Family:Daniel Gunn and Esther King (1)

Very few utensiles were available for cooking. In some households the most expensive objects were the pots and kettles. The only items for cooking owned by Esther Gunn in 1763 were an iron skillet and two iron pots, [Berkshire couty Probate Records, Daniel Gunn Jr. inventory 772.]

"The wills that accompanied the inventories showed a well-defined pattern of estate distribution. Land almost always went to sons; household goods were bequeathed to daughters; a lifetime support went to widows, at least until they remarried." [Miller, James R. "Early Life in Sheffield" p 67.]

At the time some families tilled as few as one or two acres of land, their remaining acreage being typically divided among wood lots, orchards, hay fields, pastures and kitchen gardens. Daniel and Esther's farm of 88 acres exemplified this division of land usage with 20 of them in grains and the remaining given over to the other uses just mentioned." [Millier, James R. "Early Life in Sheffield", Sheffield Historical Society, 2002, pg 15. Citing from Gunn family file, estate inventory of Daniel Gunn, by Bettye Hobbs Pruitt, ed. "The Massachusetts Tax Valuation LIst of 1771", pp 472-79.] --Gunnj 09:37, 6 September 2009 (EDT)