SOAP-MAKING IN THE 1800's by E. Ayers

I love when I start a new story, especially when the little acorn forms and the story can’t leap from my fingers fast enough. I’m feeling that way about my newest manuscript. I’ve spent most of 2020 working on contemporary stories, which I love writing. I finished another Wedding Vow book and a third Mariner’s Cove novel. And several other novellas. I’ve also taken a few online classes this past year, so I’m finally back to writing historical. Switching between the two genres forced me to do a mental one eighty. I just kept thinking I didn’t have a story to write. It was only a fuzzy idea that wasn’t congealing. Nothing was coming, not even the tiniest bubble of a story – characters and names I had, but no meat. Then the story slowly came together, and this new story has my creative juices flowing. It’s the first story of a new set of historical novels.

A good portion of this story takes place not far from Richmond, Virginia in the 1880’s. Mrs. Satterlee is the widow of a senator, she has two grown children, and a mother living not far away. Her best friend’s son as has gone west and now he wants a bride. The two mothers set up their children for matrimony, but the matchmaking won’t end there.

Here’s the really fun part of it for the readers, I’m going to give it away free! Because this story will set up my new series. It’s a prequel, and a foundation for the series that will be about various couples being matched by Mrs. Satterlee.

As you know, I love bringing all sorts of life into my stories. I want my readers to see how people lived in 1885. And this story has lots of real life tucked into it.

The hero got his education at William and Mary, and my young heroine started college but returned home when her father took sick. After her father’s death, she has no desire to go back to school. My hero is a schoolteacher during the week, and the preacher on Sundays. His father is a successful minister of a church. He wanted his son to follow in his footsteps.

Former Senator Satterlee had a great deal of influence on my young hero. My hero’s goals since living in the Territory of Wyoming in a budding railroad town are making him realize he has bigger goals than teaching a handful of students and preaching on Sundays.

My research for this novel has been crazy. I’m driving my local friends nuts because I get excited. Then I’m sharing all this crazy research with them.

Mrs. Satterlee isn’t some old stodgy woman. In today’s world, she’s considered a young
widow. She also has money, and as long as she does nothing stupid, she’s financially fine. Facing an empty nest, she opens a store and sells soap.

I’m having so much fun just with the soaps.

Did you know that one of the oldest and continuous companies in America is a soapery? They were started in 1752 and still going strong. Honestly, I’ve heard of them, but I have no memory of ever using any of their soaps. I’ve got to order from them!

https://www.caswellmassey.com/

A local friend asked if I’d ever made soap, and the answer is yes. I was a kid at the time, and I’m thinking it was some sort of project, maybe for Scouts or something. And we made our own lye. My memory of that soap wasn’t so great. Seems it “pulled apart” when it got wet, and I never liked the smell.

Today, we can buy wonderful homemade soaps from local crafters. The recipes are amazing, and the various types of soaps people can make far exceed those pitiful bars my pack of friends made as children.

Today, more people are looking at what chemicals we put on our skin and down the drains. There’s a shift to more natural products. With the pandemic, we’ve all spent too much time wiping and washing. And if it’s winter where you are, you know how quickly hands can chap. Put a puddle of hand sanitizer on chapped hands… Ouch! These “homemade” soaps are natural and eco-friendly.

Now back to my new manuscript. The mother, daughter (heroine), and Ruth make the soaps. So my readers will not only see how these women live, but they will get a glimpse of soap making. (And a glimpse of old stoves and how they functioned.) And I’m hoping to include some recipes for soaps. Recipes for today, but also the old process. Do you really want to mess around with a big bucket of hardwood ashes when you can buy a bag of lye meant for making soap? Okay, I’ll agree. It’s fun and interesting to do it the “old way” just to prove you can do it.

It’s a little like buying raw milk and making your own butter. You get to say that you’ve done it. But who wants to make their own butter when you can easily buy it? Yes, I’ve made butter from cream just to learn how to do it and to enjoy the experience.

For this book, I’m connecting with soap makers so that I can bring a very realistic look at making soaps.

I just might make a batch this spring. Maybe cucumber and dill for the kitchen. Something sweet for the bath.

A friend gave me a bar of soap she made. It smelled so good I didn’t use it as soap, I laid it in a bowl on my mantel. That wonderful scent filled the room better than anything else. Then I finally broke down and used it for the bath. It still smelled delicious.

I’ll keep you all up to date as I progress through this book, because I'm having so much fun writing it!