Belle McDonald was born October 6, 1874, to Richard and Mary Harris McDonald. The McDonalds traveled from Missouri by wagon train to Montana, staying briefly in Virginia City, Montana, prior to settling in Bozeman, Montana. The couple had four sons who did not survive to adulthood as well as three daughters: Belle, Mollie, and Melissa. Belle McDonald died February 22, 1950.
Of the three McDonald daughters, only Mollie married and had two children. Mollie was the first African American child born in the Gallatin Valley. She had a son, Richard, and a daughter, Belle. Belle McDonald Ward Fisher was born April 7, 1905. Over the course of her life Belle lived in Butte as well as the McDonald home, one of Bozeman's oldest residences, which was built on the family's homestead site. Belle McDonald Ward Fisher died February 9, 2000.
The women in the McDonald family were known for their cooking. Mollie served as the head cook for 20 years at then Montana State College's Hamilton Hall (now Montana State Univeristy). The
The Belle McDonald manuscript cookbook contains handwritten entries for various recipes created or collected by McDonald. The book was designed to house handwritten recipes, with a handcolored cardboard covered entitled "Recipes" and depicting a steaming chafing dish, a spoon, and a woman in an apron holding a book. The title page is headed "Recipes: Worth While" and there are labelled for a variety of different types of recipes. McDonald has used the sections for bread, soups, meats, salads, and cakes, with the bread and cake sections filled with recipes. Breads includes several types of loaf bread as well as waffles, pancakes, gems and muffins, and biscuits. The cakes section also includes recipes for several types of cookes as well as pastries such as doughnuts and cream puffs. Recipes under salads are salad dressings. Many of the recipes consist solely of ingredients and amounts, with only occasional brief instructions included. There are several loose pages inserted in the back of the book consisting of additional handwritten recipes as well as small printed brochures or clippings of recipes. Also included in the collection is a 1938 Retailer's Edition of
This collection is open for research.
Original cookbook and magazine compiled by the McDonald family and later gifted to Robert and Joanna Nute of Bozeman, Montana, who donated the items to Montana State University in August 2018.
This collection was processed 2018 August 23
[Creator Name], [Date of Creation], [Brief Description of Object], Folder [#], Box [#], [Collection Name], [Collection #], Montana State University (MSU) Library, Bozeman, MT