The Business of Bees

“On December 5, 1621, the Council of the Virginia Company in London wrote a letter noting they had sent "beehives" along with other provisions to the Jamestown colony. Three ships could have carried the cargo - the Discovery, the Bona Nova, and the Hopewell - and by early 1622, European honeybees had arrived on the North American continent for what would turn out to be a permanent stay.” apiaryproject.com

These immigrant bees pollinated the new colonial crops such as squash, berries, apples and peaches. Their hives provided honey used as a food sweetener and meat preserver.

Early in the Virginia Colony’s development, sugar was considered a luxury item by the British and was heavily taxed. After the Revolutionary War and into the 1800s the bee’s nectar, honey, became a natural domestic sweetener in baking porridges and cooking in general. Honey had medicinal purposes also. It was mixed with herbs and turned into salves to apply topically to sores, cuts and burns because it was naturally antibacterial and helped in the healing process. It was also good for coughs and colds and sore throats.

It was the main ingredient in Mead; an alcoholic beverage made from the honey that is fermented and then mixed with water and yeast. It's often referred to as honey wine and can be brewed with adding fruit such as apples or apple juice too.

But more importantly these new bees brought to America made beeswax, which was used for leather working, gunsmithing, metal casting, and window and oil cloth production. It helped to waterproof clothing, military gear and wood and was also used as a furniture polish.

Beeswax created candles that produced a bright clean flame, a sweet honey scent, and very little smoke. Compared to tallow candles made from animal fat which produced smokey and foul-smelling candles, they were the light of choice.

The 1840 United States Census (the sixth one for the nation) recorded for the first time pounds of beeswax as an agricultural product in its listings. Middlesex County was tallied at 932 lbs.

The 1850 census agricultural product list had beeswax and honey combined together for 880 pounds.