19th C. Table Manners and Innovation

A napkin or doily used in each hand, would have been much better! – Frederick Stokes’, “Good Form: Dinners Ceremonious and Unceremonious,” 1890, contrasted the crude gnawing from end to end with the more polite grasping with a folded napkin or doily. 

In the 1880s, works such as “Social Etiquette of New York” demonstrated that the ongoing debate between traditional European manners and new American ways favored the Continent. In the late 19th century however, Americans began to become comfortable with themselves and formulate their own rules for formal table setting, serving, and eating.

The serving in eating of corn on the cob has been an enduring issue for American authorities on table manners. In “Hints on Etiquette,” 1844, Charles Day decreed that rather than gnaw at the cob, the diner should scrape the kernels into his or her plate and eat them with a fork. 

The serving in eating of corn on the cob has been an enduring issue for American authorities on table manners. In “Hints on Etiquette,” 1844, Charles Day decreed that rather than gnaw at the cob, the diner should scrape the kernels into his or her plate and eat them with a fork. Frederick Stokes’, “Good Form: Dinners Ceremonious and Unceremonious,” 1890, contrasted the crude gnawing from end to end with the more polite grasping with a folded napkin or doily. 

The ever practical Emily Post simply discounted corn on the cob as suitable food for formal dining.

Food writer and Ladies Home Journal editor Sarah Tyson Rorer, America's first dietitian, proposed more demanding method of scoring each row of kernels and pressing out the content with the teeth, leaving the hulls attached to the cob. The ever practical Emily Post simply discounted corn on the cob as suitable food for formal dining.–From Encyclopedia of Kitchen History by Mary Ellen Snodgrass

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia