Koogler, Cora P.

Born in Dayton, Ohio, in about 1885, Cora P. Smith married the grocer James G. Koogler in November 1907. For many year they operated a store in Mad River, near Dayton, raising a son, Ralph. Ralph died in 1955 at age 77, Cora followed in 1964.

These two manuscript cookbooks include dozens of recipes for all parts of the meal, ranging from adventurous dishes such as San Francisco potatoes and cocoanut corn muffins, to the more pedestrian egg cutlets and hamburger on toast, with something of an emphasis on desserts, cakes, and cookies. Koogler cut out recipes from popular publications and promotional pieces by the food industry and pasted them into the volumes, and she inserted other pieces of ephemera as well, including newspaper clippings and a mimeographed sheet on “table manners.”