Food Safety - Progressive Era
By: Ryan Sanford
The food industry is a very complex industry with many components. Nowadays there are many regulations and health orders that we have to follow. For instance, if you own a restaurant, you have to follow rules placed by the Health Department. These rules can range from not being allowed to keep the ice scooper in the ice machine, or having to keep your meats at a certain temperature so that they do not soil. Even though today these rules keep our restaurants maintained, and overall safe, the food industry has not always had these rules. The food industry used to be a very dangerous, and not cleanly place. This changed during the Progressive Era, when the health and cleanliness of the food was brought to America's attention.
A powerful, and leading organization that kick started the reconstruction of the food industry was the Food and Drug Administration, abbreviated as FDA. This organization was founded in 1848, starting with the appointment of the Lewis Caleb Beck. This organization's purpose was to carry out chemical analyses of agricultural products. The FDA helped regulate and inspect food products, and helped maintain the health ordinances, so that the businesses would follow all of the rules. The FDA has grown into a bigger organization today, and has more impact on the food industry, but the organization definitely started something that would later impact the country as a whole.
There were many factors that brought this subject to attention in the public's eyes. There were some very important legislation that was passed during this time that dramatically changed the expectation of the food industry. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 was a piece of legislation that prohibited interstate commerce in adulterated and misbranded food and drugs. This was also known as the Wiley Act because Harvey Washington Wiley was a leading force in the passage of this legislation. This piece of legislation was passed in June 30, 1906 and was put into effect on January 1, 1907.
Another piece of legislation that was passed along with the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 was the Meat Inspection Act. This act required sanitary conditions in factories, inspections of animals and meats, and it also required correct labeling of packaged foods. This made packaged food become a lot less dangerous to the public because before this act was passed, lots of foods were mislabeled, and they contained many things that were not supposed to be in them.
Before any legislation was passed, the public’s idea and knowledge of the awful conditions in the food industry was little to none. The public had no idea what was in the packaged food that they purchased, and they did not know how disgusting businesses were, like slaughterhouses, and meat packaging factories. Something that sparked the interest, and caught America’s eye was a book written by Upton Sinclair, The Jungle. The story of the novel follows an immigrant’s family’s exploitation and the unsanitary practices prevalent in Chicago’s meatpacking industry. In order for Sinclair to gather his information on the industry, he had to dive into the industry himself. Many times he would dress up as a worker, and impersonate an employee so that he could acquire first hand information and experience of the industry. He also talked to many people, and made many connections with people in the industry so that he could gain more knowledge. Sinclair describes the conditions of the workplaces with severed fingers, tuberculosis, and blood poisoning. He said, “men who fell into vats; and when they were fished out, there was never enough left of them to be worth exhibiting.”
It was in this time period that newspapers and magazine publishers discovered that their printing sales flew up when they featured exposés on political corruption, and controversial material. The media became a huge proponent that brought many nationwide, and global issues to bay. The impact of Sinclair’s book, for example, brought the food packing industry conditions to the eye of the public. Sinclair’s novel produced an immediate and powerful effect on Americans and on federal policy concerning the food industry. After President Theodore Roosevelt got word of the novel, he became more interested in the conditions in the food industry. He created his own investigation, and learned of the disgusting condition for himself. After catching his eye, Roosevelt later passed the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906.
Within this innovation of health regulations, and standards of the food industry, it would not have been possible without communication, persuasion, and collaboration. Without communication, the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 and the Meat Inspection Act would have never been passed, or even proposed to the federal government. Without these laws, the conditions of the food industry would still be as bad as they were before the Progressive Era. After these two acts had been proposed, someone had to persuade Congress to put them into effect; Harvey Washington Wiley was a main leader in the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, and without his initiative and dedication to get them passed, they would not have been put into effect when they did. Out of the three components, collaboration is probably the most important, because without the ability to collaborate with each other, nothing would have gotten done, and the problem that was at hand would be unsolved and still present. President Theodore Roosevelt had to take matters into his own hands, and talk to lots of different people to figure out a gameplan to make the conditions better. Overall the three components are all important, and without one none of it would have worked. The food packing industry underwent a drastic change, and without that change our food would not be as reliable or as safe as it is today.
Citations
Federal Department of Agriculture - This secondary source is credible because it is straight from the website of the Federal Department of Agriculture. This comes from the source itself, and the url includes “.gov” which means its information is archives from the government, which has very reliable information. I used this source to learn about what the FDA is, and what they do. It helped me understand the types of restrictions and laws that were passed during the Progressive Era that affected Food Production.
http://docsteach.org/activities/4634/print - This is a credible source because it is from the National Archives. The website cites each source that they have, including the pictures. I used this source not only for images, but to learn of the overall culture and environment of the food industry. The before and after pictures helped me see the change that all the regulations had on the food packaging industry.
Law, Marc T., and Gary D. Libecap. The Determinants of Progressive Era Reform: The Pure Food and Drugs Act of 1906. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research, 2004. - Marc T. Law studied at the University of Vermont. Gary D. Libecap studied at Bren School of Environmental Science and Management and Economics Department and the University of California, Santa Barbara. I used this source to learn more about The Pure Food and Drugs Act of 1906, to better understand what the act declared. This source was cited on another one of my secondary sources.
Lupein, John. “Food Quality and Safety: Traceability and Labeling.” Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition 45, no. 2 (2005): 119–123. - John R. Lupein was the Former Director, Food and Nutrition Division Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). His former experience with the industry gives the reader an inside look into the industry.
*I looked in the textbook for information on the food packing industry but I was not able to find much information that I could have used.
