I believe before it was called “Red Velvet Cake”. it may have been called “Red Devil’s Food Cake” and it didn’t use food coloring.
The earliest reference I’ve found to Red Velvet type Cake is from 1950.
It was called the “Village Inn Red Cake” (same ingredients as the later “Red Velvet Cake”). A woman from Monessen, PA sent this recipe into a newspaper recipe contest and it won the first weekly prize of $5.
The 1959 story about the Waldorf Astoria “Red Velvet Cake” has a Neiman-Marcus $250 type of cookie story attached to it. Someone was supposedly charged $300 for the recipe. So this urban legend goes back to at least 1959. Read the 1959 story link below for details.
Here are links to old recipes in newspapers:
Red Devil’s Food Cake from 1928
Painesville Telegraph - Google News Archive Search
Red Devil’s Food Cake from 1933
Spokane Daily Chronicle - Google News Archive Search
Red Devil’s Food Cake from 1943
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Google News Archive Search
Red Devil’s Food Cake from 1950
The Sydney Morning Herald - Google News Archive Search
The earliest reference I’ve found to Red Velvet type Cake is from 1950
“Village Inn Red Cake” (same ingredients as the later “Red Velvet Cake”).
A woman from Monessen, PA sent this recipe into a newspaper recipe contest and it won the first weekly prize of $5.
Here’s a link to recipe and story:
“Village Inn Red Cake” (same ingredients as the later “Red Velvet Cake”). from 1950
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Google News Archive Search
“Red Cake of the Waldorf” from 1959
The Telegraph-Herald - Google News Archive Search
Red Coronation Cake from 1960
The Leader-Post - Google News Archive Search
Red Velvet Cake from 1961
Edmonton Journal - Google News Archive Search
Red Velvet Cake from 1963
The Leader-Post - Google News Archive Search
Red Velvet Cake from 1967
The Southeast Missourian - Google News Archive Search