Terms of use and copyright
The book texts
The chapters, recipes, prefaces and contents pages on this site come from books first published between 1825 and 1922. They are in the public domain in the United States. You may read, quote, copy, print and reuse them for any purpose, commercial or not, without asking. If you live outside the United States, check your own country’s rules. Many countries count from the author’s death rather than the date of publication, and a few of the authors here lived for decades after their books came out; Frederick Frye Rockwell, whose Save It for Winter appeared in 1918, died in 1976.
Illustrations
The engravings and photographs shown with chapters were printed in the same books and share their public-domain status. The cover images on book pages are photographs of the original title pages or bindings.
Our own writing
The shelf notes, author notes, reading guides, page design and site code are our work. You are welcome to quote them with a link back to the page you quoted. Please do not republish them whole.
No advice
Old cookbooks, canning manuals, veterinary handbooks and medical texts are published here as historical documents. Their methods have not been checked against current food-safety, veterinary or medical standards. Use them for reading and research, and follow current guidance for anything you eat, preserve, feed or treat.
Links to other sites
Book pages link to full scans and ebooks held by other libraries, such as Project Gutenberg, the Internet Archive and HathiTrust. Those sites have their own terms.
Last revised October 18, 2026.