How did the Food Administration try to gain public compliance with food conservation measures? Are there any potential negative consequences to the approaches taken?
How did Food Administration propaganda and James Montgomery Flagg’s recruitment poster define a citizen’s patriotic obligation in wartime? What reciprocal responsibilities does the government have to the citizenry?
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Introduction
Herbert Hoover (1874–1964) became a household name for successfully organizing a global relief effort to feed Belgian civilians after Germany invaded in 1914. When the United States entered the war, he took charge of the new Food Administration, created to ensure that U.S. food production met both domestic and foreign needs. Congress gave Hoover near-dictatorial powers to manage the food industry. Drawing on his experience managing the Commission for Relief in Belgium, Hoover opted for voluntarism over coercion. Instead of rationing food or setting production quotas, Hoover unleashed a vast propaganda campaign that messaged the importance of conserving certain foods.
One tactic was having women sign a food pledge vowing to follow Food Administration directives. Pledge-signers received two cards. They were instructed to hang their “Member of the United States Food Administration” card in a window to advertise the household’s support of food conservation measures. The second card (transcribed below) was kept in the kitchen. It explained why conservation efforts were necessary and how home cooks could conserve needed foodstuffs while still feeding their families.
The Food Administration’s recognition that women controlled the household food economy also prompted the agency to craft propaganda posters tailored specifically for female immigrants. The poster “Food Will Win the War” was reproduced in multiple foreign languages, and emphasized immigrants’ obligation to support their adopted country in time of war.
—Jennifer D. Keene
Food Administration Home Card, 1917, U.S. Food Administration, National Archives and Record Administration (National Archives identifier: 20762195). Available at https://catalog.archives.gov/id/20762195.
Hang this in your kitchen
HOME CARD
UNITED STATES FOOD ADMINSTRATION
WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP WIN THIS WAR
See other side showing why you should do it
Our problem is to feed our Allies this winter by sending them as much food as we can of the concentrated nutritive value in the least shipping space. These foods are wheat, beef, pork, dairy products, and sugar.
Our Solution is to eat less of these and more of other foods of which we have an abundance, and to waste less of all foods.
Bread and cereals. Have at least one wheatless meal a day. Use corn, oat, rye, barley, or mixed cereal rolls, muffins, and breads in place of white bread certainly for one meal and, if possible, for two. Eat less cake and pastry.
As to the white bread, if you buy from a baker, order it a day in advance; then he will not bake beyond his needs. Cut the loaf on the table and only as required. Use stale bread for toast and cooking.
Meat. Use more poultry, rabbits, and especially fish and sea food in place of beef, mutton, and pork. Do not use either beef, mutton, or pork more than once daily, and then serve smaller portions. Use all left-over meat cold or in made dishes. Use soups more freely. Use beans; they have nearly the same food value as meat.
Milk. Use all of the milk, waste no part of it. The children must have whole milk; therefore, use less cream. There is a great waste of food by not using all skim and sour milk. Sour milk can be used in cooking and to make cottage cheese. Use buttermilk and cheese freely.
Fats (butter, lard, etc.). Dairy butter has food values vital to children. Therefore, use it on the table as usual, especially for children. Use as little as possible in cooking. Reduce the use of fried foods to reduce the consumption of lard and other fats. Use vegetable oils, as olive and cottonseed oil. Save daily one-third of an ounce of animal fat. Waste no soap; it contains fat and the glycerine necessary for explosives. You can make scrubbing soap at home, and, in some localities, you can sell your saved fats to the soap maker, who will thus secure our needed glycerine.
Sugar. Use less candy and sweet drinks. Use less sugar in tea and coffee. Use honey, maple syrup, and dark syrups for hot cakes and waffles without butter or sugar. Do not frost or ice cakes. Do not stint the use of sugar in putting up fruits and jams. They may be used in place of butter.
Vegetables and fruits. We have a superabundance of vegetables. Double the use of vegetables. They take the place of part of the wheat and meat, and at the same time, are healthful. Use potatoes abundantly. Store potatoes and roots properly and they will keep. Use fruits generously.
Fuel. Coal comes from a distance, and our railway facilities are needed for war purposes. Burn fewer fires. If you can get wood, use it.
GENERAL SUGGESTIONS
| Buy less; cook no more than necessary; serve smaller portions. | Do not limit the plain food of growing children. |
| Use local and seasonable supplies. | Do not eat between meals. |
| Patronize your local producers and lessen the need of transportation. | Watch out for the waste in the community. |
| Preach and practice the “gospel of the clean platter.” | You can yourself devise other methods of saving to the ends we wish to accomplish. |
| We do not ask the American people to starve themselves. Eat plenty, but wisely, and without waste. | Under various circumstances and with varying conditions you can vary the methods of economizing. |
Abstain from Meat on Tuesdays and
Wheat Bread on Wednesdays
UNITED STATES FOOD ADMINISTRATION
WHAT YOU ARE ASKED TO DO FOR YOUR COUNTRY
See other side showing how you can do it
The men of the Allied Nations are fighting; they are not on the farms. The production of food by these countries has therefore been greatly reduced. Even before the war it was much less than the amount consumed. The difference came from America and a few other countries. Now this difference is greater than ever and, at the same time, but little food can be brought in from the outside except from America.
Therefore, our Allies depend on America for food as they have never depended before, and they ask us for it with a right which they have never had before. For today they are our companions in the great war for democracy and liberty. They are doing the fighting, the suffering, and dying—in our war.
Why we must send more wheat. England, France, Italy, and Belgium, taken together, import in peace time forty percent of their breadstuffs. But now, with their reduction in harvest, they must import sixty percent. We must increase our normal export surplus of 88,000,000 bushels to 220,000,000 bushels. It can be done but in one way: by economizing and substituting. The people of the Allies cannot substitute corn alone for bread, as we can. They are using other cereals added to wheat flour to make war bread, and can thus use up to twenty-five percent of corn for wheat. We have plenty of corn to send them, but, except in Italy, whose people normally use it, our Allies have few corn mills, and corn meal is not durable enough to be shipped by us in large quantities. Moreover, the Allied peoples do not make their bread at home; it is all made in bakeries, and corn bread cannot be distributed from bakeries. There is but one way: we must reduce our use of wheat. We use now an average of five pounds of wheat flour per person per week. The whole problem can be met if we will substitute one pound of corn or other cereal flour for one pound of wheat flour weekly per person; that is, if we reduce our consumption of wheat flour from five pounds a week to four pounds a week.
Why we must send more meat. The food animals of the Allies have decreased by 33,000,000 head since the war began; thus the source of their meat production is decreasing. At the same time, the needs of their soldiers and war workers have increased the necessary meat consumption. Our meat exports to our Allies are now already almost three times what they were before the war. The needs of the Allies will steadily increase, because their own production of food animals will steadily decrease because of lack of feed for them. If we will save one ounce of meat per person per day we can send our Allies what they need.
Why we must send butter and milk. The decreasing herds and the lack of fodder mean a steady falling off in the dairy products of our Allies. They have been asking for larger and larger exports from us. Last year we sent them three times as much butter and almost ten times as much condensed milk as we used to send them before the war. Yet we must not only keep up to this level, but do still better.
Why we must send sugar. Before the war France, Italy, and Belgium produced as much sugar as they used, while England drew most of its supply from what are now enemy countries. France and Italy are producing less than they need, while England is cut off from the source of seventy per cent of her usual imports. These three Allied countries must now draw 1,500,000 tons more of sugar than they did before the war from the same sources from which we draw our supplies. We must divide with them. We can do it by economizing. The usual American consumption per person is just double that of France.
Let us remember. Let us remember that every flag that flies opposite the German one is by proxy the American flag, and that the armies fighting in our defense under these flags cannot be maintained through this winter unless there is food enough for them and for their women and children at home. There can only be food enough if America provides it. And America can only provide it by the personal service and patriotic cooperation of all of us.
The small daily service in substitution can be done by all; the saving in waste by the majority, and the lessening of food consumed by many. This individual daily service in 20,000,000 kitchens and on 20,000,000 tables multiplied by 100,000,000, which is the sum of all of us, will make that total quantity which is the solution of the problem.
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