This summer Fort Ticonderoga is introducing a new and exciting foodway initiative entitled Chocolate: The Taste of Liberty. This initiative is based on extensive research led by the Fort Ticonderoga museum curatorial and interpretive staff and highlights the very real, important, and often little understood role that chocolate played in 18th-century military society. This fascinating (and tasty!) story is featured in daily programming and special student and teacher education. In addition, a new recreated 1776 market on the very ground where the market historically stood offers guests the opportunity to purchase chocolate just as the soldiers did while fighting for liberty at Ticonderoga.

Chocolate: The Taste of Liberty is funded in part by a Mars, Incorporated Chocolate History Grant for Research, Development and Investigative Studies. To learn more about this initiative and other programs offered daily visit www.FortTiconderoga.org.

“The goal of this new initiative is to provide greater depth to Fort Ticonderoga’s well-established foodways program,” said Beth Hill, President and CEO. “The living history program experience presented in 2014 focuses on life at Ticonderoga in the year 1776. Building upon research compiled by Fort Ticonderoga museum staff and published in the Colonial Chocolate Society’s ground-breaking work, Chocolate History, Culture and Heritage (John Wiley & Sons, 2009), as well as research that has been conducted by Fort staff in more recent years, Fort Ticonderoga has launched this new initiative to provide its guests with an authentic chocolate experience and give meaningful context to the consumption of chocolate by American forces at Ticonderoga in the American Revolution.”

“Fort Ticonderoga’s approach to interpreting its chocolate history is rooted in the realities of how chocolate was used at the site,” said Stuart Lilie, Director of Interpretation. “Evidence in the museum’s extensive archival collections shows that chocolate came to Ticonderoga in solid “cake” form – just the way it left the mills in New England and New York where it was produced. It was available to soldiers through a variety of different means. Sutlers (merchants to sell alcohol and related foods to soldiers) present at Ticonderoga list in their account books the regular sale of chocolate to soldiers in cake form for 3 shillings per pound. Provision inventories at Ticonderoga in 1776 include among other things ‘800 pounds of Chocolate.’ Commissaries write of the importance of the chocolate in nourishing the sick in the hospitals and chocolate supplies are often specifically earmarked for use in the hospitals.”

Each year Fort Ticonderoga highlights a specific moment in time –a specific year and regiment that served at Ticonderoga. In doing so, Fort Ticonderoga has become the only site in the world to take this unique and defining approach, which allows for staff to faithfully research a topic, develop the associated reproduction material culture, and present a dynamic and innovative living history program each year to its guests. The annual seasonal narrative informs interpretive activities such as fatigue duty, gardening, foodways, and trades.

The outcome of this revolutionary approach has resulted in significant growth in new marketing opportunities (each year is new at Fort Ticonderoga!), increased and repeat attendance, and a 54% growth in Friends membership to Fort Ticonderoga since 2011.

About Mars, Incorporated

In 1911, Frank C. Mars made the first Mars candies in his Tacoma, Washington kitchen and established Mars’ first roots as a confectionery company.  In the 1920s, Forrest E. Mars, Sr. joined his father in business and together they launched the MILKY WAY® bar. In 1932, Forrest, Sr. moved to the United Kingdom with a dream of  building a business based on the objective of creating a “mutuality of benefits for all stakeholders” – this objective serves as the foundation of Mars, Incorporated today. Based in McLean, Virginia, Mars has net sales of more than $33 billion, six business segments including Petcare, Chocolate, Wrigley, Food, Drinks, Symbioscience, and more than 72,000 Associates worldwide that are putting its Principles into action to make a difference for people and the planet through its performance.

For more information, please visit www.mars.com.

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