Editing Joy of Cooking (section)

== Background ==
{{Main|Irma S. Rombauer}}Born to German immigrants in 1877, [[Irma S. Rombauer|Irma Starkloff]] was born and grew up in [[St. Louis, Missouri]]. She married Edgar Rombauer, a lawyer, in 1899. Edgar committed suicide in 1930 after a severe bout of depression, widowing Irma at age 52 and leaving her with $6,000 in savings.{{Citation needed|date=February 2021}}

Rombauer's children, [[Marion Rombauer Becker]] and Edgar Roderick ("Put") Rombauer, Jr.,<ref>{{cite news|work=Literary Saint Louis: A Guide|date=2000|author1=Cuoco, Lorin |author2=Gass, William H. |isbn=1883982359|title=Irma Rombauer (October 30, 1877-October 14, 1962)|page=112|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=U3NeD7XVvXgC&q=edgar+roderick+put&pg=PA112|access-date=October 26, 2020|archive-date=May 27, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210527160941/https://books.google.com/books?id=U3NeD7XVvXgC&q=edgar+roderick+put&pg=PA112|url-status=live}}</ref> encouraged her to compile her recipes and thoughts on cooking to help her cope with her loss. Rombauer spent much of the summer of 1930 in Michigan, creating the first drafts that would later become ''Joy of Cooking''. With the help of her late husband's secretary, Mazie Whyte, Rombauer began writing and editing recipes and commentaries while searching for more recipes in St. Louis. During the autumn of 1930, Rombauer went to the A.C. Clayton Printing Company, a printer for the St. Louis shoe manufacturers. She paid them $3,000 to print 3,000 copies of ''The Joy of Cooking: A Compilation of Reliable Recipes with a Casual Culinary Chat'' in November 1931.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Stand Facing the Stove|last=Mendelson|first=Anne|publisher=Henry Holt and Company|year=1996|isbn=0805029044|location=New York|pages=[https://archive.org/details/standfacingstove00mend/page/85 85–87]|url=https://archive.org/details/standfacingstove00mend/page/85}}</ref>