Catherine Polk, Pastry Cook:
Maps, Recipes, City Directories, Census Records
Catherine Polk (1812 to 1822-1890) was pastry cook at the Cataract House from 1850 (and perhaps as early as 1836) until at least 1883, part of the core group of people of African descent who worked together year after year, both in serving guests and helping freedom seekers escape from slavery. She represented the continuity, professionalism, and personable character that visitors had come to expect from Cataract staff. She may have been born enslaved herself in Delaware, and almost certainly helped others escape from enslavement once they reached Niagara Falls.
Catherine Polk was recorded in census records from 1850 to 1870 as having been born in Pennsylvania. In 1880, however, she told the census taker that she, as well as her parents, were native to Delaware. Catherine Polk may have been one of those who escaped from slavery and camouflaged her origins by reporting her birthplace as a free state.
During the off-season, Catharine Polk lived in Geneva, New York, where she and her husband Noah owned a house near the home of the Condol family, who also worked at the Cataract House. Two Condol daughters (Clarissa Condol Hamilton and Dorothy Condol Fossett) married waiters at the Cataract House and lived and worked in Niagara Falls. Parkhurst Whitney, proprietor of the Cataract House, grew up nearby.
Catherine Polk was a well-loved fixture at the Cataract House. Recollections in the 1930s by children who had grown up in Niagara Falls described “Aunty Pope” as the “Negro pastry cook,” who was “quite a character with her bandanna around her head,” and whose domain was the basement pastry rooms with an open court. Years later, Alice Trott remembered: “We children loved to go into the basement pastry rooms where the barrels of English walnuts, almonds and raisins were kept. (There were always some on the dining room tables) and Aunty Pope would let us have some and some of the ice cream which came from the gallon cans.” On May 23, 1883, the Niagara Falls Gazette noted that “Mrs. Polk—‘Auntie” as she is familiarly called— who for thirty-three years has had charge of the department where many of the luxuries for the table in the way of pastry, etc., are prepared--returns looking as smiling as ever.”
Documents:
1. Map.
This Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Niagara Falls, New York, shows the plan of the Cataract House in 1892, overlaid on recent aerial photograph
Cataract House
Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, Niagara Falls, Niagara County, New York, 1892.
Courtesy Library of Congress
Note location of the Bake House and Oven in the basement.
2. Recipe
One of Catharine Polk’s signature recipes was Indian pudding. Dr. A. V. Chase published the recipe in his Third, Last and Complete Receipt Book (Detroit, MI & Windsor, ON: F.B. Dickerson & Co., 1890), 352. He remembered that:
Myself and family spent several days at the above hotel, in 1874, where we were so well pleased with this pudding . . . [that] I made an effort through the waiter to obtain the recipe. . . . I succeeded.
I have given it word for word as dictated by Mrs. Polk, who was highly gratified because we were so much pleased with her pudding, assuring us she “had made it in the same house for 36 seasons, without missing one!”
3. Menu.
Here is a menu from the Cataract House for July 27, 1858. Note its detailed design, with a drawing of Niagara Falls.
4. City Directory.
Geneva City Directory, 1888-89. City directories listed people who lived in various municipalities. Many listed only men. But women might also be listed if they were heads of households or businesswomen.
Geneva City Directory, 1888-89
5. Census Record, 1855
Courtesy Ancestry.com. The 1855 census for New York State listed
House #139, frame house, worth $400, family #148
Noah Polk, age 54, male, mulatto, born Delaware, married, lived in Geneva for sixteen years, voter, owner of land
New York State Census for, 1855, Second Election District, Town of Seneca,
County of Geneva,
June 8, 1855, recorded by Moses C. Wright.
“New York State Census, 1855”, database with images, FamilySearch (ark:/61903/1:1:K63F-Y1M : Wed Mar 15 06:23:31 UTC 2023), Entry for Noah L Polk, 1855.
6. Death Certificate
Catharine Polk’s death certificate from the City of Philadelphia listed her death as June 3, 1890.
7. Gravestone.
Although she died in Philadelphia, Catharine Polk was buried in Washington Street Cemetery in Geneva, New York.
Mrs. Catharine Polk. Died at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, June 3, 1890 (in list of Washington St. burials)
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/142942544/catharine-polk
