Early cooking in Ellicott City

From hearth cooking 250 years ago to cookstoves, from beehive bake ovens to Reip ovens to ovens in the cookstoves, there were many changes in cooking during Ellicott City's first one hundred years. EC was the home of the first Maryland cookbook author, and another woman author had a successful 1873 fundraising cookbook.

Hickory Ridge in Highland with Reip wall oven

The country home of Nicholas Greenberry Ridgely in Highland (Rt 108 between Ellicott City and Sandy Spring) was built in 1749 with an addition in the early 1800s.  It was later bought by Samuel Hopkins (nephew of Johns Hopkins) and renamed "White Hall."

Reip Bake Oven and Roaster, 1825 patent

A Reip metal wall oven still exists in a privately owned historic home, Hickory Ridge, in Howard County.  Elizabeth Ellicott Lea, daughter George Ellicott, had the Baltimore oven in her Sandy Spring home. Henry Reip obtained a patent for a 'Bake Oven and Roaster' in 1825, which he and his sons manufactured and sold for about forty years.  The oval oven, left, now at Hampton NHS (the birthplace of the wife of Gov. George Howard of Waverly) was made by the eldest son, Alfred Reip.

If you have an old home with a metal oven... keep it intact!  If you try to use it, do not make it too hot (not meant for pizza) or it will warp. Contact me with any questions.