Quilt History Tidbits -- Old & Newly Discovered

Florence M. La Ganke was born May 2, 1886, daughter of Robert F. and Lily J. (Green) La Ganke of Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio.  She married Fred Harris about 1923 (some believe that Florence first married a Mr. Poor but evidence has not been discovered).

From early in her career, Florence believed that cookery was an art, but cooking was a drudgery.  She was hired by the Oakland, California, school system in 1919 and introduced to the Oakland community in the Oakland (CA) Tribune, August 22, 1919:

New Teacher in Local Schools
  Miss Florence M. La Ganke, instructor in the foods and cookery department of the Columbia University, New York City, has been elected by the Oakland board of education as the new director of the home economics department in the Oakland public schools.
  Superintendent of Schools Fred M. Hunter, during his recent visit to New York City, discovered Miss La Ganke teaching during the summer session at teachers' college of Columbia university and succeeded in persuading her to accept the directorship and supervision of the home economics, domestic art and science departments of the Oakland schools.
Dietitian in Hospitals
  Miss La Ganke has been dietitian of large hospitals, has directed immense school cafeterias, has managed university dining rooms and has a broad experience in organization of schools, outlining courses and in teaching all of the subjects included in the home economics work of a large school system.
  Miss Florence M. La Ganke is a native of Ohio.  Her early education was obtained in the public schools of Cleveland.  After a tour of Europe, Miss La Ganke entered upon her study of home economics at Pratt Institute, but at the conclusion of her first year's work she decided to complete her training at teachers' college.
  As dietitian of St. Luke's hospital, Cleveland, Miss La Ganke received her first experience in practical home economics work.  Following her two years at St. Luke's, she was invited to return to New York to take charge of the Horace Mann cafeteria, a work sufficiently onerous in itself, since it involved the preparation of seven hundred and fifty meals per day.  Miss La Ganke's propensity for big undertakings, however, admitted of her taking charge of the Whittier Hall dining room during the summer session of 1913.
Teaches in Cleveland.
  It was a fitting endorsement of Miss La Ganke's service at Horace Mann and Whittier Hall in New York City that she was offered the instructorship in home economics at the college for women, Western Reserve University, Cleveland.  In this capacity Miss La Ganke did the pioneer work in organizing classes, installing a students' cafeteria, college tea room, and ultimately conducting the dining room of the Flora Mather House dormitory.  As a purely philanthropic venture, Miss La Ganke undertook to transmute into first class chefs a group of boys in a night class of one of Cleveland's settlement houses.
  During the past year and a half Miss La Ganke has been at teachers' college, Columbia University, New York City.  She has responded to the appeal of the foods and cookery and also the household administration department by conducting classes in institutional management, marketing and large quantity cookery.
  Miss La Ganke, the new home economics supervisor of the Oakland schools, has arrived and will take up her duties at the opening of the schools next Monday, August 25.  (NewspaperArchive.com)

For reasons that weren't fully explained in the Oakland newspapers, Florence apparently ruffled a few feathers, accused of "'spreading propaganda against the economy and efficiency program of the school department.'"  She had the full support of the State Home Economics Association, Bay section, that adopted resolutions to that effect.  Although the charges never came to fruition, she returned to Cleveland in 1922 but not before being honored with a tea given by the women members of the supervisory department of the Oakland public schools.

The Nancy Page Daily Household Column