Butter

  I have plans to increase my production of posts once the hours of daylight and sunshine decrease. While you can be sure that the days will get shorter and the sun will move farther south, you are probably less sure about my ability to stick with my plans. You are not alone in having such thoughts and I admit that it is a rare thing for me to plan anything and, rarer still, for me to accomplish something. 

   There is even a subject category in Mulcahy’s Miscellany relating to “Abandoned Projects”. In it you will find short posts about longer things left behind, such as my inability to read all of the books in “A Dance to the Music of Time,” or write about “Charcoal Fueled Automobiles.” As an indication of my improved intentions, however, I will try now to produce a few blog nuggets before August ends and I begin working harder around Labour Day. Or perhaps, maybe when the snow starts.

About the Butter

  Of all the images and illustrations I have provided to you, it is likely the one of the former Mayor of Toronto, the late Doug Ford, is your favourite. It is a picture of a large sculpture for which he was the model. He is reading a book by Margaret Atwood. The sculpture was carved from a block of butter.

   At a time when the news remains dreadful and statues everywhere are being destroyed, it is good to learn that sculptors still can find employment creating sculptures carved from pure butter. I learned about such activities from an article which is reporting on the Minnesota State Fair. It is also good to learn that State Fairs and Fall Fairs still exist.

   A new artist has been hired to replace Linda Chistensen who butter sculpted for around 50 years. Gerry Kulzer is the new guy and he is now carving from butter, not clay, which I gather is easier than butter to work with. “To capture a person’s likeness is really tough,” said Mr. Kulzer, 53, of Litchfield, Minn. “Especially when you’re in a 40-degree refrigerator.”

   He will carve all aspirants who are competing to be the next Princess Kay of the Milky Way. The princesses and the sculptor are in a glass display cooler that rotates so Fair attendees can witness the operations. He is carving as I write this and will be doing so until September 4th.

What About Margarine?

  As far as I know, real butter, not margarine, is used for sculpting. I realise the subject of margarine is a contentious one and I only raise it here because, so far, this post is too short. I will not say much more since I will soon run the risk of making the post too long and, besides, you surely will already know about the great butter/margarine controversy.

   Basically, margarine is cheaper than butter. People with cows did not wish to see the less expensive product on the grocery shelves. For that reason margarine was illegal for many years in Canada. When it was allowed to be made and sold, it was often highly taxed. Then, there is the colour issue. Those who produced butter did not want margarine to be yellow since it would look like the real thing. In Quebec, yellow margarine like conscription was opposed. There was even a Supreme Court case about it. You may not believe me so I will simply provide sources to keep this short.

Sources:

 You will be most eager to see the Ford Butter Sculpture and you will learn much more about butter sculpting: The Land of Cockaigne. 

  The article about the Minnesota State Fair is this one: "His Medium, Salted Butter. His Craft Sublime," Christina Morales, New York Times, Aug. 23, 2022.

"Gerry Kulzer, the new butter sculptor at the Minnesota State Fair, is ready to capture the likenesses of the dairy princesses, if only he can sculpt their tresses in time....

In 2019, Ms. Christensen and the Midwest Dairy trade group chose Mr. Kulzer as an apprentice from a pool of five applicants because of his skills at sculpting and bronze casting, and because of his personal background. He grew up on a Minnesota grain farm and would help on his cousins’ dairy farm, which gave him an intimate understanding of the fair’s butter-sculpting tradition....

To prepare for this week’s fair, Mr. Kulzer spent several days a week in his studio working on his sculpting speed using clay, the medium he says is closest to butter. When he filled in for Ms. Christensen two years ago, he struggled to finish the hairstyles for the finalists’ busts in the eight hours allotted for each.

Butter sculptures first appeared at the Minnesota State Fair more than a century ago. In 1965, a dairy trade group began the fair’s tradition of sculpting the finalists in Midwest Dairy’s pageant, which began about a decade earlier (the Associated Milk Producers, a trade group, has donated the 900 pounds of butter needed for the art since 1993). The contest honors young female leaders in the state’s dairy industry; the winner is crowned the night before the fair begins, and greets guests at 6 a.m. as they enter the gates.
 The website for the Minnesota State Fair is here and it is still on. 

  For more about Princess Kay of the Milky Way, see this. 

The Great Butter/Margarine Controversy

Here are just a few Canadian sources. It was also controversial elsewhere.

Heick, Welf H. "What Ontario Wants, Canada Gets; The 1886 Margarine Debate," Canadian Papers in Rural History, 1988, Vo. 6, p.240.

Abstract: Traces the margarine debate in Canada, from its origin in Ontario, when that province was experiencing a shift from wheat to mixed farming, to its conclusion in 1886. With soil depletion, dairying became a viable alternative to growing wheat, but acceptable quality butter was to remain a serious problem during the 1860's-70's. Evidence suggests that the appearance of margarine in Canada came in 1878, and by the early 1880's the butter/margarine competition was well developed. Rather than regulation, a ban was advocated in the intensely emotional debate in the Commons. Parliament listened to the arguments of Ontario dairymen who viewed themselves as vulnerable when margarine appeared on the market.

Heick, Welf H. "Margarine in Newfoundland History," Newfoundland Studies, March, 1986, Vol.2, No.1.

Abstract: The Newfoundland margarine industry began in 1883 when emerging industrialization filled the gap caused by the weak agricultural base in the country. The local population neither produced nor imported an adequate amount of butter to maintain a reasonable standard of health and the establishment of the margarine industry not only helped the poorer segments of society, but also aided the colony as a whole by promoting reliance on a locally-produced product. The politicians made sure that confederation with Canada (1949) did not disturb the local right to make the butter substitute. The story of margarine production in Newfoundland is one of people acting soundly to improve and protect their standard of living.

Post Script:

Milk as a subject will not be tackled. I went to buy some the other day and there were rows of different kinds of milks?

The Bonus: 

For more about Minnesota, see my post about The University of Minnesota Press. 

People from Minnesota are called "Minnesotans." If you are going to the Minnesota State Fair and are passing through the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, the people there are referred to as "Yoopers." For more, see: Unobvious Demonyms.