Celebrating All Things Chocolate By Donna Schlachter -- with Giveaway

Photo by Loannes Marc from Pexels

October 28th is the day Americans celebrate chocolate, and it’s one of the few that also have an International or World Day of its own—December 28th or July 7th, depending on which source you follow. Regardless, chocolate is America’s favorite flavor, so let’s talk more about it. Read all the way through to learn how to win a free e-book of Testing Tessa, book 1 in “Healing the Wounded Heart” series.

Chocolate has been consumed for at least 3,000 years, and grows primarily in Mexico, Central America, and northern South America. Documentation dates to around 1100 BC.

How and why the first person ever ate the bean that chocolate comes from is a mystery, since it’s intense and bitter. In fact, the bean must be fermented to develop the flavor, then dried, cleaned, and roasted. Seems like a lot of work for whoever did it first, particularly since there was no guarantee they’d come up with something edible.

However, we are glad they persisted, because once the roasted bean is ground into a powder and combined with enough sugar, milk, butter, and other ingredients, then it becomes not only edible but delicious.

Photo by Polina Tankilevitch from Pexels

As any chocolate aficionado will attest, there are different kinds of chocolate, and we each have our own preference. Unsweetened is good for baking or making cocoa from scratch. Semi-sweet adds just the right touch of flavor to baked goods like cookies and breads. Milk chocolate is, of course, for eating. And white chocolate actually doesn’t contain any cocoa solids. Some argue it is merely sugar in disguise.

Photo by Polina Tankilevitch from Pexels

 

Regardless of your taste preference, there is no dissension for celebrating the Day. You might choose to visit your favorite restaurant and indulge your sweet tooth in an exquisite chocolate creation. Maybe you prefer to bake. If so, invite some friends over and enjoy one of the recipes listed below. You could promote your favorite kind of chocolate on social media using #NationalChocolateDay, or check out the myriad of posts about this topic.

 

https://www.food.com/recipe/chocolate-lasagna-502197

 

It’s probably no surprise that the National Confectioners Association created National Chocolate Day, but I’m sure it was in response to consumer demand. Or a desire to sell more chocolate. Or both.

https://www.pexels.com/photo/architecture-art-clouds-landmark-290386/

Also, not surprisingly, other good things happened throughout history on this special date. For example, in 1886, the Statue of Liberty was dedicated; in 1919 prohibition passed, and in 1954 author Ernest Hemingway won the Nobel Prize in Literature for The Old Man and the Sea.

Enjoying your birthday on this date is second only to dressing up and begging for candy from neighbors (Halloween, of course, my birthday😊). Several notable figures from history set the fun precedence for October 28th, including Remington in 1816, Auguste Escoffier in 1846, Edith Head in 1897, and Jonas Salk in 1914. If any on this esteemed list are strangers, feel free to check them out.

Thanks for joining me on one of my favorite days of the year. Kinda like barbeque, chocolate is one of those foods you need to wear on the inside and the outside. Go for it!

Photo by cottonbro from Pexels

 

Giveaway: Leave a comment about your favorite kind of chocolate or favorite treat, and I’ll draw randomly for an ebook copy of Testing Tessa. Don’t forget to leave your email address so I can contact you if you are the winner. Use the format: donna AT historythrutheages DOT com so those pesky robots can’t track you or spam you.

About Testing Tessa:

 

In 1868, Tessa, a Mennonite nurse graduates from nursing school and is assigned to the Amana Colonies in Iowa because of her expertise in treating asthma and other breathing problems. As a former student at a women's medical school, she knows more than most about respiratory diseases. She's also had her fair share of heartbreak when, upon her mentor's death, she was forced to abandon her dream of becoming a doctor. Will she be able to use her skills? Or will her gender keep her from helping those who truly need her?

Seth, a widower in Amana, is still nursing a broken heart from his sweetheart's passing two years before. Now raising their invalid son Seth on his own, he wonders why God didn't listen to his prayers for healing for his family. Caleb has been afflicted with the same form of asthma that killed Anna, and Seth stands by helplessly as his son fades away. Can he trust God and trust medicine, or is faith in one mutually exclusive of faith in the other?

About Donna:

 

Donna writes historical suspense under her own name, and contemporary suspense under her alter ego of Leeann Betts, and has been published more than 40 times in novellas, full-length novels, and non-fiction books. She is a member of several writing communities; facilitates a critique group; teaches writing classes; ghostwrites; edits; blogs regularly; and judges in writing contests.

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Etsy online shop of original artwork: https://www.etsy.com/shop/Dare2DreamUS

Resources:

https://nationaldaycalendar.com/national-chocolate-day-october-28/

No Bake Chocolate Oat Bars: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/10602/no-bake-chocolate-oat-bars/?evt19=1

Chocolate Lasagna: https://www.food.com/recipe/chocolate-lasagna-502197

A History of Type

By Kathy Kovach

What can one say about typewriters? Plenty since they were invented in the 18th century. Over the years the typewriter evolved, eventually morphing into the computer keyboard we know today.

In 1714, English inventor Henry Mill worked at the New River Water Works Company as Engineer-in-Chief. He patented a machine made for "impressing writing on parchment." Alas, no illustrations or models of this first typewriter exist. For whatever reason, Mill never developed it. Following is the wording of the original patent:

One hundred and fifty years later, in 1865, Danish inventor Rev. Rasmus Malling-Hansen came up with a version of a typewriter that doesn't look like the model which has became popular over the centuries. It's known as the Hansen Writing Ball. Although Malling-Hansen made improvements and won first prize in two world exhibitions, his invention nearly disappeared from annals of history.

A mere three years later, American Christopher Latham Sholes went on to produce fifty machines but failed to sell them. He took his idea to gun manufacturer Philo Remington and sold the production rights. A year later, the first typewriter was made available by E. Remington & Sons, and another year saw an upgrade featuring both upper and lower case letters. It was named the Remington 2. Sholes was dubbed "The Father of the Typewriter" despite the efforts of those before him.

After another decade, John Thomas Underwood, a competitor of Remington's, bought the rights from inventor Franz Xavior Wagner for a more practical "front

stroke" machine. The US Navy ordered 250 Underwood typewriters, and their popularity soared. By 1915, Underwood employed 7,500 workers and produced 500 typewriters daily.

Sholes had originally intended the machine to print page numbers on books, but it was lawyer and inventor Carlos Glidden who suggested adding letters. At first, the letters were laid out alphabetically, but consumers complained of keys sticking. If you'll recall, the keys were wire rods that struck the paper when pressed. Common letters like "a" and "e" would often tangle and slow down the process. Glidden suggested moving letters around for more proficiency, and thus, the QWERTY keyboard was born, named so for the first six letters on the top row.

Here are some fun facts:

• Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer was the first novel written on a typewriter.
• The word "qwertyuiop" now appears in the Oxford English dictionary.
• Sholes had expressed the thought that a typewriter could help women enter the workplace, replacing male clerks. Way to go, Christopher!

Another fun fact includes an actor popular today, Tom Hanks. A passionate collector of typewriters, Hanks professes to have owned hundreds in his lifetime. He started collecting at age nineteen and is still vocal about the importance of vintage and modern typewriters. So passionate, in fact, he has published a collection of short stories entitled Uncommon Type: Some Stories, centered around the typewriter and its impact on his life. Disclaimer: I read the first story and it's rated...um...shall we say TVMA? Proceed with caution. However, the following two links should be safe. He shares his love of these machines with enthusiasm and humor.

Tom Hanks, typewriter enthusiast - YouTube

Tom Hanks: Uncommon Type [CC] - YouTube

As I type on my computer, I recall the days of tapping away on my first Royal Typewriter when I was a child. I upgraded through the years, moving on to an IBM Selectric with the font ball that reminds me of the Hansen Writing Ball. Then on to a word processor which showed four lines of type before one committed it to paper. Like magic! 

Then the computer. First DOS, where I had to put in code when I wanted it to shift, tab, or return. And then, FINALLY, Word was invented. I have joked I couldn't become a writer until Bill Gates created Microsoft. That being said, there's something to typing on a vintage machine. Hearing the clacks of the keys and the ding of the return carriage, the ratcheting of the rubber platen and the stinging paper cut when I yanked the paper out. 

In my book, Titanic: Legacy of Betrayal, one of the characters needs to write a memoir, a confession of sorts. She has severe arthritis and doesn't want to dictate her deepest, darkest secrets to another person. Find out how she by-stepped the typewriter and communicated with others a century later.

Titanic: Legacy of Betrayal

A secret. A key. Much was buried on the Titanic, but now it's time for resurrection.

Follow two intertwining stories a century apart. 1912 - Matriarch Olive Stanford protects a secret after boarding the Titanic that must go to her grave. 2012 - Portland real estate agent Ember Keaton-Jones receives the key that will unlock the mystery of her past... and her distrusting heart.

To buy: Amazon

Kathleen E. Kovach is a Christian romance author published traditionally through Barbour Publishing, Inc. as well as indie. Kathleen and her husband, Jim, raised two sons while living the nomadic lifestyle for over twenty years in the Air Force. Now planted in northeast Colorado, she's a grandmother, though much too young for that. Kathleen is a longstanding member of American Christian Fiction Writers. An award-winning author, she presents spiritual truths with a giggle, proving herself as one of God's peculiar people.

Website
Blog With A Giggle
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If the Need Arose

 

When I was a preteen, my father bought me a lever-action .22 rifle and taught me how to use it. I didn’t have much occasion to do so, but he believed I needed to know. Dad seemed to have a little of the Old West in his veins and wanted his women-folk to be capable of doing what was required if the need arose.

Now I write historical fiction about women just like that. Hmm.

I haven’t yet written about crack-shot Phoebe Ann Moses, but I do have two cats named Annie and Oakley. And I have an old Leanin’ Tree birthday card with an untitled Fred Fellows painting of an aproned woman standing on the wide prairie. She’s holding a bouquet of flowers in one hand and her horse’s reins in the other. A Henry rifle hangs off the saddle horn.

“Prairie Garden” by Fred Fellows
http://www.fellowsstudios.com/gallery-fred/prairie-garden.html

I’ve kept that birthday card for more than twenty years because of what the picture says about pioneer women of the plains and Old West: There wasn’t much they couldn’t handle if the need arose.

My childhood .22 vanished years ago, but I have Dad’s trusty shotgun which is great for scaring off coyotes. A distant double-barrel cousin of the old standby made a cameo appearance in one of my novellas about a young widow and her two small children.

But it’s a double-barrel of a different sort that has piqued my interest lately. One that is not quite so bulky and fits discreetly in the folds of a lady’s skirt—a compact Remington double derringer smaller than a woman’s hand.

Nederlands: Een 4de Generatie over-under Remington Derringer in .41 

randvuur Southpaw Dutch Wikipedia/commons

Concealed carry is nothing new, and Henry Deringer of Philadelphia offered his first single-shot, muzzle-loading, miniature power-packed pistol in 1852. Often called a pocket pistol, the popularity of the original Philadelphia Deringer eventually gave way to the double barrel .41 Rimfire Remington Model 95.

From The Look of the Old West by William Foster-Harris,
illustrated by Evelyn Curro, Skyhorse Publishing, 2007.

Remington wasn’t the only company to pilfer Henry’s label, and competitors added an “r” to the well-known name to keep ol' Henry at bay. However the Remington model quickly became synonymous with “derringer.”

Cold-eyed, nimble-fingered gamblers weren’t the only people in the Old West carrying a holdout or concealed weapon, and derringers showed up in the cuffs and vest pockets of men on both sides of the law.

They also showed up in the reticules, boots, and garters of ladies bearing equally contrasting reputations.

With its signature hook handle, the derringer had a fairly accurate range of between fifteen and twenty feet. Up close, it could do serious damage.

One could be had for about eight dollars, ten if the owner wanted to fancy things up with a pearl or ivory stock or engraving.

Western film buffs easily identify the snappy little weapon that was scattered across screens and pages of Western lore, becoming one of the most widely recognized American handguns.

James West, the fictional Secret Service agent in Hollywood’s The Wild Wild West sported a Remington double derringer as a sleeve gun (or dismantled inside the hollow heels of his boots), and Miss Kitty Russell from television’s Gun Smoke had no qualms about drawing a well-concealed derringer if necessary.

The Remington derringer also fit nicely into the hands of my character Elizabeth (Betsy) Parker in An Unexpected Redemption. In fact, she had two Remingtons: one with bullets and one with keys. But that’s a story for another time.

As a woman on her own, Betsy had good reason to be proactive regarding her safety, but she didn’t hesitate to use it in defense of others:

She dashed down the narrow stairway, counting the steps so she didn’t tumble off at the bottom, and ran into her room, where she threw open her trunk. After tossing clothing onto the floor, she opened the secret compartment, loaded her Remington derringer, and slipped it into her skirt pocket.

It was no Winchester rifle, nor would it hold a candle to Garrett’s Colt, but in a tight spot, the double-barreled derringer could be the difference between dead or alive.

However, the derringer, left casually in a desk drawer, almost marked that very difference in Betsy:

The mantle clock’s ticking drowned out his future brother-in-law’s voice as Garrett planned a discreet exit. But a thud from upstairs and breaking glass sent him running from the room.

Lamp-oil fumes met him on the landing.

He kicked in Betsy’s door. With a hungry rush, flames followed the path of spilled oil and leaped up the window curtains. Garrett jerked them off the wall, yanked the quilt from the bed, and smothered the fire. Water from the basin and pitcher soaked the smoking mound, and he stomped it into submission. Only then did he sense he was not alone.

Betsy stood in the corner near the door, eyes wide, hands gripping a man’s arm clamped across her throat.

Garrett slapped his right hip—and found nothing. His gun and holster were in his room.

A double-barrel derringer pressed into Betsy’s right temple, held steady by the hand of Anthony Rochester. He laughed. “Unprepared, are you, cowboy?”

Garrett’s hands balled into fists and he took a step forward.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Elizabeth’s Remington is closer to her pretty curls than you are to me.”

Thank goodness, many a woman has been capable of doing what was required when the need arose.

Wife and mother of professional rodeo bullfighters, Davalynn Spencer writes Western romance. She is a Publisher's Weekly bestselling author and winner of the Will Rogers Medallion for Inspirational Western Fiction. Connect with her at https://www.davalynnspencer.com/.

Desperate to redeem her reputation and independence, runaway Betsy Parker returns home to face her toughest critics—the people she grew up with, a rugged lawman who threatens to steal her heart, and the one person unwilling to forgive her.