Life of a Pioneer Woman." It was marvelous and quite in-depth. The film began by showing her getting up at 4 am and stoking the fire. The husband brings in the dove, she washes clothes in the creek and hangs them to dry over bushes. The tool collection of Ginny Elverson Welch's late father, River Oaks realtor Robin Elverson, holds pride of place in an outbuilding turned toolshed. The 19th-century tool table, one of a pair, holds vises for woodworking projects, carving implements, and planes.