In Meat We Trust

by Maureen Ogle

  [>] “Once upon a time”: “Frankfurters,” Consumer Reports 37, no. 2 (February 1972): 73.

  [>] “pig swill”: The consumer comments are quoted in “P.S. on Pig Snouts,” National Provisioner 168, no. 5 (February 3, 1973): 30, 32, 34.

  [>] “wiener is being clobbered”: Joseph M. Winski, “Makers of Hog Dogs, Speaking Frankly, Say Sales Aren’t So Hot,” Wall Street Journal, May 29, 1973, p. 1.

  [>] “personal affronts”: Quoted in ibid.

  [>] “I have an answer”: “‘Egghead’ Proposals Make Reader Sizzle,” National Provisioner 166, no. 11 (March 11, 1972): 19.

  [>] “aesthetics”: “Aesthetics No Basis for Byproducts Ban,” National Provisioner 168, no. 2 (January 13, 1973): 15–16. A summary of the new rules is in “U.S. Sets New Rules for Processed Meat,” New York Times, June 2, 1973, p. 16.

  [>] “Most of us”: Quoted in John S. Lang, “Cancer-Inciting Hormone Found in U.S. Beef Supply,” Des Moines Register, June 24, 1970, p. 1. Lang’s report was carried by the AP and appeared in newspapers nationwide. There are only two general sources of information about the history of the DES-in-beef controversy: Harrison Wellford, Sowing the Wind: A Report from Ralph Nader’s Center for the Study of Responsive Law on Food Safety and the Chemical Harvest (Grossman Publishers, 1972); and Alan I. Marcus, Cancer from Beef: DES, Federal Food Regulation, and Consumer Confidence (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994). Of the two, Marcus’s is the more complete account, although he is less interested in the history of DES regulation than in the way that the DES battle exemplified the fracturing of scientific authority at midcentury. Wellford was one of Ralph Nader’s colleagues, and his account is oriented toward the politics of the regulatory mechanisms. His take on DES also appeared as Harrison Wellford, “Behind the Meat Counter: The Fight Over DES,” Atlantic 230 (October 1972): 86–90. For a useful look at the politics of DES regulation (and to a lesser extent antibiotics), also see U.S. House of Representatives, Regulation of Diethylstilbestrol (DES) and Other Drugs Used in Food Producing Animals, HR 93–708, 93d Cong., 1st sess.

  [>] “intellectually fascinating”: Quoted in Walter Sullivan, “Bacteria Passing On Resistance to Drugs,” New York Times, August 9, 1966, pp. 1, 31. The editorial appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine on August 4, 1966. For scientists’ and veterinarians’ take on the state of knowledge in the mid-1960s, see the essays in Use of Drugs in Animal Feeds: Proceedings of a Symposium, Publication 1679 (National Academy of Sciences, 1969). The British were not as reticent. In 1969, the authors of a Parliament-sponsored investigation announced that they did “not accept the statement that 20 years of experience goes to show that there are no serious ill-effects from giving antibiotics to animals.” They argued that Parliament should ban human-use antibiotics in animal feeds. “In the long term,” the committee wrote, “we believe it will be more rewarding to study and improve the methods of animal husbandry than to feed diets containing antibiotics.” Quoted in Alvin Shuster, “Britain to Curb Antibiotic Feed,” New York Times, November 21, 1969, p. 17.

  [>] “potential health hazard”: Quoted in Harold M. Schmeck Jr., “Limitation on Antibiotics in Feed for Livestock Urged by F.D.A.,” New York Times, February 1, 1972, p. 19.

  [>] “bad news”: Neal Black, “FDA Antibiotic Order Not as Bad as Feared,” National Hog Farmer 18, no. 7 (July 19, 1973): 4.

  [>] “better research”: Quoted in George Getschow, “Meat Producers Fear FDA Will Curb Use of Antibiotics, Thus Reducing Supplies,” Wall Street Journal, January 6, 1975, p. 18.

  [>] “grossly inadequate”: Quoted in Rex Wilmore, “They Want to Ban Antibiotics from Feed,” Farm Journal 96 (March 1972): 23.

  [>] “the furthest from being”: “Why United Packers Has Closed Its Doors,” National Provisioner 167, no. 26 (December 23, 1972): 18.

  [>] The critique of agribusiness: My take on the impact of the Hightower critique is an educated guess pieced together as I worked on this book. This is yet another example of the lack of historical research on topics relevant to contemporary America. To date, historians have ignored the turmoil in late-twentieth-century agriculture, particularly the spread of corporate hog farming and the rural activism that accompanied it. As of this writing—2013—for example, there are no comprehensive histories of the emergence of rural activism in the 1960s and 1970s, nor have historians studied the links between, say, programs in rural sociology and rural activism, to say nothing of the history of confinement, lagoons, or much else connected with agriculture since the 1950s.

  [>] “relatively free”: “Bill Would Ban Large Corporate Farms,” Omaha World-Herald, January 6, 1972, p. 6.

  [>] “Do you get the feeling”: See the letter to the editor from Larry G. Hauer, “Small Producers Being Forced Out,” National Hog Farmer 28, no. 10 (October 1983): 29.

  [>] “If the people of Nebraska”: Quoted in C. David Kotok, “Stock Feeder: Initiative 300 Could Cripple the Industry,” Omaha World-Herald, June 22, 1983, p. 2.

  [>] burg of Doland: See Russ Keen, “Hog-Farm Opinions Split Doland Folk,” Aberdeen (SD) American News, February 21, 1988, p. 1B.

  [>] “They can get [it] cheaper”: Quoted in Kent Warneke, “Local Farmers, Businesses Supportive—Atkinson Farm Corporation Not Seen as Villain,” Omaha World-Herald, December 30, 1984; accessed online.

  [>] “stoop to anything”: Quoted in “Missouri Gains Hog Farm That Iowa Turned Away,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 7, 1989, p. 8E.

  [>] “It’s going to be a big help”: Quoted in ibid.

  [>] “We don’t need”: Quoted in ibid. For the Morrell example, see Charles Siler, “Where Did All the Pigs Go?” Forbes 145, no. 6 (March 19, 1990); accessed online.

  [>] “rest[ed] largely with”: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, “Economies of Size in Hog Production,” by Roy Van Arsdall and Kenneth E. Nelson, Technical Bulletin no. 1712, December 1985, pp. 39, 41.

  [>] “large corporate hog farms”: See Bill Fleming, “Opinion Page,” National Hog Farmer 32, no. 11 (November 15, 1987): 9.

  [>] “within 10 years”: Quoted in Bill Fleming, “Opinion Page,” National Hog Farmer 31, no. 5 (May 15, 1986): 10.

  [>] There’s no better place: For discussions of these changes, see Walter Kiechel III, “The Food Giants Struggle to Stay in Step with Consumers,” Fortune 98, no. 5 (September 11, 1978): 50–56; Walter Kiechel III, “Two-Income Families Will Reshape the Consumer Markets,” Fortune 101, no. 5 (March 10, 1980): 110–14, 117, 119–20; Jean Kinsey, “Changes in Food Consumption from Mass Market to Niche Markets,” in Lyle P. Schertz and Lynn M. Daft, Food and Agricultural Markets: The Quiet Revolution, NPA Report no. 270 (National Planning Association, 1994), 19–43; Jean Kinsey and Ben Senauer, “Consumer Trends and Changing Food Retailing Formats,” American Journal of Agricultural Economics 78, no. 5, Proceedings Issue (December 1996): 1187–91; and Alan Barkema, Mark Drabenstott, and Kelly Welch, “The Quiet Revolution in the U.S. Food Market,” Economic Review 76, no. 3 (May/June 1991): 25–41. The late-twentieth-century shift in eating and cooking habits is often attributed to the increase in numbers of women working outside the home. But, as noted in the text, that cliché obscures another transformation: more households were headed by adults, male and female, who worked outside the home. As the divorce rate soared, for example, more households were the domain of single men or part-time dads who had no interest in cooking. Some analysts argue that while women were more “liberated” and educated, they also worked because they had no choice: their families were being squeezed by declining wages and rising economic inequality. But again, that easy explanation does not go far enough to explain the complexities of the change. Consider an obvious if uncomfortable alternative view: Postwar Americans grew up in an era of extraordinary affluence. They assumed that their homes would contain more than one change of clothes, a television or two, and gizmos and gadgets designed to make life easier (electric can openers and toothbrushes). Americans who suffered declining inco
mes in the 1970s could have adjusted their way of life accordingly. Some did but more did not, even if it meant carrying credit card debt to do so.

  [>] “young and leisure-oriented shoppers”: W. G. Vander Ploeg, “Packers Are Still Facing Effects of ‘Deli Revolution,’” National Provisioner 171, no. 19 (November 9, 1974): 174.

  [>] “The supermarkets are crying”: Quoted in “Tyson Foods: Putting Its Brand on High-Margin Poultry Products,” Business Week, August 20, 1979, p. 48.

  [>] “I think my mother”: Quoted in “Don Tyson Tells How He Hopes to Earn 20% Net,” Broiler Industry 40, no. 2 (February 1977): 27.

  [>] “We really were”: Quoted in Taubes, Good Calories, Bad Calories, 45. For the report, see U.S. Senate, Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs, Dietary Goals for the United States, 95th Cong., 1st sess.

  [>] “hell broke loose”: Quoted in Taubes, Good Calories, Bad Calories, 47. The example of the egg industry consultant is in ibid., 51. The Hegsted/Frito-Lay connection is in ibid., 53.

  [>] “antimicrobial-resistant organisms”: Quoted in “Poisoning Linked to Cattle Germs,” New York Times, September 6, 1984, p. A20. A fascinating profile of the investigation is in Marjorie Sun, “In Search of Salmonella’s Smoking Gun,” Science 226, no. 4670 (October 5, 1984): 30–32.

  [>] “health reasons”: Bill Fleming, “Survey Confirms: Pork Still Has Image Problem!” National Hog Farmer 28, no. 12 (December 15, 1983): 6. On the McRib, see, for example, Dean Houghton, “Pork’s Fast-Food Foothold,” Successful Farming 79 (September 1981): H6, H8; and Debra Switzky, “McRib’s Future Uncertain,” National Hog Farmer 28, no. 9 (September 15, 1983): 48.

  [>] “A story about”: Quoted in Terri Minsky, “Bleak Pastures: Cattlemen Lose Money as Prices Fail to Rise with Production Costs,” Wall Street Journal, May 8, 1981, p. 1.

  [>] “Nobody eats beef anymore”: Quoted in ibid., 17.

  [>] “the Mercedes of Meat”: Terri Minsky, “Beef Industry Turning to Ads to Change Meat’s Reputation,” Wall Street Journal, April 1, 1982, p. 29.

  [>] “We thought everybody”: Quoted in Robert Reinhold, “Beef Industry Reduces Use of Disputed Drugs in Feed,” New York Times, February 16, 1985, p. 8.

  [>] “inference”: Quoted in ibid.

  [>] “By dropping antibiotics”: Quoted in ibid.

  [>] “the harsh reality”: Quoted in Marj Charlier, “State of the Steak: Beef’s Drop in Appeal Pushes Some Packers to Try New Products,” Wall Street Journal, August 28, 1985, p. 1.

  [>] “It’s the younger”: Quoted in Bill Eftink, “Chickens Are Stampeding Our Beef Customers,” Successful Farming 79 (May 1981): 23.

  [>] “delicious chunks”: “Just What Is a Chicken McNugget,” Wall Street Journal, October 3, 1985, p. 33. Consumption statistics are in U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, Economics of the U.S. Meat Industry, by Richard J. Crom, Agriculture Information Bulletin no. 545, November 1988, Table 4, p. 7; and U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, Food Consumption, Prices, and Expenditures, 1970–97, by Judith Jones Putnam and Jane E. Allshouse, Statistical Bulletin no. 965, April 1999, Table 4.

  [>] Indeed, researchers theorized: For speculation about the role of vaccinations see Tom Paulson, “Risky Food—Why Now?—10 Years After First Appearance, Tiny Bug Is Still Baffling Experts,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 22, 1993; accessed online.

  [>] “so infected”: Paul Shukovsky, “Roadblocks to Reform—Why Agency Didn’t Act,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 23, 1993; accessed online.

  [>] “They don’t know”: Quoted in Carole Sugarman, “U.S. Meat Inspections Come Under Scrutiny,” Washington Post, February 9, 1993; accessed online.

  [>] “not against technology”: Ibid. The inspection example is from Mike McGraw and Mike Hendricks, “Consumers Can’t Depend on USDA for Meat Safety; Inspectors Seldom Test for Pathogens That Must Be Killed in Cooking,” Kansas City Star, January 31, 1993; accessed online.

  [>] In the wake of: The reporter’s point about the two agencies is in Christopher Hanson, “Roadblocks to Reform—U.S. Inspectors Know Trouble but Action Slow,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 23, 1993; accessed online.

  [>] “we wanted to find out”: Quoted in Bettie Fennell, “Success Keeps Murphy Farms High on the Hog,” Wilmington (NC) Star-News, January 18, 1987, p. 1E.

  [>] Deliverance arrived: For brief histories of Smithfield, see Mitchell Gordon, “High on the Hog,” Barron’s National Business and Financial Weekly 65, no. 47 (November 25, 1985); accessed online; and Sharon Reier, “High on the Hog,” Financial World 157, no. 14 (June 28, 1988); accessed online.

  [>] “We are not against”: Quoted in Stuart Leavenworth, “250 Debate Animal-Waste Issue at Public Hearing,” Raleigh News & Observer, June 24, 1992; accessed online.

  [>] “wildly cheering”: Quoted in Martha Quillin, “Bladen Divided Over Plant—Slaughterhouse’s Jobs Wanted, Not Its Waste,” Raleigh News & Observer, March 7, 1991; accessed online.

  [>] “All of a sudden”: Quoted in Greg Barnes, “Factory Farms Take Hold,” Fayetteville (NC) Observer, December 16, 2003; accessed online.

  [>] “Didn’t nobody mean”: Quoted in Joby Warrick, “Hog-Waste Spill Fouls Land, River in Onslow,” Raleigh News & Observer, June 23, 1995; accessed online. A solid account of the North Carolina spills as well as other conflicts over industrial farms in the 1990s is in David Kirby, Animal Factory: The Looming Threat of Industrial Pig, Dairy, and Poultry Farms to Humans and the Environment (St. Martin’s Press, 2010).

  [>] “environmental Alamo”: Joby Warrick, “Hog Spills Change Lawmakers’ Views,” Raleigh News & Observer, August 6, 1995; accessed online.

  [>] “AIDS look like”: Quoted in Sam Howe Verhovek, “Talk of the Town: Burgers v. Oprah,” New York Times, January 21, 1998, p. A10.

  8. Utopian Visions, Red Tape Reality

  [>] “I don’t have papers”: The exchanges between Coleman and the inspectors are recounted in Stephen M. Voynick, Riding the Higher Range: The Story of Colorado’s Coleman Ranch and Coleman Natural Beef (Glenn Melvin Coleman, 1998), 156.

  [>] “losing battle”: Quoted in ibid., 139.

  [>] “Inflation costs”: Ibid., 145.

  [>] “We had to do something”: Ibid., 149.

  [>] “tingle ran down”: Quoted in ibid., 152.

  [>] “mood of intolerance”: Quoted in Mary Elizabeth Barham, “Sustainable Agriculture in the United States and France: A Polanyian Perspective” (Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 1999), 153, 154.

  [>] But in the wake: For a useful discussion of changes in attitude, see Randal S. Beeman and James A. Pritchard, A Green and Permanent Land: Ecology and Agriculture in the Twentieth Century (University Press of Kansas, 2001), especially 89ff.

  [>] “When you start trimming”: Quoted in Jessica Frazier, “Monfort of Colorado Markets Organic Beef,” Greeley Tribune, December 26, 1971, p. 18.

  [>] “a colossal blunder”: Quoted in George Getschow, “Meat Producers Fear FDA Will Curb Use of Antibiotics, Thus Reducing Supplies,” Wall Street Journal, January 6, 1975, p. 18. University economists confirmed the gap between idea and profit. One study predicted that putting beef cattle back on pasture would result in a short-term 50 percent drop in beef, and that livestock producers would earn higher profits. But they concluded that over the long haul, eliminating antibiotics and hormones would drive up farmers’ production costs and lead to higher meat prices for consumers who would likely respond by reducing their consumption. (Economists did not calculate an important intangible—how consumers would respond to the taste of grass-fed beef—nor did they factor in rising land prices.) As for hogs, analysts predicted that returning to pasture and natural breeding schedules would prevent meatpackers from running their plants at capacity year-round, so they’d charge more for their products. A good summary of the “what if” studies is in Antibiotics in Animal Feeds: A Report Prepared by the Committee on Animal Health and the Committee on Animal
Nutrition [and] Board on Agriculture and Renewable Resources (National Academy of Sciences, 1979); but also see Henry C. Gilliam et al., Economic Consequences of Banning the Use of Antibiotics at Subtherapeutic Levels in Livestock Production, Departmental Technical Report no. 73–2 (Department of Agricultural Economics and Sociology and Texas Agricultural Experiment Station, 1973); and Henry C. Gilliam Jr. and J. Rod Martin, “Economic Importance of Antibiotics in Feeds to Producers and Consumers of Pork, Beef and Veal,” Journal of Animal Science 40, no. 6 (1975): 1241–55.

  [>] “Food is a scarce item”: Quoted in Marian Burros, “A Maverick’s Views,” Washington Post, January 8, 1976; accessed online.

  [>] “It’s obvious”: Quoted in Lynn Heinze, “Although Less Beef Consumption Likely, Cattle Have Future,” Greeley Tribune, March 9, 1976, p. B-23.

  [>] At the center of: The elder Rodale died in 1971. The most substantive study of the Rodale empire is Andrew N. Case, “Looking for Organic America: J. I. Rodale, the Rodale Press, and the Popular Culture of Environmentalism in the Postwar United States” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Wisconsin–Madison, 2012).

  [>] “Don Quixote”: Quoted in Suzanne Peters, “The Land in Trust: A Social History of the Organic Farming Movement” (Ph.D. dissertation, McGill University, 1979), 221.

  [>] “ecosystem”: Quoted in Beeman and Pritchard, Green and Permanent Land, 93, 94. For Commoner, see Michael Egan, “Barry Commoner and the Science of Survival” (Ph.D. dissertation, Washington State University, 2004).

  [>] “massive intervention into nature”: Quoted in Beeman and Pritchard, Green and Permanent Land, 93.

  [>] “As far as our methods”: Quoted in Peters, “Land in Trust,” 279.

  [>] “voluntary simplicity”: Quoted in Curtis E. Beus and Riley E. Dunlap, “Conventional Versus Alternative Agriculture: The Paradigmatic Roots of the Debate,” Rural Sociology 55, no. 4 (Winter 1990): 608–9.