3: Fannie Merritt Farmer.

This chapter details the life of Fannie Merritt Farmer, the inventor of the modern-day cookbook. Fannie Farmer was born on March 23, 1857 in Boston, Massachusetts, the eldest of four girls born to John Franklin Farmer and Mary Watson Merritt Farmer. At 16, however, Fannie's life changed. She had just graduated from high school and was planning to go to college when she was struck by polio which crippled her left leg. Years later, when she approached the publishers with her Boston Cooking School Cook Book, they were so skeptical about the exact measurements format she introduced that they insisted she pay the production costs. After eight years at the Boston Cooking School, she resigned to open her own Miss Farmer's School of Cookery. Fannie Farmer died in Boston on January 15, 1915, at the age of 58, a household name known to millions of grateful brides, bachelors, and anyone else who has ever had to prepare a dish from a printed recipe.