Between 1861 and 1865, Eastman Johnson visited his home-town of Fryeburg, Maine, where, as a reprieve from his Civil War subjects, he recorded the activities associated with the maple sugar harvest. The symbolism of New England sugaring reflected the artist’s abolitionist views. While enslaved people produced white sugar from Southern and Caribbean plantations, maple sugar in New England was produced by people characterized as “happy and free.” Just as there were abolitionists who wore no clothing made from Southern cotton, there were those who chose “free” maple sugar for their meals. Although reassuring, this perception obscured the ways that the Northern economy benefited from enslaved labor, both in its connection to the Southern economy and before and after slavery was gradually abolished in the Northern states.