40 Terrifying Vintage Recipes From 1973 McCall’s Great American Recipe Card Collection

McCall’s was a monthly American women’s magazine that enjoyed great popularity through much of the 20th century, peaking at a readership of 8.4 million in the early 1960s. From 1973 through the early 1980s, the magazine created the Great American Recipe Card Collection “capturing the spirit of America through its recipes” by bringing “together the famous dishes… from the 50 states.” It was created by the editors of McCall’s and Random House.

The collection consisted of a plastic recipe card case featuring a bald eagle behind a red, white and blue shield surround by a plentiful food bounty. There are twenty four sections that each had twenty four recipe cards which became 600 cards in total. On each section divider card there is the title of the section, a little illustration pertaining to the theme in the top right corner, a full color photo on the front while on the back was a little blurb about the section’s theme. Lastly there was an index booklet that had a quick reference for all the recipes in the collection. These were available starting in 1973 all the way through the early 1980s.

There were two ways to obtain this collection. The first was to send the card found in the newspaper and McCall’s magazine to Random House. In return you would get the Bicentennial recipe card case, the 24 divider cards and the first set of twenty four cards called “Our Rich Heritage” for a free 14 day trial examination. If you liked the card and wanted to keep going, then you would pay one dollar for the initial set and then get sent the rest of the cards one by one and eventually in small groups at a charge of one dollar per set.

The second way was through your local grocery store. There would be a display of these cards and once a week another set would be added. The recipe card case came free with the purchase of the first set and the dividers came free with the second set. Again each card sets were one dollar each and by the end one would have paid $24 for the whole set.