The day I’m writing this, Aug. 15, the birthday of an important woman, should be declared a national holiday to honor this woman who changed the face of eating in America. In 1912, Julia Carolyn McWilliams was born in Pasadena, Calif., into an upper middle class family.
Her family had moved to California from New England. Her father was a graduate of Princeton University; her maternal grandfather had been lieutenant governor of Massachusetts. Her parents were indulgent with Julia and her two siblings. They lived in a rambling house with a household staff, including a cook who provided good, sturdy American meals for the family. The McWilliams children were left to develop curious and inquiring minds, exploring their environment. After graduation from a private school she went back East to Smith College, graduating in 1934 with a degree in history.
Following graduation she moved to New York City, beginning her work as a copywriter. As the world moved toward war, Julia hoped for a career in a women's branch of the military. However, her unusual height of 6-foot-2 prohibited her being admitted to the military.
She found a job in Washington in the Office of Strategic Services as a typist at the Washington headquarters. Because of her education and keen mind, she was soon engaged as a top secret researcher in the direct command of the head of the agency. After a year in Washington she was posted to China, then Ceylon. Among her other duties was working with a team investigating a repellent to prevent sharks from interfering with underwater explosives. She came up with the idea of cooking different combinations of chemicals to put into the water to repel the sharks. Her formula is still in use today. For this and other work she received several awards.
Interesting that her first kitchen adventure was shark repellent.
In 1946 she met Paul Child, her future husband. This match was a true love match, one which would change the principals and also the world. These two were soulmates in every way. Paul grew up in quite a different background, one of more sophistication and polish; he delighted in introducing his All-American wife to the pleasures of the French table.
Traveling to Paris through Rouen, Mr. and Mrs. Child stopped for lunch. Julia called this first French meal as “an opening up of the soul and spirit for me.” At that moment, the stage was set for a complete and total change in the food eaten in America and the world. The groundwork was set for an explosion in television and the way people viewed food. It became a new national pastime.
Julia was so drawn to this new interest that she learned French to attend Les Cordon Bleu, a culinary school.
This new experience in eating changed her life - and ours.
In 1962 Julia appeared on WGBH, a public television station in Boston to promote the ground-breaking cookbook she and two colleagues had written. From this first appearance on TV, an entire industry was born. Julia was 53 years old.
What can I say about Julia Child, my lifetime heroine that has not already been said hundreds of times? She was larger than life (in height), down to earth and had an overwhelming interest in the world around her.
Let me begin by saying that I watched her black and white show “The French Chef” on my grandmother’s television in the 1960s (my grandmother could get ETV from Jackson and we couldn’t). She introduced me to a world totally removed from Southern cooking, but yet still as basic in its own right. As she said so many times, the biggest virtues in the kitchen were the simple ones.
She had an amazing ability to convince me that she was talking directly to me and me alone. I was in the kitchen with her. As the years went by, she had shows with more elaborate sets and direction, but she never wavered from that totally personal style. She was unshaken by her own mistakes and would forge ahead, never missing a beat.
“I did not have my glasses on when I was thinking,” she’d say if she made a mistake on live television.
“I think the secret of her appeal was a combination of joy in what she was doing and a deep desire to teach and to teach well,” said Geof Drummond, who produced her cooking programs in the 1990s. “The food was important to her, and it was important to her that you get it.”
Julia Child amassed countless honors in her culinary career.
She co-founded the American Institute of Wine and Food with close friend, winemaker Robert Mondavi. Her foundation, the Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and Culinary Arts, provides grants for culinary education and all things food, drink and agriculture, and oversees her posthumous endorsement of ideas, books or endorsements. By the way, she never endorsed any product for sale and only produced television programs on public television. A beautiful yellow rose was named for her; she has been on a U.S. postage stamp and published more than 20 books.
Julia was awarded the French Legion of Honor, the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom and several honorary doctoral degrees. The Smithsonian Institution moved the kitchen from her home in Cambridge, Mass., site of many of her television programs, into their museum - the only kitchen ever recognized in that way.
Receiving these and many more accolades from around the globe did not surpass what I believe to be her greatest and most lasting achievement - that of putting her arm around my shoulder in Natchez in 1992 at a celebration of her 85th birthday and answering my request for a photograph taken with her by saying, “I’d be honored.”
Fran Ginn is former chef/owner of The Back Door Café, who retired after 31 years in the food industry to be a grandmother. She can be contacted at fran@franginn.com.
