The Council Room

[DavidAyars]

I can't find any support on teh interwebs for Norm's legendary speech about the dangers of cooking in rusty pans.

First you'll be afraid you're gonna die...
Then you'll be afraid you're not gonna die...

Now, sure, cooking in a pan with food bacteria that's been multiplying since the previous cookout or campout certainly risked a quickstep trot for the pines, so it was important to clean the pans after cooking. But did rust really make a pan unsafe for use?

Rust, I see now on a number of websites, is associated with cast iron cookware that has been scrubbed too briskly (which removes the seasoning), put away wet, or put away with a lid particularly in a humid, outdoor, summer environment. But I see no evidence supporting a connection between rust and gastrointestinal illness. The bigger risk there came from guys not washing their hands after going to the pines. Where was Norm on that hot-button issue?

What you're supposed to do with cast iron cookware is pour in water with a similar temperature and some detergent and gently scrub out all the grease and food particles, then towel dry the cookware, and if you think it may need to be reseasoned (which will be needed if you've scrubbed too harshly or if it was rusty), rub in some oil to season the pan. The oil keeps food from sticking the next time the pan is used. If food sticks in cast iron cookware-- and what potato dish cooked at camp didn't stick to the pan??-- it means the pan needs seasoning. It also means it's more prone to rust. Ah, the circle of life.

I'd call this an urban legend, but it's not even mentioned on urban legend websites. I think Norm was just yanking our chains. This is like finding out that our moms were all wet when it came to not swimming right after eating. Contrary to every mother's nightmare, we were not going to cramp up and drown. Or finding out that our eyes wouldn't really "get stuck" if we goofed around and crossed them, or that we wouldn't permanently mess up our eyesight reading in dim light. I feel so disillusioned.
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Camper: J-8 1965 (Kevin Ryan), J-8 1966 (Mike Freeland), S-6 1967 (Russ Hatch), S-3 1968 (Jeremy Cripps), and JA-2 1969 (Dan Mannis).
JC: J-2 1970 (Bill Bettison) and J-3 1971 (Gene Comella). Councilor 1972, J-5 1973, and JA-1 1974 & 1975

[Robert Vaughan]

Norm's speech was always memorable. I can't remember whether it was the vespers right before the first cookout or at the precamp staff meetings. He spoke in such an interesting and slow style.

I'm sorry Dave that so many things have been disillusioning for you. That's what a great liberal education does for you.

[Mike Freeland]

I don't feel as disillusioned as Dave here. I always wanted my mom to be wrong, just once. If you questioned the veracity of her assertions ("You're not allowed to drink Coke because if you leave a tooth in a glass of Coke overnight, you can stick a fork in it the next day. That's how bad it is for your teeth." or my personal fave: "Bubble gum has ground glass in it".) her unassailable response was something like "You'd be surprised!"

Norm may well have been referring to rust, not bacteria. Who hasn't been whisked off to the doctor for a tetanus booster after having tangled with a rusty nail (not Scotch and Drambui, though I have felt a little tetanus-y after tangling with some of those)? Tetanus was also known as Lockjaw, an otherwise benign disease whose only symptom was that you couldn't open your mouth. Horrible way to die: first you lose a lot of unsightly excess fat, then you die of starvation.

Remember also, Dave, that not all of the pans were cast iron -- I had a couple that were just thin steel (hollow, rolled handle). Those things just couldn't be cured.

I always wished we'd been given raw potatoes, rather than boiled ones. Maybe they'd take too long to cook, but I doubt it. Also, hot dogs would have been SO much easier than hamburger patties (didja ever see how Phil made those things? He used an ice cream scoop to measure gobs of meat onto rolled-out waxed paper, on one of the big kitchen tables, then covered them all with another run of waxed paper, and finally,slammed each gob with a can of fruit juice, making all those perfectly round patties).

Talk about dangerous! Raw meat, probably not always cooked to perfection over a balky open fire? I swear all those poisonings with raw hamburger are new to our era. Those bacteria didn't exist in the 60s. It was the rust.
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'56-C-9 C. Mosher '57-C-9 Bill Feaster
'58-J-14 H. Peavy '59-J-11 G. Wood, C. Duncan
'60-S-8 R. Leavitt, D. Hemphill '61-S-1 E. Slocum
'62-JA-1 H. Dunbar '63-C-2 (JC)
'64-C-5, (JC) Councilor
'65-C-9 '66 - '72-J-8
'73-JA1 '75-J-6