November 13, 2024 • 44 mins
Would you drink embalmed milk?! Arpita tells the story of the scientist who cracked down on harmful preservatives and additives in food and started the FDA.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Aarati (00:10):
Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Smart Tea Podcast,
where we talk about the lives ofscientists and innovators who
shaped the world.
How's it going, Arpita?
Arpita (00:19):
It's going.
I feel like this week was Threeyears long.
Aarati (00:24):
This week has been such a rollercoaster.
It's been just insane.
I'm just, like, my emotions aretapped out.
All my emotions.
I, I just don't know what to doanymore.
Arpita (00:36):
same.
I feel so drained and I guess onthat, up of that roller coaster,
um, happy birthday.
Ha ha ha ha.
Aarati (00:48):
know,
Arpita (00:48):
does it feel to be a year older and wiser?
Ha ha ha
Aarati (00:52):
I don't know about wiser, but
Arpita (00:54):
ha.
Definitely.
Aarati (00:56):
I don't know.
It, it almost, it's, it's alwaysbittersweet.
My birthday for a while now hasalways been tied to negative
things in my life.
It's always been like aroundelection time, which is emotions
are running high with a lot ofpeople.
And, you know, especially thisyear, the election obviously
didn't go the way we wanted itto, and everyone is still
(01:19):
reeling from that.
And then all my friends arelike, Oh, but by the way, happy
birthday.
Arpita (01:25):
ha.
Aarati (01:26):
Thanks.
Thanks for remembering me.
I appreciate the thought.
And I know everybody's like,emotions are in such a negative
state, there's like so muchdepression and anger and
sadness.
And then they're like, oh, butwe still love you.
Arpita (01:41):
It's like such a mixed bag.
One of my really good friends,you know.
His birthday was yesterday andhe said the exact same thing.
He was just like, I think I wantto, um, take a rain check on my
birthday and celebrate it later.
And I was like, honestly, that'sfine by me.
Like, I totally get it.
Like, this feels like a bad weekto do that.
Aarati (02:00):
Yeah.
It's just like, you can't getinto the celebratory mood, you
know?
Arpita (02:04):
Totally get it.
Totally get it.
Aarati (02:06):
On the bright side, I did get An e reader.
I got a Kobo e reader.
Um, it's like not a Kindle, buta Kobo.
Yeah.
It's like Kindle's competitor,So, I've just been diving into
like fictional worlds to makemyself.
Yeah.
Just forget about what's goingon.
I'm just like, yeah, I'm justgoing to read a fantasy book and
(02:28):
forget that I live in realityfor a little while.
Arpita (02:31):
No, it's the best.
I was a huge naysayer for areally long time.
I was like, I only like physicalbooks.
I don't want a Kindle.
And probably like three or fouryears now, I got a Kindle and I
love it.
It is like my like fifthappendage, honestly.
I use it.
All the time.
I take it with me everywhere.
If I'm waiting in line or on thetrain, I'm always reading my
(02:54):
Kindle and it's just soconvenient to have it for
travel.
And yeah, I read it all thetime.
Aarati (02:59):
For me, I'm like, the biggest thing is.
I usually read before I go tobed, and it really does help me
fall asleep, so I've beenreally, really happy with that.
Yeah, just been like, cuddlingunder the blankets, reading
until I fall asleep, and it'sbeen great.
Arpita (03:14):
Have you seen the, the stand that people have that they
Aarati (03:18):
I have,
Arpita (03:20):
That's what I've asked for for my birthday this year.
Aarati (03:22):
Oh, really?
Arpita (03:24):
Yeah.
Aarati (03:25):
Okay, noted.
Arpita (03:26):
I want stand and the Bluetooth remote.
Um, because it's getting coldand I just want to keep my hands
in my bed then just have theKindle right above my eyeballs
so that I can just click it.
Aarati (03:39):
That sounds amazing.
Arpita (03:41):
like, Logan's not going to see me all winter.
I'm just going to be in my bedreading the Kindle.
Aarati (03:46):
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, but that was nice.
I did like a lot of research asto like which e reader I wanted
and stuff like that.
And then my mom paid for it.
So like, you know, cause that'swhat my family does.
They, they don't do likesurprise gifts at all.
They're just like, what do youwant?
I'll get it for you.
And I'm like, okay, that works.
I guess at least, I know I'mgetting something I want.
(04:07):
So.
Arpita (04:08):
No, A plus.
Charge it to your mom's creditcard.
That's the best idea ever heard.
Aarati (04:13):
Yeah, exactly, so it's like, she's like, okay, great, I
did my duty, I gave you a gift,and I'm like, yes, you did,
thank you,
Arpita (04:20):
I always think so funny when my family does that too and
it's like let's pretend that I'mnot a grown ass adult
Aarati (04:26):
I know, yeah,
Arpita (04:27):
Who can buy my own things.
Aarati (04:30):
I was dropping serious hints, I was like, so, I think
I'm gonna get this at some pointvery soon.
By the way, then they're like,yeah, exactly.
Arpita (04:40):
A week away from my birthday.
Aarati (04:42):
Exactly.
I'm like, I think this is goingto be like my birthday gift to
myself.
And they're like, Oh no, you canjust use my credit card to buy
it.
And I'm like, great.
That's what wanted all along.
Perfect.
Yeah.
Arpita (04:54):
I love that.
Aarati (04:55):
Yeah.
Anywho.
maybe we can further escapereality by talking about
hopefully a good, uh, scientiststory.
So who do you have today?
Arpita (05:07):
Yeah, I'm excited about today's.
Uh, today is Harvey WashingtonWiley, who I have never heard of
before, but he is the reasonthat we have the FDA and our
food is actually safe to eat.
And so during research for thisepisode, I found some real gross
stuff that used to happen withour food that no happens and
(05:28):
it's thanks to him.
Aarati (05:30):
Sounds amazing.
I'm so excited.
Arpita (05:34):
Ok so let's dive in.
So Harvey Washington Wiley wasborn in a log cabin in Indiana
in 1844.
He was the sixth of seven kids,and he was raised on this big
farm, and because they lived atthat southernmost tip of
Indiana.
They were actually right acrossthe river from Kentucky.
(05:54):
And at that point in time,Kentucky still had slavery
legal, but Indiana did notbecause they were part of the
North.
And so his parents were actuallyconductors on the Underground
Railroad and they helped slavesescape into the North.
So that's what his likechildhood was involved in.
Aarati (06:11):
Oh my gosh, that's amazing.
Arpita (06:13):
I know.
Aarati (06:14):
Amazing childhood.
That's great.
Arpita (06:16):
Yeah.
So it's like pre civil war.
So he actually went to collegefor one year at Hanover college
in 1863.
And then he enlisted with theunion army in 1864.
And then he fought in theAmerican civil war.
Um, and at the end of the war,he was a corporal and he went
back to Hanover College in 1865,majored in humanities and
(06:39):
graduated in 1867.
Aarati (06:41):
Oh, that's interesting.
He was a humanities major?
Arpita (06:45):
yeah.
Aarati (06:45):
So like not, not a science major from the get go.
Cause so many of our storiesstart with like, oh, they were
interested in nature, they wereinterested in science from a
very young but right now it'ssounding like he's very much
like a social justice type ofperson.
Arpita (06:59):
Yeah.
It is.
I'm not super sure what histransition was because the next
thing that I found is that afterthat he went and got his MD.
So I'm not really sure if therewas like a specific course or
something that he was interestedin that like really spurred his
interest into science.
Aarati (07:15):
Yeah, or even just like he wanted to help people and
like, again, a doctor is a veryclear way to be able to help
people.
So maybe that was it.
Okay.
Interesting though, that'sreally interesting that his
background wasn't alwaysscience.
Arpita (07:30):
Right.
It wasn't.
It wasn't.
Yeah.
And so now he, now he has hisMD.
And so then after he gets hisMD, he starts teaching chemistry
at this medical college and hetaught, Indiana Medical
College's first lab course inchemistry.
And then he moved on to afaculty position and he was
(07:51):
appointed state chemist ofIndiana.
Aarati (07:54):
State chemist?
What is that?
Arpita (07:56):
Like, just like I think it's a regulatory government
position, what it sounds like.
So, I'm kind of getting ahead ofmyself, but like He then becomes
a chemist for the federalgovernment.
So I think he's starting at thestate level right now.
And he's like inspecting, likeanything that comes through
either agriculture, food, drugs,anything.
Aarati (08:18):
Do we have positions like that today where you can
like be a scientist for thestate or for the, for the
government?
Arpita (08:26):
We do, especially part of the department of
agriculture.
Aarati (08:29):
I suppose like if you work for the FDA now, or you
work for the DOE or somethinglike that, or some sort of
federal government entity, thenyou would be a scientist for the
state or for the government.
That makes sense.
Arpita (08:43):
Correct.
Yeah, that's exactly right.
Aarati (08:46):
I've just never heard the term like, chemist for the
state.
Like, I think it's throwing meoff.
Arpita (08:52):
Um, yeah, so then he takes a little break, he travels
to Germany, and he spends sometime learning with this man,
August Wilhelm von Hoffman.
And I'd never heard of him, butvon Hoffman was someone who
discovered a lot of differentchemicals that are used in
manufacturing and processing.
(09:12):
Most of them are derived fromtar, like aniline.
Aarati (09:15):
hmm.
Arpita (09:16):
It's used in dyes, rubber processing, and a lot of
like mechanical manufacturing,which was kind of the turn of
the century and was like reallyimportant around this like
industrialization period.
And so he works with Hoffmanwhile he's in Germany.
And he spends some time at theImperial Food Laboratory in
Bismarck working with this otherman named Eugene Sell.
(09:39):
And he's studying sugarchemistry.
So the United States at thispoint was importing sugar from
West Africa, from the Caribbean,all these different places, but
they were trying to establish adomestic sugar industry.
And so Harvey was trying tolearn as much as he could.
And so when he came back toIndiana and Purdue University,
(10:00):
he was asked to analyze all thesugars and syrups that were
available on the market to seehow they were processed and to
see if there was like anyadulteration or how they could
continue replicating this andscale the sugar industry.
Aarati (10:15):
Wow, that's actually a really big undertaking when you
think about it, because sugar isin like literally everything.
So that's, that's a hugeproject.
Arpita (10:25):
it is.
At this point, it really wasn'tas ubiquitous as we think about
it today, like especiallysyrups, but regardless.
They were, it was still a reallybig crop that they were trying
to figure out how to not import,
Aarati (10:37):
Yeah, I can totally imagine that because that would
save you so much money if youcould grow that at home.
Yeah.
Arpita (10:43):
Exactly.
So he spends a few yearsstudying sorghum, which is
another grain, as well as sugarchemistry, just try to see if
this would take off.
And It didn't happen as we know,but in 1881, he published his
first paper on what he found,which was that a lot of sugar
was adulterated with glucose.
(11:04):
So it wasn't actually allsucrose the way that we thought
it was.
Aarati (11:07):
So wait, So the sucrose is coming from the sugarcane
plant, I'm assuming, and thenchemists were adding glucose or
was glucose like a byproduct ofwhatever processes that they
did?
Arpita (11:20):
They were passing off the glucose as sucrose.
Aarati (11:22):
Oh, interesting.
Arpita (11:24):
Yeah.
So they were, it was likemisrepresented.
Aarati (11:26):
So they were like synthetically creating glucose
and then using that in syrupsand things instead of using
sucrose, which would have beenmore expensive because they
would have to import that.
Arpita (11:37):
Correct.
And it's, it's just sweet, butwhat they're doing is
misrepresenting what they'reselling.
Aarati (11:42):
Ah, got you..
Yeah.
So all these people are like,real sugar in this product and
it's
Arpita (11:47):
and it's not Exactly.
Exactly right.
Aarati (11:50):
Wow.
Arpita (11:51):
So that leads me to the next point, which is, at this
point in history, there were nolaws on food safety or making
sure that what's in your food iswhat you say it actually is.
Um, there's no regulation.
So at this point, Europe andCanada have some regulations,
but the U.
S.
was really slow to the uptake.
So, In the 19th century, therewas a ton of resistance to the
(12:12):
idea of the federal government,quote, policing what people eat.
So it's like the similar ethosto like what we hear today of
just like, nobody tells me whatto do, individual rights, and
this American mentality that isstill so pervasive today.
So this idea of the federalgovernment regulating what's in
food was met with a ton ofresistance.
Aarati (12:32):
I can totally see that.
Like, given the politicalclimate today and the things
that we are arguing about anddebating about today, I can
totally see this argumenthappening and people saying
like, you have no right tocontrol what food I eat.
Arpita (12:46):
That is exactly what's happening right now.
However, Harvey sees thatthere's a real problem here.
And so to help combat publicopinion, he commissions a
medical journalist to basicallydo some scicomm and to write out
findings in an understandablemanner for both the public and
the politicians to help themlearn about all of the dangers
(13:08):
for what was in food currently,so some of the things that they
found were embalmed milk.
So they were adding formaldehydeto milk to keep it from going
bad.
Aarati (13:18):
Oh, my God.
That just sounds horrible.
Embalmed milk is like such aterrible phrase.
Okay,
Arpita (13:25):
Um, they were adding copper sulfate to canned green
beans to make them more green.
Um, there's all sorts ofproblems.
Those are like two of the weirdones...
Aarati (13:36):
Sorry.
Copper sulfate.
Like, that reminds me of theStatue of Liberty turning green.
It's like that, that's literallywhat they're doing.
Like, the Statue of Liberty isgreen because it's made of
copper, and now they're addingthat into green beans,
Arpita (13:49):
Correct.
To make them
Aarati (13:50):
greener.
Oxidizes But, like, that's asimilar like
Arpita (13:53):
So it's like when you open the can, the beans look
greener.
Um,
Aarati (13:57):
Oh my God.
Yikes.
Arpita (13:58):
And the reason that both of these things were happening
was that there's suddenly thisindustrialization problem.
So usually people were not veryfar away from the food that was
grown.
And now that there was cities,there was this huge problem of
trying to get large amounts offood to people in cities without
it going bad.
And this was pre refrigeration.
It's pre preservatives oranything like that.
(14:20):
So there was this big problem oftrying to get food to people
without it going bad.
And so like formaldehyde toprevent bacteria from growing
and then like trying to make thebeans like once they start
rotting actually look green.
So then people will still eatthem.
Like a lot of these problemscame from like a transportation
logistics place.
Aarati (14:38):
That makes a lot of sense.
So it's like, I guess theirheart was in the right place,
but man, that's scary.
Like, oh my god.
Arpita (14:47):
This unfortunate story gets worse before it gets
better.
So even though they werepublishing all these papers,
people weren't really thatconcerned and paying attention.
And when things changed was in1898, when U.
S.
soldiers were fighting in Cubaduring the Spanish American War.
The food that they sent from themainland to Cuba included meat
(15:11):
that was chemically preserved.
A lot of it was spoiled.
A lot of it was, like, reallybad to eat.
The soldiers found bones andother unsavory parts of the
animal and it caused a recordnumber of illnesses, like
dysentery and food poisoning.
And these soldiers already kindof had malaria and yellow fever
and basically all the thingsthat you get from being in,
(15:32):
like, a tropical climate.
And so this didn't make thingsbetter.
And the general, the SpanishAmerican war general, Nelson
Miles, was like, this is anoutrage.
Like, this cannot be the waythat we are treating American
soldiers who are fighting forour freedom.
Um, and so he reported this tonewspapers and generally tried
to talk to anybody who wouldlisten to make the public aware
(15:55):
that these were the conditionsthe American soldiers were
serving in, and this finally gotthe public alarmed and
interested about what wasactually in their food.
Aarati (16:05):
Oh nice.
Yeah, like tie it to patriotism.
That'll, you know, get peopleoff their butts.
Yeah.
Arpita (16:11):
I know, because there was that other episode that we
had about MDMA and like, untilpeople started using it for
veterans and PTSD, it's like, noone actually gave a shit.
And it was like, finally theycame around.
They were like, this is apopulation that people are
universally sympathetic towards.
Aarati (16:26):
Yeah.
And also it's like, it's amilitary issue, right?
You're weakening our military bygiving them rotten food, like,
that's not good.
This is a security issue.
This is a defense issue.
It can actually affect how ourmilitary operates and how
successful they are.
Arpita (16:44):
Yeah, no, that's right.
I was doing some digging to belike, what did, I mean, wars
before this also didn't haverefrigeration and preservatives.
So what did they do?
So I guess what actually endedup happening is they got local
supplies for all previous wars,so it didn't have to transport
very much.
So they would like, take oversome village or whatever.
And then that's where they wouldget all their supplies from.
(17:07):
And I guess that wasn't possiblein Cuba, largely because of
infrastructure.
And so they had to shipeverything in from the mainland
that's where the problem came.
Aarati (17:18):
That's really interesting.
I'm just getting like images ofthese soldiers who are fighting
this, battle and it's like,okay, it's dinner time.
It's lunchtime and it looksgood.
Like, cause they probably added,it didn't look good.
Like, cause I was imagining theyadded all these preservatives to
make it at least look okay.
But like, no?
Arpita (17:38):
No.
I read something that was like,it was like gray and like
smelled bad and like, madepeople sick universally.
It was like so bad.
Aarati (17:46):
Oh no, I feel so bad for them.
Arpita (17:48):
I know, it's disgusting.
Aarati (17:50):
Okay, cause I thought it, I thought it would at least,
like, look okay, but then itstill made them sick because,
you
Arpita (17:55):
It didn't seem like it looked, smelled, or felt or
anything
Aarati (17:59):
Oh god, okay, that just makes it, like, 10 times worse
because you can see that you'reeating rotten food.
Arpita (18:05):
Okay so then at this point Harvey gets offered the
position of chief chemist in theU.
S.
Department of Agriculture, USDAin 1882.
Um, so he's still reallyinterested in this idea that
food isn't safe, but what he'shired to do is to continue this
sugar study.
So they were really looking forsomeone to help further the
(18:26):
study of sorghum because he hadalready worked on it.
Um, and he took this job becausehe's still living in Indiana and
he had applied for the job ofpresident of the University at
Purdue, but he didn't get thejob because he was quote, too
young and too jovial, unorthodoxin his religious beliefs, and a
bachelor.
And so he had all these likepings against him.
(18:49):
So then he ended up taking thisjob at the USDA and he moved to
Washington.
Aarati (18:55):
Oh my gosh.
That's so funny.
Like you're too happy to be ascientist.
Arpita (18:58):
I know, I think they just needed like a solemn kind
of old man.
And he was that he was like ayoung, happy dude.
And so he got passed over forthe job.
Aarati (19:07):
And also like unorthodox in his religious views is also
an interesting phrase there.
Arpita (19:12):
Yeah, he is an atheist and was public about it and they
wanted someone who
Aarati (19:19):
Yeah,
Arpita (19:20):
was more traditional basically.
He's in Washington and when hejoins the USDA, there's a fewer
than a dozen chemists at theagency.
And to your point, chemists wereresponsible for all the
agricultural chemistry issues inthe U.
S., including pesticides, cropgrowth, and soil quality.
(19:40):
And he is officially working onthis like sugar sorghum project,
but he starts this side projectthat is trying to test the
integrity of the American foodsupply.
So he gets this tiny group ofchemists who start doing a
series of reports under thissuper boring name, Bulletin 13.
(20:01):
And they look at dairy, cannedvegetables, coffee and tea, wine
and beer, spices, and processedmeats, and they do a deep dive
and they find really, really badthings.
Aarati (20:14):
Oh dear.
Okay, I'm bracing myself.
Arpita (20:16):
So, Some of it's not that bad.
So some of it was just actuallyfraud.
So spices were like a big thing.
So they were almost alwaysadulterated so if you're buying
cinnamon, you were actuallybuying brick dust.
If you were buying pepper, youwere potentially buying dirt or
charred bits of stuff.
Aarati (20:35):
Oh, my goodness.
Arpita (20:36):
If you're buying coffee, sometimes you were just getting
like ground up shells ofsomething.
People would grind up bones andcharred lead into coffee.
If you got flour, you'reprobably also getting gypsum,
which is like a mineral.
If you got milk, you got chalkor plaster of Paris and actual
milk was full of tons ofbacteria because there was no
(20:57):
pasteurization or refrigeration.
and like we said, people wereputting formaldehyde in milk.
And people are getting sick allthe time, but like, no one
really knows why.
And the bottom line here is thateverything that I just mentioned
was totally legal.
Like, there's no repercussionfor this.
Like, companies can do whateverthey want, and there's no
(21:17):
retribution for how food isbeing processed at all.
Aarati (21:21):
Oh, my gosh.
That's so scary.
And I can just imagine all thesefood companies campaigning
against regulations.
And him fighting for, goodscience communications to kind
of get the people to understandthat, like, hey, that cinnamon
that you're eating is actually
Arpita (21:38):
Bricks.
So that's what happens next.
So like I said, there's norequirement to honestly label
anything at the time, and he'snoticing that there's tons of
additives.
So we've mentioned formaldehyde,but another one is salicylic
acid, which when you eat itcauses the lining of your
stomach to bleed, among otherthings, like bad things happen
your body.
And so he's really trying to getpeople to care about the fact
(22:01):
that there are poisons in theirfood that they're consuming.
And it seems totally reasonableto us, but there's so much
industry resistance this becausethey're trying to meet a bottom
line like this would cause a tonof increases in their costs and
nothing that he proposes becausehe works with the federal
government.
So like nothing he proposes,none of the measures he proposes
even get like remote attention.
(22:23):
He goes to Congress.
They laugh him out of like,laugh him out of the room,
basically.
And at this point, a lot ofCongress people are being funded
by these big industryexecutives, food industry
executives.
So they're like, notincentivized to care all because
they're getting funding from thefood industry.
So this is all this big circlewhere no one is paying attention
(22:45):
to him.
Aarati (22:46):
I feel like it's exactly what's still happening today,
just on different issues.
Arpita (22:50):
Totally.
Just different issues.
Aarati (22:51):
Yeah, just, it's kind of disheartening to know that it's
always been like this,
Arpita (22:55):
Yes.
Yes.
It's like insert issue here.
Like yeah, totally.
Aarati (23:00):
And then you have the whole industry on one side
campaigning against him.
You have the people who, in theCongress, who don't really care,
and, or are being funded bythese industries.
And then you have the scientiststhat are, like, trying to get
the public to care.
It's a struggle to get them tounderstand or care about the
issue.
Yeah.
Arpita (23:17):
that's exactly what ends up happening.
So he is really trying to getthe public on his side.
So in 1902, he gets$5, 000 as astipend to study the effects of
a diet containing all of thesepreservatives.
So to do this, he gets a bunchof human volunteers and he calls
them his.
quote, Poison Squad.
(23:38):
And the tests that he conductsare called the Hygienic Table
Trials.
And so during these trials, hegets 12 young dudes basically,
and they put vigorous andvoracious and he fed them and
gave them room and board in thebasement of the agricultural
department in Washington.
(23:58):
And so before each meal, the menwere weighed and any changes to
their condition were noted.
And so out of the 12, he got 6of them where they were fed
quote,"wholesome, unadulteratedfood" and then the other 6 were
fed food laced with additivessuch as borax, formaldehyde, and
(24:18):
salicylic acid, and every 2weeks they switched.
Aarati (24:23):
Oh, interesting.
Okay.
Arpita (24:25):
And so the subjects got.
5 a month and free food andboard to be basically
systemically poisoned.
And they were told, they weretold this is
Aarati (24:35):
what they were going to do.
Yeah.
Arpita (24:35):
Like, it wasn't like a,
Aarati (24:37):
But I can totally see young, young dudes being like,
yeah, that sounds like a great,yeah, great deal, I'm in.
Arpita (24:43):
They were so into it.
I was like reading somethingabout it and they were like,
this sounds really bad, but heactually had people lining up to
participate in this.
Like,
Aarati (24:51):
yeah, 100%, you're gonna pay me 5, give me room and board
and food?
Like, totally,
Arpita (24:56):
I don't care it's gross.
Aarati (24:58):
Yeah, I can, I can weather any storm, like, I'm
strong and young and, yeah,sure,
Arpita (25:02):
That's like exactly, there was like a quote from a
letter.
I don't think I ended upincluding it, but there was a
quote from a letter of some guyasking to participate.
He said that he had a stomach ofiron or something.
And he was like, yeah, I'll eatanything.
Like I'll participate in yourstudy.
Aarati (25:15):
I can so see this.
This is amazing.
Arpita (25:18):
I know it's like, boys have really not changed at all
in
Aarati (25:21):
Yeah.
Arpita (25:22):
130 years.
Aarati (25:24):
Not at all.
No, I can, I can, I can seecollege students doing this a
hundred percent.
Arpita (25:28):
exactly, it's like they're, yeah, they were just
like, they were probably like intheir early twenties.
Yeah.
Aarati (25:32):
Yeah, absolutely.
Um, what was the.
logic behind switching every twoweeks?
Was he, like, wanting to studypatterns, like, to see if they
got better and worse and betterand worse?
Arpita (25:44):
exactly.
Exactly.
Aarati (25:48):
Hi everyone, Aarati here.
I hope you're enjoying thepodcast.
If so, and you wish someonewould tell your science story, I
founded a science communicationscompany called Sykom, that's S Y
K O M, that can help.
Sykom blends creativity withscientific accuracy to create
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(26:11):
writing, and more.
We work with academicresearchers, tech companies, non
profits, or really any scientistto help simplify your science.
Check us out at sykommer.
com.
That's S Y K O M M E R dot com.
Okay, back to the story.
Arpita (26:29):
So the experiment started in November 1902.
And even though they started inreally high spirits by
Christmas, they were pretty sad.
So there was a Washington Postarticle from December 26th, and
it reads, quote,"The borax dietis beginning to show its effect
on Dr.
Wiley's government fed boardersat the Bureau of Chemistry.
And last night, when theofficial weights were taken just
(26:51):
before the Christmas dinner, thesix guests who were taking the
chemical course showed a slightdecrease and lost their flesh.
On Christmas Day, when probablyeverybody else in Washington
gained more or less fromfeasting and was regarded by the
boarders themselves as doublysignificant." end quote.
Aarati (27:08):
Oh my gosh, poor babies!
Arpita (27:10):
So they're real sad.
Yeah.
They're sad.
Aarati (27:13):
Poor guys.
Like you get feast laced withborax.
That's
Arpita (27:17):
That's exactly what it was.
I think there was like actuallylike a menu on, hold on, I had
it somewhere.
Oh yeah.
It's like applesauce.
Borax, soup, borax, turkey,borax, canned string beans,
sweet potatoes, white potatoes,turnip, borax, chip beef laced
with borax, cream gravy,cranberry sauce, celery,
(27:37):
pickles, rice pudding, milk,formaldehyde, bread and butter,
tea, coffee, borax.
Aarati (27:43):
Oh my god.
Arpita (27:45):
I like did not make that up, that's like actually from
the Washington
Aarati (27:48):
That is crazy.
Oh my goodness.
What, what a crazy menu.
That sounds like a deliciousChristmas feast.
Arpita (27:56):
So the guys who were participating in the study are
the ones who talked to the pressand because Harvey was really
trying to like preserve theintegrity of this study, he
finally issued like an ordersaying that they couldn't talk
about it until he finished thestudy.
But even though he said this,people had already talked to the
press and the public wereinterested and tons of people
(28:17):
were talking and writing aboutthis.
Aarati (28:19):
You know what this of?
Is, have you, have you seenthat, uh, documentary, Supersize
Me?
Arpita (28:26):
Mm hmm.
Aarati (28:26):
Yeah, that's what this reminds me of.
That guy eating, like,McDonald's for every single
meal, and like, testing hisweight and his cholesterol and
all these, like, things.
Arpita (28:36):
That's more or less what's happening here.
Aarati (28:38):
And then everyone gets really interested in what's in
my fast food and how does it,yeah, yeah.
It's like you need to actuallysee the effects firsthand, kind
of.
Arpita (28:49):
In like a A-B test.
Aarati (28:50):
Yeah, like a national experiment that everyone can see
the results of in real time.
Arpita (28:57):
Exactly.
No, exactly.
Harvey is obviously buoyed byall of this and becomes a
crusader in building support fornational food and drug
regulation.
And he enacted, a bill whicheventually passed in 1906 called
the Pure Food and Drugs Act.
And the enforcement of this actwas given to the Bureau of
(29:19):
Chemistry because of theirunique scientific qualifications
to examine food and drugs.
So the very first food and druginspectors in the U.
S.
were hired to complement thework of laboratory scientists.
And that was like, they'reinspecting things basically on a
very, very small scale.
And this inspection programchanged the way that we thought
(29:39):
about food supply.
Within about a decade or so.
So this is like kind of lookingforward, but that's kind of like
the long term sequelae and howthis was enforced.
Um, and this is the act that hethought of and initially
proposed, which finally passedin 1906.
Aarati (29:56):
So, are they, since it's food and drug, are they also
looking at medicines now,?
Arpita (30:01):
Yeah, I think they technically are, but this is pre
FDA.
Aarati (30:06):
Okay.
Yeah, yeah.
It's pre FDA, but I can see thateven with medications, if you
think you're getting, you know,ibuprofen or something, but it's
actually laced with chalk orsomething like that, you know.
I can totally see that happeningif there's no regulations at
this point, and so I was justwondering if they've already
figured that out aboutmedications and are adding this
(30:27):
into the bill that they haveright now.
Arpita (30:30):
Um, yeah, definitely.
So the whole point of the PureFood and Drug Act was really
just to analyze what was inthings or like look at
processing.
There were still a lot of issueson preservatives.
And like how things werepreserved, which is then his
like next problem here.
There was also a lot of issuesaround enforcement.
(30:52):
So that was like anotherconcern.
So even though it existed by thetime it finally passed, it had
been ping ponged around Congressfor so long that like there were
limited funds, it was actuallyjust like, like the idea was
there, but it still wasn't asrobust as it needed to be
Aarati (31:09):
Makes sense.
Yeah, it's just the beginnings.
Yeah,
Arpita (31:12):
Just the beginnings.
So like I mentioned, preservingchemicals, which really weren't
addressed in the Pure Food andDrugs law, continue to be
controversial.
And so the Secretary ofAgriculture appointed a board of
consulting scientists to repeatHarvey's human trials of the
preservatives.
So rather than looking atadditives, they were looking at
(31:33):
preservatives.
And so they're looking at theuse of saccharin and bleached
flour and caffeine and benzoateof soda, like, these are all
things that were used aspreservatives and they were
trying to see how safe theywere.
And so, under Harvey'sleadership,(he's still working
at this Bureau of Chemistry atthe USDA) this whole department
(31:55):
starts to really grow.
Now there's more funding,there's more interest, and he
started out with a budget ofonly like a hundred thousand
dollars, and then by 1906, whenthe pure food and drug law
passed, he was up to almost amillion dollars in the budget.
Aarati (32:13):
Amazing.
Arpita (32:13):
Yeah, so it's like starting gain a ton more
traction.
Aarati (32:16):
Yeah.
Arpita (32:18):
So originally when he first started out thinking
about, you know, food safety tobegin with he was really just
trying to get foods labeledcorrectly and making sure that
people understood what they wereeating
Aarati (32:28):
Mm hmm.
Arpita (32:30):
But then he realized that actually like something
shouldn't be even allowed atall.
Aarati (32:34):
Yeah.
Arpita (32:35):
It's not just awareness.
Like we should just not permitthese things to be consumed.
Aarati (32:39):
Yeah.
You shouldn't give people thechoice to eat bricks if they
want to.
Like, that should just not be anoption.
Arpita (32:45):
So he proposed another food bill, which was really
specifically this one doesn'teven really have a name.
It's like Bill 1202.
And it was basically about this,like banning certain chemicals,
and it didn't even register avote.
It was defeated by foodlobbyists.
And so to counteract this,Harvey very smartly got the
(33:06):
support of a lot of femalegroups.
And at this point, the womencannot vote.
They have no political power.
And he knows this, but he alsoknows that they're very smart.
They're very organized, and theyalso have a lot of domestic
influence.
So they can choose what thingsare being bought and other women
are going to listen to them.
And so now there's this pushtowards at least public
(33:29):
recognition that food is unsafe.
Aarati (33:32):
That's so smart.
Because this this is the timewhen women are like really the
domestic household, you know,people who, buy food, cook the
food, are responsible for thehealth of the family and the
well being of the family.
So that's really, really smart.
Arpita (33:45):
Right.
So now they're trying to exertlike consumer pressure here.
And so, the cookbooks of thetime, there's this cookbook
writer.
Her name is Fanny Farmer.
And she says like, okay, likeyou should add coffee to this
recipe, but just be aware thatit might not actually be coffee
or like, maybe don't use milk inthis recipe because milk might
make you sick.
(34:05):
And she started campaigningunder this big slogan basically
of wanting pure food.
And so then this spilled intowider community health and
welfare calling for publiccontrol of the food system to be
like, this is not safe.
Like we are eating unsafethings.
Aarati (34:23):
Yeah, yeah.
I bet she also maybe couldendorse certain foods that she
knew was safe, like use thisbrand of butter because it is
actually butter and it's notlike, you know, some weird
chemical.
Arpita (34:35):
No, you're spot.
So Heinz, the ketchup brand isactually the first one of the
first companies to actually getbehind this.
And so she does endorse Heinzbecause they changed their
recipe for tomato ketchup toreplace all their chemical
preservatives and then just usevinegar.
And they started in putting allof these different hygienic
practices into their factory.
(34:55):
And they were like, no, you'reright.
Like we should definitely havesafe food practices.
So then this is one of the veryfirst large food brands that
gets their seal of approval.
Aarati (35:04):
Oh, wow.
Arpita (35:05):
So around the same time, Upton Sinclair's The Jungle was
published, which is it revealeda lot of inside information on
the slaughterhouses of Chicago.
So Sinclair first published thiswork in a socialist newspaper
called Appeal to Reason as acall to arms about the plight of
(35:27):
the worker, and he's basicallytrying to explain that the
working conditions inslaughterhouses are really bad.
He finally gets a New York Citypublisher to agree to publish
it, and he has all these, like,descriptions about how horrible
meat processing is, and the moldthat's growing on the meat still
goes into, like, the ham, andthe disease, and, like, the
(35:47):
rotting animals that go into thesausage, like, he tells this
really really graphic story.
Aarati (35:52):
It's gruesome.
Yeah.
Arpita (35:54):
Yes.
And this publisher in New Yorksends fact checkers to Chicago
to be like, is this what'sactually happening?
And the fact checkers come backand they're like, uh, it's even
worse than he says it is.
Aarati (36:06):
Oh, no.
Arpita (36:07):
So they send this book to the president at the time,
Theodore Roosevelt.
And then this book becomes thishuge sensation.
He was really hoping to getpeople's public sympathy about
the workers.
Aarati (36:19):
Yeah.
Arpita (36:19):
No one gave a shit about the workers and they were just
like, what is happening in themeat industry?
And there's this famous quotefrom Upton Sinclair.
Quote,"I aimed for the public'sheart.
And by accident, I hit it in thestomach" end quote.
Aarati (36:34):
That's a great quote.
I love that But it's so true.
Like I can totally see thatpeople would be like, oh my god
That's what oh I'm eatingbecause it directly affects them
and they wouldn't care about
Arpita (36:45):
They
Aarati (36:45):
like these workers that they don't know or yeah, like,
why would you?
Yeah, I can totally see that.
I
Arpita (36:51):
They do not care.
And so someone sends a copy toTheodore Roosevelt, and he's
reading this book, and he wasinvolved in this whole Cuba
incident, way back in 1898, andso then now he has, like,
flashbacks from that, and he'slike, oh, shoot, like, this is
really bad.
And so In 1906, they passed theMeat Inspection Act, which
(37:12):
controls slaughterhouses, andthe Food and Drug Act, which is
looking at the prohibition ofadditives.
So now we have the Pure Food andDrug Law, which is looking at
making sure that we know what'sin our food.
Like, just the basics.
Listing ingredients, the MeatInspection Act, and then also
the Food and Drug Act that'slooking at additives.
So we're slowly but surelymoving in the right direction.
Aarati (37:34):
We're making some good progress here.
Arpita (37:36):
So the first additive that was banned, was
formaldehyde.
And it was found to be verydangerous to ingest.
And this is something thatslowly started being phased out
of food.
Aarati (37:46):
Yeah.
I can't, I can't even imaginepeople eating formaldehyde.
Like, that's just
Arpita (37:51):
It also smells so bad, like, formaldehyde, like, smells
disgusting,
Aarati (37:56):
It smells so gross.
Arpita (37:58):
It smells so bad.
I mean it is a preservative so.
Aarati (38:01):
You know, in biology class where you have to do,
like, dissections and stuff?
I was so close to gaggingbecause, I just couldn't stand
the smell.
I had to leave the classroom fora minute just to like, breathe
some fresh air.
And I'm not the student to dothat.
But I was just like, I have toleave right now or I'm going to
throw up, literally.
And I just needed to exit theclassroom, stand in the hall for
(38:22):
a minute.
Gather myself.
Yeah.
Arpita (38:25):
Cadaver lab was the worst, I hated it so much.
Aarati (38:28):
And I can't imagine eating that.
Oh, uh, Yeah, So gross.
Okay, so it makes sense.
That's the first one on thechopping block
Arpita (38:37):
It's the first one on the chopping block.
And so now he has a new target,and he targets Coca Cola in
1908, and originally there waslike a problem here of their
using cocaine, but that hadactually already stopped by
1909, but the thing that he wasfighting against was the
excessive use of caffeine and atthis point, they knew that
caffeine was really addictiveand they were like, we're giving
(38:58):
coke to children.
And so he sues, or he, like,files a suit against Coca Cola,
and they went to trial in 1911,where Coca Cola argued that it
could be drunk with no illeffects and it wasn't addictive
and it wasn't misleading and itdidn't have cocaine.
The courts decided that Harveyhad gone too far, and Coke was
(39:20):
not found to be guilty ofbreaching the Food and Drug Act,
and the president at the time,President Taft, was pressured
into firing Harvey, because thiswas just such a landmark case
and they didn't win.
And so he resigns, hisleadership of the chemistry
bureau and he's, in a way, alittle bit relieved because from
(39:42):
the beginning, the Pure Food andDrugs Act was such a big
problem, and enforcing it wassuch a nightmare, and he just
fought such a good fight for nowso many years, and he was
honestly kind of over it.
And despite all this publicpressure that they were saying
against President Taft, sayinglike that Harvey was so
(40:04):
valuable, they're like, howcould you possibly do this?
Aarati (40:07):
Yeah.
Arpita (40:07):
He ends up leaving the Bureau.
Aarati (40:10):
Oh, that's kind of sad, but I totally understand.
It's like a David versus Goliathkind of
Arpita (40:14):
Yes,
Aarati (40:15):
he's just tired.
Arpita (40:17):
Exactly.
And it's like he unfortunatelyleaves on a little bit of a low
note, but
Aarati (40:22):
Mm hmm.
Arpita (40:23):
It is what it is.
Aarati (40:24):
Yeah.
Arpita (40:25):
Um, and then he takes over the laboratories of Good
Housekeeping magazine.
And so I'm sure you've seenbefore, there's the Good
Housekeeping seal of approval,uh, like on a certain product.
He started that and he was oneof the chemists at Good
Housekeeping who analyzed andtested countless products and
help people choose the bestthings for their home.
(40:47):
And his goal, I know he wasworking for a corporation, but
his goal was really to educatethe public and make sure that
they were consuming the bestpossible things for themselves
and their homes and theirfamilies.
So he really cared about that.
Aarati (41:00):
That's really smart.
And so like every product thathad this little badge on it,
like when you went to thegrocery store, you could look
for that seal of approval andknow that you were buying some
quality product.
Arpita (41:09):
Something that was good for you and good Exactly.
Um, and he stayed with GoodHousekeeping then for 18 years.
So that was like the rest of hiscareer.
Yeah.
Aarati (41:19):
Wow.
That's amazing.
Arpita (41:21):
And on June 30th, 1930, um, he died in his home in
Washington, D.
C., and he's now buried in theArlington National Cemetery.
Eventually, we replaced the PureFood and Drug Act with the Food,
Drug, and Cosmetic Act in 1938,which gave way to the modern
(41:42):
FDA.
We've had tons of amendments tothe FDA's power, including the
Food Traceability EnhancementAct and trying to understand all
of the different components andprocesses that go into our food
and drugs and the things that weput in our body, but we still
have a lot of problems in ourFDA, as we both know.
(42:03):
That makes it difficult toenforce a lot of different
aspects of food and drug safety,but it is one of like the
biggest entities into protectingall things that go inside of our
body.
And the reason it exists isbecause of Harvey Washington
Wiley.
Aarati (42:18):
That is amazing.
Arpita (42:20):
Yeah.
Aarati (42:21):
Wow.
Arpita (42:21):
That's the story!
Aarati (42:23):
That's just, that's such an amazing, like, I didn't, I
didn't know it started with,formaldehyde in food.
That's crazy.
Arpita (42:30):
It started in a really bad place.
Aarati (42:31):
To me.
Yeah.
And, and now I'm like, you know,it just brings up for me, the
whole argument where people arefeeling like vaccines are unsafe
and I'm like, I don't think thatthey would allow mercury in
vaccines.
Like we've come so far, we'vecome so far.
Like that's the whole point ofthe FDA to make sure that these
(42:52):
kinds of chemicals don't end upin our bodies in unsafe amounts,
like, you know, it's suchrigorous testing, and it's so
important to keep funding thatkind of research So,
Arpita (43:05):
I thought his whole, like, crusade against, like,
fighting the big fight againstCongress and all the lobbyists
was just, like, so relevant andso interesting, too.
Aarati (43:12):
It's so relevant.
Yeah.
Arpita (43:14):
And this idea of just, like, you can't police what I'm
putting in my body.
I was like, goddammit, like,we're, like, still having this
conversation.
Like we moved the needle at all.
Yeah, exactly.
Aarati (43:24):
Yeah, yeah, but I think like, that's part of the reason
I, feel like sciencecommunication is so important
because I'm like, you know,these scientists who work for
the FDA or, work in, you know,universities and things like
that.
They dedicate their lives tomaking sure that things are safe
and drugs are safe, food issafe, you know, and it's, it's
(43:47):
really like, trust the experts,you know, like they've, they've
made sure that these things aresafe, and are actually efficient
and actually protective, andgood for you.
So I think it's such importantresearch and I'm so glad that
you did his story so that wecould kind of see
Arpita (44:05):
Yeah.
where we started and like howmuch work goes Yeah,
Aarati (44:08):
into it.
Arpita (44:09):
Like both how far we've come and also like how not far
we've come.
Aarati (44:13):
Yeah.
Like how much there is yet togo.
Arpita (44:17):
Yeah,
Aarati (44:18):
Yeah.
Arpita (44:19):
Literally.
Aarati (44:19):
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
Great story though.
Arpita (44:22):
Thank you.
Aarati (44:25):
Thanks for listening.
If you have a suggestion for astory we should cover or
thoughts you want to share aboutan episode, reach out to us at
smartteapodcast.
com.
You can follow us on Instagramand Twitter at smartteapodcast
and listen to us on Spotify,Apple podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts and leave us arating or comment.
It really helps us grow.
Episodes are released everyother Wednesday.
(44:46):
See you next time.
Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Smart Tea Podcast,
where we talk about the lives ofscientists and innovators who
shaped the world.
How's it going, Arpita?
Arpita (00:19):
It's going.
I feel like this week was Threeyears long.
Aarati (00:24):
This week has been such a rollercoaster.
It's been just insane.
I'm just, like, my emotions aretapped out.
All my emotions.
I, I just don't know what to doanymore.
Arpita (00:36):
same.
I feel so drained and I guess onthat, up of that roller coaster,
um, happy birthday.
Ha ha ha ha.
Aarati (00:48):
know,
Arpita (00:48):
does it feel to be a year older and wiser?
Ha ha ha
Aarati (00:52):
I don't know about wiser, but
Arpita (00:54):
ha.
Definitely.
Aarati (00:56):
I don't know.
It, it almost, it's, it's alwaysbittersweet.
My birthday for a while now hasalways been tied to negative
things in my life.
It's always been like aroundelection time, which is emotions
are running high with a lot ofpeople.
And, you know, especially thisyear, the election obviously
didn't go the way we wanted itto, and everyone is still
(01:19):
reeling from that.
And then all my friends arelike, Oh, but by the way, happy
birthday.
Arpita (01:25):
ha.
Aarati (01:26):
Thanks.
Thanks for remembering me.
I appreciate the thought.
And I know everybody's like,emotions are in such a negative
state, there's like so muchdepression and anger and
sadness.
And then they're like, oh, butwe still love you.
Arpita (01:41):
It's like such a mixed bag.
One of my really good friends,you know.
His birthday was yesterday andhe said the exact same thing.
He was just like, I think I wantto, um, take a rain check on my
birthday and celebrate it later.
And I was like, honestly, that'sfine by me.
Like, I totally get it.
Like, this feels like a bad weekto do that.
Aarati (02:00):
Yeah.
It's just like, you can't getinto the celebratory mood, you
know?
Arpita (02:04):
Totally get it.
Totally get it.
Aarati (02:06):
On the bright side, I did get An e reader.
I got a Kobo e reader.
Um, it's like not a Kindle, buta Kobo.
Yeah.
It's like Kindle's competitor,So, I've just been diving into
like fictional worlds to makemyself.
Yeah.
Just forget about what's goingon.
I'm just like, yeah, I'm justgoing to read a fantasy book and
(02:28):
forget that I live in realityfor a little while.
Arpita (02:31):
No, it's the best.
I was a huge naysayer for areally long time.
I was like, I only like physicalbooks.
I don't want a Kindle.
And probably like three or fouryears now, I got a Kindle and I
love it.
It is like my like fifthappendage, honestly.
I use it.
All the time.
I take it with me everywhere.
If I'm waiting in line or on thetrain, I'm always reading my
(02:54):
Kindle and it's just soconvenient to have it for
travel.
And yeah, I read it all thetime.
Aarati (02:59):
For me, I'm like, the biggest thing is.
I usually read before I go tobed, and it really does help me
fall asleep, so I've beenreally, really happy with that.
Yeah, just been like, cuddlingunder the blankets, reading
until I fall asleep, and it'sbeen great.
Arpita (03:14):
Have you seen the, the stand that people have that they
Aarati (03:18):
I have,
Arpita (03:20):
That's what I've asked for for my birthday this year.
Aarati (03:22):
Oh, really?
Arpita (03:24):
Yeah.
Aarati (03:25):
Okay, noted.
Arpita (03:26):
I want stand and the Bluetooth remote.
Um, because it's getting coldand I just want to keep my hands
in my bed then just have theKindle right above my eyeballs
so that I can just click it.
Aarati (03:39):
That sounds amazing.
Arpita (03:41):
like, Logan's not going to see me all winter.
I'm just going to be in my bedreading the Kindle.
Aarati (03:46):
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, but that was nice.
I did like a lot of research asto like which e reader I wanted
and stuff like that.
And then my mom paid for it.
So like, you know, cause that'swhat my family does.
They, they don't do likesurprise gifts at all.
They're just like, what do youwant?
I'll get it for you.
And I'm like, okay, that works.
I guess at least, I know I'mgetting something I want.
(04:07):
So.
Arpita (04:08):
No, A plus.
Charge it to your mom's creditcard.
That's the best idea ever heard.
Aarati (04:13):
Yeah, exactly, so it's like, she's like, okay, great, I
did my duty, I gave you a gift,and I'm like, yes, you did,
thank you,
Arpita (04:20):
I always think so funny when my family does that too and
it's like let's pretend that I'mnot a grown ass adult
Aarati (04:26):
I know, yeah,
Arpita (04:27):
Who can buy my own things.
Aarati (04:30):
I was dropping serious hints, I was like, so, I think
I'm gonna get this at some pointvery soon.
By the way, then they're like,yeah, exactly.
Arpita (04:40):
A week away from my birthday.
Aarati (04:42):
Exactly.
I'm like, I think this is goingto be like my birthday gift to
myself.
And they're like, Oh no, you canjust use my credit card to buy
it.
And I'm like, great.
That's what wanted all along.
Perfect.
Yeah.
Arpita (04:54):
I love that.
Aarati (04:55):
Yeah.
Anywho.
maybe we can further escapereality by talking about
hopefully a good, uh, scientiststory.
So who do you have today?
Arpita (05:07):
Yeah, I'm excited about today's.
Uh, today is Harvey WashingtonWiley, who I have never heard of
before, but he is the reasonthat we have the FDA and our
food is actually safe to eat.
And so during research for thisepisode, I found some real gross
stuff that used to happen withour food that no happens and
(05:28):
it's thanks to him.
Aarati (05:30):
Sounds amazing.
I'm so excited.
Arpita (05:34):
Ok so let's dive in.
So Harvey Washington Wiley wasborn in a log cabin in Indiana
in 1844.
He was the sixth of seven kids,and he was raised on this big
farm, and because they lived atthat southernmost tip of
Indiana.
They were actually right acrossthe river from Kentucky.
(05:54):
And at that point in time,Kentucky still had slavery
legal, but Indiana did notbecause they were part of the
North.
And so his parents were actuallyconductors on the Underground
Railroad and they helped slavesescape into the North.
So that's what his likechildhood was involved in.
Aarati (06:11):
Oh my gosh, that's amazing.
Arpita (06:13):
I know.
Aarati (06:14):
Amazing childhood.
That's great.
Arpita (06:16):
Yeah.
So it's like pre civil war.
So he actually went to collegefor one year at Hanover college
in 1863.
And then he enlisted with theunion army in 1864.
And then he fought in theAmerican civil war.
Um, and at the end of the war,he was a corporal and he went
back to Hanover College in 1865,majored in humanities and
(06:39):
graduated in 1867.
Aarati (06:41):
Oh, that's interesting.
He was a humanities major?
Arpita (06:45):
yeah.
Aarati (06:45):
So like not, not a science major from the get go.
Cause so many of our storiesstart with like, oh, they were
interested in nature, they wereinterested in science from a
very young but right now it'ssounding like he's very much
like a social justice type ofperson.
Arpita (06:59):
Yeah.
It is.
I'm not super sure what histransition was because the next
thing that I found is that afterthat he went and got his MD.
So I'm not really sure if therewas like a specific course or
something that he was interestedin that like really spurred his
interest into science.
Aarati (07:15):
Yeah, or even just like he wanted to help people and
like, again, a doctor is a veryclear way to be able to help
people.
So maybe that was it.
Okay.
Interesting though, that'sreally interesting that his
background wasn't alwaysscience.
Arpita (07:30):
Right.
It wasn't.
It wasn't.
Yeah.
And so now he, now he has hisMD.
And so then after he gets hisMD, he starts teaching chemistry
at this medical college and hetaught, Indiana Medical
College's first lab course inchemistry.
And then he moved on to afaculty position and he was
(07:51):
appointed state chemist ofIndiana.
Aarati (07:54):
State chemist?
What is that?
Arpita (07:56):
Like, just like I think it's a regulatory government
position, what it sounds like.
So, I'm kind of getting ahead ofmyself, but like He then becomes
a chemist for the federalgovernment.
So I think he's starting at thestate level right now.
And he's like inspecting, likeanything that comes through
either agriculture, food, drugs,anything.
Aarati (08:18):
Do we have positions like that today where you can
like be a scientist for thestate or for the, for the
government?
Arpita (08:26):
We do, especially part of the department of
agriculture.
Aarati (08:29):
I suppose like if you work for the FDA now, or you
work for the DOE or somethinglike that, or some sort of
federal government entity, thenyou would be a scientist for the
state or for the government.
That makes sense.
Arpita (08:43):
Correct.
Yeah, that's exactly right.
Aarati (08:46):
I've just never heard the term like, chemist for the
state.
Like, I think it's throwing meoff.
Arpita (08:52):
Um, yeah, so then he takes a little break, he travels
to Germany, and he spends sometime learning with this man,
August Wilhelm von Hoffman.
And I'd never heard of him, butvon Hoffman was someone who
discovered a lot of differentchemicals that are used in
manufacturing and processing.
(09:12):
Most of them are derived fromtar, like aniline.
Aarati (09:15):
hmm.
Arpita (09:16):
It's used in dyes, rubber processing, and a lot of
like mechanical manufacturing,which was kind of the turn of
the century and was like reallyimportant around this like
industrialization period.
And so he works with Hoffmanwhile he's in Germany.
And he spends some time at theImperial Food Laboratory in
Bismarck working with this otherman named Eugene Sell.
(09:39):
And he's studying sugarchemistry.
So the United States at thispoint was importing sugar from
West Africa, from the Caribbean,all these different places, but
they were trying to establish adomestic sugar industry.
And so Harvey was trying tolearn as much as he could.
And so when he came back toIndiana and Purdue University,
(10:00):
he was asked to analyze all thesugars and syrups that were
available on the market to seehow they were processed and to
see if there was like anyadulteration or how they could
continue replicating this andscale the sugar industry.
Aarati (10:15):
Wow, that's actually a really big undertaking when you
think about it, because sugar isin like literally everything.
So that's, that's a hugeproject.
Arpita (10:25):
it is.
At this point, it really wasn'tas ubiquitous as we think about
it today, like especiallysyrups, but regardless.
They were, it was still a reallybig crop that they were trying
to figure out how to not import,
Aarati (10:37):
Yeah, I can totally imagine that because that would
save you so much money if youcould grow that at home.
Yeah.
Arpita (10:43):
Exactly.
So he spends a few yearsstudying sorghum, which is
another grain, as well as sugarchemistry, just try to see if
this would take off.
And It didn't happen as we know,but in 1881, he published his
first paper on what he found,which was that a lot of sugar
was adulterated with glucose.
(11:04):
So it wasn't actually allsucrose the way that we thought
it was.
Aarati (11:07):
So wait, So the sucrose is coming from the sugarcane
plant, I'm assuming, and thenchemists were adding glucose or
was glucose like a byproduct ofwhatever processes that they
did?
Arpita (11:20):
They were passing off the glucose as sucrose.
Aarati (11:22):
Oh, interesting.
Arpita (11:24):
Yeah.
So they were, it was likemisrepresented.
Aarati (11:26):
So they were like synthetically creating glucose
and then using that in syrupsand things instead of using
sucrose, which would have beenmore expensive because they
would have to import that.
Arpita (11:37):
Correct.
And it's, it's just sweet, butwhat they're doing is
misrepresenting what they'reselling.
Aarati (11:42):
Ah, got you..
Yeah.
So all these people are like,real sugar in this product and
it's
Arpita (11:47):
and it's not Exactly.
Exactly right.
Aarati (11:50):
Wow.
Arpita (11:51):
So that leads me to the next point, which is, at this
point in history, there were nolaws on food safety or making
sure that what's in your food iswhat you say it actually is.
Um, there's no regulation.
So at this point, Europe andCanada have some regulations,
but the U.
S.
was really slow to the uptake.
So, In the 19th century, therewas a ton of resistance to the
(12:12):
idea of the federal government,quote, policing what people eat.
So it's like the similar ethosto like what we hear today of
just like, nobody tells me whatto do, individual rights, and
this American mentality that isstill so pervasive today.
So this idea of the federalgovernment regulating what's in
food was met with a ton ofresistance.
Aarati (12:32):
I can totally see that.
Like, given the politicalclimate today and the things
that we are arguing about anddebating about today, I can
totally see this argumenthappening and people saying
like, you have no right tocontrol what food I eat.
Arpita (12:46):
That is exactly what's happening right now.
However, Harvey sees thatthere's a real problem here.
And so to help combat publicopinion, he commissions a
medical journalist to basicallydo some scicomm and to write out
findings in an understandablemanner for both the public and
the politicians to help themlearn about all of the dangers
(13:08):
for what was in food currently,so some of the things that they
found were embalmed milk.
So they were adding formaldehydeto milk to keep it from going
bad.
Aarati (13:18):
Oh, my God.
That just sounds horrible.
Embalmed milk is like such aterrible phrase.
Okay,
Arpita (13:25):
Um, they were adding copper sulfate to canned green
beans to make them more green.
Um, there's all sorts ofproblems.
Those are like two of the weirdones...
Aarati (13:36):
Sorry.
Copper sulfate.
Like, that reminds me of theStatue of Liberty turning green.
It's like that, that's literallywhat they're doing.
Like, the Statue of Liberty isgreen because it's made of
copper, and now they're addingthat into green beans,
Arpita (13:49):
Correct.
To make them
Aarati (13:50):
greener.
Oxidizes But, like, that's asimilar like
Arpita (13:53):
So it's like when you open the can, the beans look
greener.
Um,
Aarati (13:57):
Oh my God.
Yikes.
Arpita (13:58):
And the reason that both of these things were happening
was that there's suddenly thisindustrialization problem.
So usually people were not veryfar away from the food that was
grown.
And now that there was cities,there was this huge problem of
trying to get large amounts offood to people in cities without
it going bad.
And this was pre refrigeration.
It's pre preservatives oranything like that.
(14:20):
So there was this big problem oftrying to get food to people
without it going bad.
And so like formaldehyde toprevent bacteria from growing
and then like trying to make thebeans like once they start
rotting actually look green.
So then people will still eatthem.
Like a lot of these problemscame from like a transportation
logistics place.
Aarati (14:38):
That makes a lot of sense.
So it's like, I guess theirheart was in the right place,
but man, that's scary.
Like, oh my god.
Arpita (14:47):
This unfortunate story gets worse before it gets
better.
So even though they werepublishing all these papers,
people weren't really thatconcerned and paying attention.
And when things changed was in1898, when U.
S.
soldiers were fighting in Cubaduring the Spanish American War.
The food that they sent from themainland to Cuba included meat
(15:11):
that was chemically preserved.
A lot of it was spoiled.
A lot of it was, like, reallybad to eat.
The soldiers found bones andother unsavory parts of the
animal and it caused a recordnumber of illnesses, like
dysentery and food poisoning.
And these soldiers already kindof had malaria and yellow fever
and basically all the thingsthat you get from being in,
(15:32):
like, a tropical climate.
And so this didn't make thingsbetter.
And the general, the SpanishAmerican war general, Nelson
Miles, was like, this is anoutrage.
Like, this cannot be the waythat we are treating American
soldiers who are fighting forour freedom.
Um, and so he reported this tonewspapers and generally tried
to talk to anybody who wouldlisten to make the public aware
(15:55):
that these were the conditionsthe American soldiers were
serving in, and this finally gotthe public alarmed and
interested about what wasactually in their food.
Aarati (16:05):
Oh nice.
Yeah, like tie it to patriotism.
That'll, you know, get peopleoff their butts.
Yeah.
Arpita (16:11):
I know, because there was that other episode that we
had about MDMA and like, untilpeople started using it for
veterans and PTSD, it's like, noone actually gave a shit.
And it was like, finally theycame around.
They were like, this is apopulation that people are
universally sympathetic towards.
Aarati (16:26):
Yeah.
And also it's like, it's amilitary issue, right?
You're weakening our military bygiving them rotten food, like,
that's not good.
This is a security issue.
This is a defense issue.
It can actually affect how ourmilitary operates and how
successful they are.
Arpita (16:44):
Yeah, no, that's right.
I was doing some digging to belike, what did, I mean, wars
before this also didn't haverefrigeration and preservatives.
So what did they do?
So I guess what actually endedup happening is they got local
supplies for all previous wars,so it didn't have to transport
very much.
So they would like, take oversome village or whatever.
And then that's where they wouldget all their supplies from.
(17:07):
And I guess that wasn't possiblein Cuba, largely because of
infrastructure.
And so they had to shipeverything in from the mainland
that's where the problem came.
Aarati (17:18):
That's really interesting.
I'm just getting like images ofthese soldiers who are fighting
this, battle and it's like,okay, it's dinner time.
It's lunchtime and it looksgood.
Like, cause they probably added,it didn't look good.
Like, cause I was imagining theyadded all these preservatives to
make it at least look okay.
But like, no?
Arpita (17:38):
No.
I read something that was like,it was like gray and like
smelled bad and like, madepeople sick universally.
It was like so bad.
Aarati (17:46):
Oh no, I feel so bad for them.
Arpita (17:48):
I know, it's disgusting.
Aarati (17:50):
Okay, cause I thought it, I thought it would at least,
like, look okay, but then itstill made them sick because,
you
Arpita (17:55):
It didn't seem like it looked, smelled, or felt or
anything
Aarati (17:59):
Oh god, okay, that just makes it, like, 10 times worse
because you can see that you'reeating rotten food.
Arpita (18:05):
Okay so then at this point Harvey gets offered the
position of chief chemist in theU.
S.
Department of Agriculture, USDAin 1882.
Um, so he's still reallyinterested in this idea that
food isn't safe, but what he'shired to do is to continue this
sugar study.
So they were really looking forsomeone to help further the
(18:26):
study of sorghum because he hadalready worked on it.
Um, and he took this job becausehe's still living in Indiana and
he had applied for the job ofpresident of the University at
Purdue, but he didn't get thejob because he was quote, too
young and too jovial, unorthodoxin his religious beliefs, and a
bachelor.
And so he had all these likepings against him.
(18:49):
So then he ended up taking thisjob at the USDA and he moved to
Washington.
Aarati (18:55):
Oh my gosh.
That's so funny.
Like you're too happy to be ascientist.
Arpita (18:58):
I know, I think they just needed like a solemn kind
of old man.
And he was that he was like ayoung, happy dude.
And so he got passed over forthe job.
Aarati (19:07):
And also like unorthodox in his religious views is also
an interesting phrase there.
Arpita (19:12):
Yeah, he is an atheist and was public about it and they
wanted someone who
Aarati (19:19):
Yeah,
Arpita (19:20):
was more traditional basically.
He's in Washington and when hejoins the USDA, there's a fewer
than a dozen chemists at theagency.
And to your point, chemists wereresponsible for all the
agricultural chemistry issues inthe U.
S., including pesticides, cropgrowth, and soil quality.
(19:40):
And he is officially working onthis like sugar sorghum project,
but he starts this side projectthat is trying to test the
integrity of the American foodsupply.
So he gets this tiny group ofchemists who start doing a
series of reports under thissuper boring name, Bulletin 13.
(20:01):
And they look at dairy, cannedvegetables, coffee and tea, wine
and beer, spices, and processedmeats, and they do a deep dive
and they find really, really badthings.
Aarati (20:14):
Oh dear.
Okay, I'm bracing myself.
Arpita (20:16):
So, Some of it's not that bad.
So some of it was just actuallyfraud.
So spices were like a big thing.
So they were almost alwaysadulterated so if you're buying
cinnamon, you were actuallybuying brick dust.
If you were buying pepper, youwere potentially buying dirt or
charred bits of stuff.
Aarati (20:35):
Oh, my goodness.
Arpita (20:36):
If you're buying coffee, sometimes you were just getting
like ground up shells ofsomething.
People would grind up bones andcharred lead into coffee.
If you got flour, you'reprobably also getting gypsum,
which is like a mineral.
If you got milk, you got chalkor plaster of Paris and actual
milk was full of tons ofbacteria because there was no
(20:57):
pasteurization or refrigeration.
and like we said, people wereputting formaldehyde in milk.
And people are getting sick allthe time, but like, no one
really knows why.
And the bottom line here is thateverything that I just mentioned
was totally legal.
Like, there's no repercussionfor this.
Like, companies can do whateverthey want, and there's no
(21:17):
retribution for how food isbeing processed at all.
Aarati (21:21):
Oh, my gosh.
That's so scary.
And I can just imagine all thesefood companies campaigning
against regulations.
And him fighting for, goodscience communications to kind
of get the people to understandthat, like, hey, that cinnamon
that you're eating is actually
Arpita (21:38):
Bricks.
So that's what happens next.
So like I said, there's norequirement to honestly label
anything at the time, and he'snoticing that there's tons of
additives.
So we've mentioned formaldehyde,but another one is salicylic
acid, which when you eat itcauses the lining of your
stomach to bleed, among otherthings, like bad things happen
your body.
And so he's really trying to getpeople to care about the fact
(22:01):
that there are poisons in theirfood that they're consuming.
And it seems totally reasonableto us, but there's so much
industry resistance this becausethey're trying to meet a bottom
line like this would cause a tonof increases in their costs and
nothing that he proposes becausehe works with the federal
government.
So like nothing he proposes,none of the measures he proposes
even get like remote attention.
(22:23):
He goes to Congress.
They laugh him out of like,laugh him out of the room,
basically.
And at this point, a lot ofCongress people are being funded
by these big industryexecutives, food industry
executives.
So they're like, notincentivized to care all because
they're getting funding from thefood industry.
So this is all this big circlewhere no one is paying attention
(22:45):
to him.
Aarati (22:46):
I feel like it's exactly what's still happening today,
just on different issues.
Arpita (22:50):
Totally.
Just different issues.
Aarati (22:51):
Yeah, just, it's kind of disheartening to know that it's
always been like this,
Arpita (22:55):
Yes.
Yes.
It's like insert issue here.
Like yeah, totally.
Aarati (23:00):
And then you have the whole industry on one side
campaigning against him.
You have the people who, in theCongress, who don't really care,
and, or are being funded bythese industries.
And then you have the scientiststhat are, like, trying to get
the public to care.
It's a struggle to get them tounderstand or care about the
issue.
Yeah.
Arpita (23:17):
that's exactly what ends up happening.
So he is really trying to getthe public on his side.
So in 1902, he gets$5, 000 as astipend to study the effects of
a diet containing all of thesepreservatives.
So to do this, he gets a bunchof human volunteers and he calls
them his.
quote, Poison Squad.
(23:38):
And the tests that he conductsare called the Hygienic Table
Trials.
And so during these trials, hegets 12 young dudes basically,
and they put vigorous andvoracious and he fed them and
gave them room and board in thebasement of the agricultural
department in Washington.
(23:58):
And so before each meal, the menwere weighed and any changes to
their condition were noted.
And so out of the 12, he got 6of them where they were fed
quote,"wholesome, unadulteratedfood" and then the other 6 were
fed food laced with additivessuch as borax, formaldehyde, and
(24:18):
salicylic acid, and every 2weeks they switched.
Aarati (24:23):
Oh, interesting.
Okay.
Arpita (24:25):
And so the subjects got.
5 a month and free food andboard to be basically
systemically poisoned.
And they were told, they weretold this is
Aarati (24:35):
what they were going to do.
Yeah.
Arpita (24:35):
Like, it wasn't like a,
Aarati (24:37):
But I can totally see young, young dudes being like,
yeah, that sounds like a great,yeah, great deal, I'm in.
Arpita (24:43):
They were so into it.
I was like reading somethingabout it and they were like,
this sounds really bad, but heactually had people lining up to
participate in this.
Like,
Aarati (24:51):
yeah, 100%, you're gonna pay me 5, give me room and board
and food?
Like, totally,
Arpita (24:56):
I don't care it's gross.
Aarati (24:58):
Yeah, I can, I can weather any storm, like, I'm
strong and young and, yeah,sure,
Arpita (25:02):
That's like exactly, there was like a quote from a
letter.
I don't think I ended upincluding it, but there was a
quote from a letter of some guyasking to participate.
He said that he had a stomach ofiron or something.
And he was like, yeah, I'll eatanything.
Like I'll participate in yourstudy.
Aarati (25:15):
I can so see this.
This is amazing.
Arpita (25:18):
I know it's like, boys have really not changed at all
in
Aarati (25:21):
Yeah.
Arpita (25:22):
130 years.
Aarati (25:24):
Not at all.
No, I can, I can, I can seecollege students doing this a
hundred percent.
Arpita (25:28):
exactly, it's like they're, yeah, they were just
like, they were probably like intheir early twenties.
Yeah.
Aarati (25:32):
Yeah, absolutely.
Um, what was the.
logic behind switching every twoweeks?
Was he, like, wanting to studypatterns, like, to see if they
got better and worse and betterand worse?
Arpita (25:44):
exactly.
Exactly.
Aarati (25:48):
Hi everyone, Aarati here.
I hope you're enjoying thepodcast.
If so, and you wish someonewould tell your science story, I
founded a science communicationscompany called Sykom, that's S Y
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(26:11):
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Check us out at sykommer.
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That's S Y K O M M E R dot com.
Okay, back to the story.
Arpita (26:29):
So the experiment started in November 1902.
And even though they started inreally high spirits by
Christmas, they were pretty sad.
So there was a Washington Postarticle from December 26th, and
it reads, quote,"The borax dietis beginning to show its effect
on Dr.
Wiley's government fed boardersat the Bureau of Chemistry.
And last night, when theofficial weights were taken just
(26:51):
before the Christmas dinner, thesix guests who were taking the
chemical course showed a slightdecrease and lost their flesh.
On Christmas Day, when probablyeverybody else in Washington
gained more or less fromfeasting and was regarded by the
boarders themselves as doublysignificant." end quote.
Aarati (27:08):
Oh my gosh, poor babies!
Arpita (27:10):
So they're real sad.
Yeah.
They're sad.
Aarati (27:13):
Poor guys.
Like you get feast laced withborax.
That's
Arpita (27:17):
That's exactly what it was.
I think there was like actuallylike a menu on, hold on, I had
it somewhere.
Oh yeah.
It's like applesauce.
Borax, soup, borax, turkey,borax, canned string beans,
sweet potatoes, white potatoes,turnip, borax, chip beef laced
with borax, cream gravy,cranberry sauce, celery,
(27:37):
pickles, rice pudding, milk,formaldehyde, bread and butter,
tea, coffee, borax.
Aarati (27:43):
Oh my god.
Arpita (27:45):
I like did not make that up, that's like actually from
the Washington
Aarati (27:48):
That is crazy.
Oh my goodness.
What, what a crazy menu.
That sounds like a deliciousChristmas feast.
Arpita (27:56):
So the guys who were participating in the study are
the ones who talked to the pressand because Harvey was really
trying to like preserve theintegrity of this study, he
finally issued like an ordersaying that they couldn't talk
about it until he finished thestudy.
But even though he said this,people had already talked to the
press and the public wereinterested and tons of people
(28:17):
were talking and writing aboutthis.
Aarati (28:19):
You know what this of?
Is, have you, have you seenthat, uh, documentary, Supersize
Me?
Arpita (28:26):
Mm hmm.
Aarati (28:26):
Yeah, that's what this reminds me of.
That guy eating, like,McDonald's for every single
meal, and like, testing hisweight and his cholesterol and
all these, like, things.
Arpita (28:36):
That's more or less what's happening here.
Aarati (28:38):
And then everyone gets really interested in what's in
my fast food and how does it,yeah, yeah.
It's like you need to actuallysee the effects firsthand, kind
of.
Arpita (28:49):
In like a A-B test.
Aarati (28:50):
Yeah, like a national experiment that everyone can see
the results of in real time.
Arpita (28:57):
Exactly.
No, exactly.
Harvey is obviously buoyed byall of this and becomes a
crusader in building support fornational food and drug
regulation.
And he enacted, a bill whicheventually passed in 1906 called
the Pure Food and Drugs Act.
And the enforcement of this actwas given to the Bureau of
(29:19):
Chemistry because of theirunique scientific qualifications
to examine food and drugs.
So the very first food and druginspectors in the U.
S.
were hired to complement thework of laboratory scientists.
And that was like, they'reinspecting things basically on a
very, very small scale.
And this inspection programchanged the way that we thought
(29:39):
about food supply.
Within about a decade or so.
So this is like kind of lookingforward, but that's kind of like
the long term sequelae and howthis was enforced.
Um, and this is the act that hethought of and initially
proposed, which finally passedin 1906.
Aarati (29:56):
So, are they, since it's food and drug, are they also
looking at medicines now,?
Arpita (30:01):
Yeah, I think they technically are, but this is pre
FDA.
Aarati (30:06):
Okay.
Yeah, yeah.
It's pre FDA, but I can see thateven with medications, if you
think you're getting, you know,ibuprofen or something, but it's
actually laced with chalk orsomething like that, you know.
I can totally see that happeningif there's no regulations at
this point, and so I was justwondering if they've already
figured that out aboutmedications and are adding this
(30:27):
into the bill that they haveright now.
Arpita (30:30):
Um, yeah, definitely.
So the whole point of the PureFood and Drug Act was really
just to analyze what was inthings or like look at
processing.
There were still a lot of issueson preservatives.
And like how things werepreserved, which is then his
like next problem here.
There was also a lot of issuesaround enforcement.
(30:52):
So that was like anotherconcern.
So even though it existed by thetime it finally passed, it had
been ping ponged around Congressfor so long that like there were
limited funds, it was actuallyjust like, like the idea was
there, but it still wasn't asrobust as it needed to be
Aarati (31:09):
Makes sense.
Yeah, it's just the beginnings.
Yeah,
Arpita (31:12):
Just the beginnings.
So like I mentioned, preservingchemicals, which really weren't
addressed in the Pure Food andDrugs law, continue to be
controversial.
And so the Secretary ofAgriculture appointed a board of
consulting scientists to repeatHarvey's human trials of the
preservatives.
So rather than looking atadditives, they were looking at
(31:33):
preservatives.
And so they're looking at theuse of saccharin and bleached
flour and caffeine and benzoateof soda, like, these are all
things that were used aspreservatives and they were
trying to see how safe theywere.
And so, under Harvey'sleadership,(he's still working
at this Bureau of Chemistry atthe USDA) this whole department
(31:55):
starts to really grow.
Now there's more funding,there's more interest, and he
started out with a budget ofonly like a hundred thousand
dollars, and then by 1906, whenthe pure food and drug law
passed, he was up to almost amillion dollars in the budget.
Aarati (32:13):
Amazing.
Arpita (32:13):
Yeah, so it's like starting gain a ton more
traction.
Aarati (32:16):
Yeah.
Arpita (32:18):
So originally when he first started out thinking
about, you know, food safety tobegin with he was really just
trying to get foods labeledcorrectly and making sure that
people understood what they wereeating
Aarati (32:28):
Mm hmm.
Arpita (32:30):
But then he realized that actually like something
shouldn't be even allowed atall.
Aarati (32:34):
Yeah.
Arpita (32:35):
It's not just awareness.
Like we should just not permitthese things to be consumed.
Aarati (32:39):
Yeah.
You shouldn't give people thechoice to eat bricks if they
want to.
Like, that should just not be anoption.
Arpita (32:45):
So he proposed another food bill, which was really
specifically this one doesn'teven really have a name.
It's like Bill 1202.
And it was basically about this,like banning certain chemicals,
and it didn't even register avote.
It was defeated by foodlobbyists.
And so to counteract this,Harvey very smartly got the
(33:06):
support of a lot of femalegroups.
And at this point, the womencannot vote.
They have no political power.
And he knows this, but he alsoknows that they're very smart.
They're very organized, and theyalso have a lot of domestic
influence.
So they can choose what thingsare being bought and other women
are going to listen to them.
And so now there's this pushtowards at least public
(33:29):
recognition that food is unsafe.
Aarati (33:32):
That's so smart.
Because this this is the timewhen women are like really the
domestic household, you know,people who, buy food, cook the
food, are responsible for thehealth of the family and the
well being of the family.
So that's really, really smart.
Arpita (33:45):
Right.
So now they're trying to exertlike consumer pressure here.
And so, the cookbooks of thetime, there's this cookbook
writer.
Her name is Fanny Farmer.
And she says like, okay, likeyou should add coffee to this
recipe, but just be aware thatit might not actually be coffee
or like, maybe don't use milk inthis recipe because milk might
make you sick.
(34:05):
And she started campaigningunder this big slogan basically
of wanting pure food.
And so then this spilled intowider community health and
welfare calling for publiccontrol of the food system to be
like, this is not safe.
Like we are eating unsafethings.
Aarati (34:23):
Yeah, yeah.
I bet she also maybe couldendorse certain foods that she
knew was safe, like use thisbrand of butter because it is
actually butter and it's notlike, you know, some weird
chemical.
Arpita (34:35):
No, you're spot.
So Heinz, the ketchup brand isactually the first one of the
first companies to actually getbehind this.
And so she does endorse Heinzbecause they changed their
recipe for tomato ketchup toreplace all their chemical
preservatives and then just usevinegar.
And they started in putting allof these different hygienic
practices into their factory.
(34:55):
And they were like, no, you'reright.
Like we should definitely havesafe food practices.
So then this is one of the veryfirst large food brands that
gets their seal of approval.
Aarati (35:04):
Oh, wow.
Arpita (35:05):
So around the same time, Upton Sinclair's The Jungle was
published, which is it revealeda lot of inside information on
the slaughterhouses of Chicago.
So Sinclair first published thiswork in a socialist newspaper
called Appeal to Reason as acall to arms about the plight of
(35:27):
the worker, and he's basicallytrying to explain that the
working conditions inslaughterhouses are really bad.
He finally gets a New York Citypublisher to agree to publish
it, and he has all these, like,descriptions about how horrible
meat processing is, and the moldthat's growing on the meat still
goes into, like, the ham, andthe disease, and, like, the
(35:47):
rotting animals that go into thesausage, like, he tells this
really really graphic story.
Aarati (35:52):
It's gruesome.
Yeah.
Arpita (35:54):
Yes.
And this publisher in New Yorksends fact checkers to Chicago
to be like, is this what'sactually happening?
And the fact checkers come backand they're like, uh, it's even
worse than he says it is.
Aarati (36:06):
Oh, no.
Arpita (36:07):
So they send this book to the president at the time,
Theodore Roosevelt.
And then this book becomes thishuge sensation.
He was really hoping to getpeople's public sympathy about
the workers.
Aarati (36:19):
Yeah.
Arpita (36:19):
No one gave a shit about the workers and they were just
like, what is happening in themeat industry?
And there's this famous quotefrom Upton Sinclair.
Quote,"I aimed for the public'sheart.
And by accident, I hit it in thestomach" end quote.
Aarati (36:34):
That's a great quote.
I love that But it's so true.
Like I can totally see thatpeople would be like, oh my god
That's what oh I'm eatingbecause it directly affects them
and they wouldn't care about
Arpita (36:45):
They
Aarati (36:45):
like these workers that they don't know or yeah, like,
why would you?
Yeah, I can totally see that.
I
Arpita (36:51):
They do not care.
And so someone sends a copy toTheodore Roosevelt, and he's
reading this book, and he wasinvolved in this whole Cuba
incident, way back in 1898, andso then now he has, like,
flashbacks from that, and he'slike, oh, shoot, like, this is
really bad.
And so In 1906, they passed theMeat Inspection Act, which
(37:12):
controls slaughterhouses, andthe Food and Drug Act, which is
looking at the prohibition ofadditives.
So now we have the Pure Food andDrug Law, which is looking at
making sure that we know what'sin our food.
Like, just the basics.
Listing ingredients, the MeatInspection Act, and then also
the Food and Drug Act that'slooking at additives.
So we're slowly but surelymoving in the right direction.
Aarati (37:34):
We're making some good progress here.
Arpita (37:36):
So the first additive that was banned, was
formaldehyde.
And it was found to be verydangerous to ingest.
And this is something thatslowly started being phased out
of food.
Aarati (37:46):
Yeah.
I can't, I can't even imaginepeople eating formaldehyde.
Like, that's just
Arpita (37:51):
It also smells so bad, like, formaldehyde, like, smells
disgusting,
Aarati (37:56):
It smells so gross.
Arpita (37:58):
It smells so bad.
I mean it is a preservative so.
Aarati (38:01):
You know, in biology class where you have to do,
like, dissections and stuff?
I was so close to gaggingbecause, I just couldn't stand
the smell.
I had to leave the classroom fora minute just to like, breathe
some fresh air.
And I'm not the student to dothat.
But I was just like, I have toleave right now or I'm going to
throw up, literally.
And I just needed to exit theclassroom, stand in the hall for
(38:22):
a minute.
Gather myself.
Yeah.
Arpita (38:25):
Cadaver lab was the worst, I hated it so much.
Aarati (38:28):
And I can't imagine eating that.
Oh, uh, Yeah, So gross.
Okay, so it makes sense.
That's the first one on thechopping block
Arpita (38:37):
It's the first one on the chopping block.
And so now he has a new target,and he targets Coca Cola in
1908, and originally there waslike a problem here of their
using cocaine, but that hadactually already stopped by
1909, but the thing that he wasfighting against was the
excessive use of caffeine and atthis point, they knew that
caffeine was really addictiveand they were like, we're giving
(38:58):
coke to children.
And so he sues, or he, like,files a suit against Coca Cola,
and they went to trial in 1911,where Coca Cola argued that it
could be drunk with no illeffects and it wasn't addictive
and it wasn't misleading and itdidn't have cocaine.
The courts decided that Harveyhad gone too far, and Coke was
(39:20):
not found to be guilty ofbreaching the Food and Drug Act,
and the president at the time,President Taft, was pressured
into firing Harvey, because thiswas just such a landmark case
and they didn't win.
And so he resigns, hisleadership of the chemistry
bureau and he's, in a way, alittle bit relieved because from
(39:42):
the beginning, the Pure Food andDrugs Act was such a big
problem, and enforcing it wassuch a nightmare, and he just
fought such a good fight for nowso many years, and he was
honestly kind of over it.
And despite all this publicpressure that they were saying
against President Taft, sayinglike that Harvey was so
(40:04):
valuable, they're like, howcould you possibly do this?
Aarati (40:07):
Yeah.
Arpita (40:07):
He ends up leaving the Bureau.
Aarati (40:10):
Oh, that's kind of sad, but I totally understand.
It's like a David versus Goliathkind of
Arpita (40:14):
Yes,
Aarati (40:15):
he's just tired.
Arpita (40:17):
Exactly.
And it's like he unfortunatelyleaves on a little bit of a low
note, but
Aarati (40:22):
Mm hmm.
Arpita (40:23):
It is what it is.
Aarati (40:24):
Yeah.
Arpita (40:25):
Um, and then he takes over the laboratories of Good
Housekeeping magazine.
And so I'm sure you've seenbefore, there's the Good
Housekeeping seal of approval,uh, like on a certain product.
He started that and he was oneof the chemists at Good
Housekeeping who analyzed andtested countless products and
help people choose the bestthings for their home.
(40:47):
And his goal, I know he wasworking for a corporation, but
his goal was really to educatethe public and make sure that
they were consuming the bestpossible things for themselves
and their homes and theirfamilies.
So he really cared about that.
Aarati (41:00):
That's really smart.
And so like every product thathad this little badge on it,
like when you went to thegrocery store, you could look
for that seal of approval andknow that you were buying some
quality product.
Arpita (41:09):
Something that was good for you and good Exactly.
Um, and he stayed with GoodHousekeeping then for 18 years.
So that was like the rest of hiscareer.
Yeah.
Aarati (41:19):
Wow.
That's amazing.
Arpita (41:21):
And on June 30th, 1930, um, he died in his home in
Washington, D.
C., and he's now buried in theArlington National Cemetery.
Eventually, we replaced the PureFood and Drug Act with the Food,
Drug, and Cosmetic Act in 1938,which gave way to the modern
(41:42):
FDA.
We've had tons of amendments tothe FDA's power, including the
Food Traceability EnhancementAct and trying to understand all
of the different components andprocesses that go into our food
and drugs and the things that weput in our body, but we still
have a lot of problems in ourFDA, as we both know.
(42:03):
That makes it difficult toenforce a lot of different
aspects of food and drug safety,but it is one of like the
biggest entities into protectingall things that go inside of our
body.
And the reason it exists isbecause of Harvey Washington
Wiley.
Aarati (42:18):
That is amazing.
Arpita (42:20):
Yeah.
Aarati (42:21):
Wow.
Arpita (42:21):
That's the story!
Aarati (42:23):
That's just, that's such an amazing, like, I didn't, I
didn't know it started with,formaldehyde in food.
That's crazy.
Arpita (42:30):
It started in a really bad place.
Aarati (42:31):
To me.
Yeah.
And, and now I'm like, you know,it just brings up for me, the
whole argument where people arefeeling like vaccines are unsafe
and I'm like, I don't think thatthey would allow mercury in
vaccines.
Like we've come so far, we'vecome so far.
Like that's the whole point ofthe FDA to make sure that these
(42:52):
kinds of chemicals don't end upin our bodies in unsafe amounts,
like, you know, it's suchrigorous testing, and it's so
important to keep funding thatkind of research So,
Arpita (43:05):
I thought his whole, like, crusade against, like,
fighting the big fight againstCongress and all the lobbyists
was just, like, so relevant andso interesting, too.
Aarati (43:12):
It's so relevant.
Yeah.
Arpita (43:14):
And this idea of just, like, you can't police what I'm
putting in my body.
I was like, goddammit, like,we're, like, still having this
conversation.
Like we moved the needle at all.
Yeah, exactly.
Aarati (43:24):
Yeah, yeah, but I think like, that's part of the reason
I, feel like sciencecommunication is so important
because I'm like, you know,these scientists who work for
the FDA or, work in, you know,universities and things like
that.
They dedicate their lives tomaking sure that things are safe
and drugs are safe, food issafe, you know, and it's, it's
(43:47):
really like, trust the experts,you know, like they've, they've
made sure that these things aresafe, and are actually efficient
and actually protective, andgood for you.
So I think it's such importantresearch and I'm so glad that
you did his story so that wecould kind of see
Arpita (44:05):
Yeah.
where we started and like howmuch work goes Yeah,
Aarati (44:08):
into it.
Arpita (44:09):
Like both how far we've come and also like how not far
we've come.
Aarati (44:13):
Yeah.
Like how much there is yet togo.
Arpita (44:17):
Yeah,
Aarati (44:18):
Yeah.
Arpita (44:19):
Literally.
Aarati (44:19):
Yeah.
Oh my gosh.
Great story though.
Arpita (44:22):
Thank you.
Aarati (44:25):
Thanks for listening.
If you have a suggestion for astory we should cover or
thoughts you want to share aboutan episode, reach out to us at
smartteapodcast.
com.
You can follow us on Instagramand Twitter at smartteapodcast
and listen to us on Spotify,Apple podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts and leave us arating or comment.
It really helps us grow.
Episodes are released everyother Wednesday.
(44:46):
See you next time.
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