46 | OCTOBER 17 • 2019 History of Food Safety How one scientist helped end the century of the ‘ great American stomachache.’ SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER W hile doing research for her most recent book, science writer Deborah Blum learned about Nathan Straus, the Jewish founder of Macy’ s. At the turn of the 20th cen- tury, Straus became a huge advocate for pasteurized milk. In New York during that time, many children were dying from milk-borne pathogens, and he set up free pasteurized milk stations. “Nathan Straus doesn’ t get enough credit for what he did, ” says Blum, author of The Poison Squad: One Chemist’ s Single- Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (Penguin Group). “I spend some time in my book talking about the prob- lems of unpasteurized milk and how dangerous it was. Because Straus had roots in Europe, where they were much more advanced in pasteurization, he proactively used this issue to save lives. “Straus is one of my personal unsung heroes. I love unsung heroes and sing about them. ” The hero at the center of the new book is Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley, a Purdue University chemistry professor named chief chemist at the Department of Agriculture in 1883. Wiley began the investi- gation of food and drink fraud and did human tests on young men known as the Poison Squad. Blum’ s book recounts Wiley’ s work over 30 years, most nota- bly with the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. She also calls attention to the jour- nalists intent on exposing cor- porate greed and government corruption in efforts to evade food safety measures. Blum, a Pulitzer Prize-winner and director of the Knight Science Journalism Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will talk about her book and current food safety issues when she appears at the Metro Detroit Book & Author Society Luncheon to be held Monday, Oct. 21, at the Burton Manor in Livonia. Other authors discussing their latest projects include nov- elist Susan Isaacs (Takes One to Know One), memoirist Bridgett Davis (The World According to Fannie Davis: My Mother’ s Life in the Detroit Numbers) and New York Times TV critic James Poniewozik (Audience of One: Donald Trump, Television and the Fracturing of America). “I really love taking a for- gotten moment in history, in this case a largely forgotten chemist, and returning him to the public stage, where he should be, ” says Blum, married to retired arts and history writer Peter Haugen. “I’ m really glad to give Harvey Wiley another moment in the sun because he was so important to this paradigm-shifting moment in American history in which we decide that the government should engage in consumer protection starting with food and drugs. “I like to remind people that a single person can make a difference, and Wiley is a great example of that. At a time when we can feel washed away by all the political mechanics around us, it’ s important to realize that people who stand their ground, hold to an issue and stubbornly refuse to give up on what mat- ters actually change things. ” Blum, 64, and influenced to study science by her entomol- ogist father, Murray Sheldon Blum, moved on to journal- ism and graduated from the University of Georgia. She worked as a general reporter before specializing in science journalism as taught at the University of Wisconsin, which prepared her for cover- ing important environmental issues from Alaskan glaciers to Hawaiian volcanoes. Blum’ s books have included The Monkey Wars about differ- ing views on research animals, The Poisoner’ s Handbook about the development of forensic sci- ence and Sex on the Brain: The Biological Differences Between Men and Women. “I spend a lot of time looking at history because I believe you never understand where you are until you also understand how you got there, ” says the author, whose personal religious history is traced to Jewish heritage from Germany and Russia. Blum, whose books individ- ually take less than three years to research and write, feels her release of The Poison Squad was very timely. “If I had written this pro-reg- ulation book when Barack Obama was president, it wouldn’ t have had nearly the traction of saying we really need to preserve the safety net, ” she says. “In the Trump administra- tion, long-standing regulations are being rolled back. ” Blum’ s Michigan talk will cover dramatic examples in the fight for regulations — past and present. “I’ m going to talk some about that myth of 19th-century food, which is in the era before any federal food regulations, ” she says. “The University of Michigan medical historian Howard Markel and I were on a panel together, and he describes the 19th century as the century of the ‘ great American stomach- ache. ’ “We have labels now, which we did not have in the 19th cen- tury, and there’ s good informa- tion on those labels. Our food labels still are not as transparent as I would like them to be. ” MARK BENNINGTON Deborah Blum details The Metro Detroit Book & Author Society Luncheon will be held Monday, Oct. 21, at the Burton Manor in Livonia. Book sales begin at 11 a.m. Lunch and speaker program start at noon. Book sales continue after lunch and during book signings. $40. bookandauthor.org. (586) 685-5750. Arts&Life books