Another Menu

Most of our menus date back to the 1800’s or the earliest decades of the 1900’s, but here is one that is from the mid-1900’s. It’s from the 30th Annual Meeting of the Society of Neurological Surgeons on June 10, 1949 at the Maryland Club.

In searching our archives, I found a paper crumpled and wrapped around a printing die that was used for the cover of a program.

After I un-crumpled it, and found the die inside, I flattened out the paper and discovered another menu.

In the 40 years between the 1909 menu and this one from 1949, things have changed dramatically. Cigars, cigarettes, wine and liquor are all gone. However, the starter of celery and olives remains.

I cleaned up the print from the die so that we could use it for a current meeting of the Neurological Surgeons, held earlier this summer. The turtle is the Maryland Terrapin and the bird is the Johns Hopkins Blue Jay.

I wonder if olives and celery was a MedChi tradition or whether it was common at one point in time?