James Henry was born in Scott, New York in 1823.  In his twenties, he studied his way through the collegiate hierarchy and by the time he was 30, became a doctor and a well-respected chemist.  We might never have heard of Dr. James had it not been for America’s bloodiest and most divisive conflict, the Civil War.  During the Civil War, Dr. James served as a physician for the Union army.  There was little he could do to help soldiers wounded in battle other than try to repair their damaged and broken bodies.  Dr. James recognized that he was treating more soldiers for diseases than from battle wounds.  According to the National Park Service, more than twice as many Union soldiers died from diseases than from battle.  Most of the soldiers Dr. James treated were suffering from severe diarrhea, which led to dehydration, and often proved fatal.  Now that was a problem that Dr. James thought he could solve by using his background in chemistry.

Dr. James began studying the soldiers’ diet.  At the start of the war, soldiers on both sides were allotted a small ration of pork, bacon, or salt beef, hardtack (hard bread), beans, peas, potatoes, rice, corn, and other available vegetables.  Dr. James concluded that vegetables and starchy foods produced poisons in the digestive system.  He blamed vegetables for a host of illnesses such as heart disease, tuberculosis, mental illness, tumors, and, of course, diarrhea.  Had my younger self known of Dr. James’s conclusions, I certainly would have used them in an attempt to avoid eating my broccoli.  Dr. James believed that the troops suffering from diarrhea could be treated with a diet of coffee and lean chopped beefsteak.  Dr. James claimed that healthy soldiers could avoid getting diarrhea if they utilized the same diet.  Dr. James had a hard time getting military leaders to adopt his diet because of limitations in supplies of meat. 

Following the Civil War, Dr. James continued to encourage people to adopt his diet of coffee and steak.  Contrary to what we might expect in a capitalistic society, Dr. James was not seeking profit.  He shared his recipes openly with anyone who would listen.  His recipes often appeared in newspapers.  His most popular recipe was for his steak, which he suggested should be eaten three times a day.  In 1888, newspapers throughout the country declared that Dr. James’s steak “appears to be giving remarkably good results as a diet for people troubled with weak or disordered digestion, but who require the supporting power of animal food.”  The article shared the manner for preparing the steak as described by a Dr. Hepburn in the Philadelphia Medical and Surgical Reporter.  “The surface of a round steak is chopped with a dull knife, the object being not to cut but to pound the meat.  As the meat pulp comes to the top, it is scraped off, while the tough and fibrous portion gradually reaches the bottom of the trough.  The pulp is then made into cakes and lightly and quickly broiled so as to leave it almost raw inside.”

Today, Dr. James’s dietary work has been largely forgotten with the exception of his steak.  Many of us still eat his steak as his recipe suggested — flavored with onion and other seasonings, then broiled, and covered with thick gravy or brown sauce – though not three times a day as he would have liked.  Perhaps we cancel out the healthy properties of his steak as we consume it with hearty helpings of vegetables.  We still know the steak by his last name, which upon hearing may subconsciously cause your mouth to water.  Now you know how and why Dr. James Henry Salisbury invented the Salisbury Steak. 

Sources:

1.     Manitoba Weekly Free Press, February 19, 1885, p.10.

2.     New York Tribune, August 24, 1905, p.7.

3.     “Civil War Facts: 1861-1865,” National Park Service, NPS.gov, nps.gov/civilwar/facts.htm.