Editor's Note: This article was originally published in December, 2023 on Patreon.

Back in October I hosted a public event at work where I made punch. A simple mixture of sweet cider, cranberry juice, and ginger ale (2 parts cider, 1 part cranberry, 1-2 parts ginger ale). I served it in a giant black ceramic cauldron I brought from home (it was Halloween). A visitor mentioned "I didn't think anyone did punch anymore!" with delight as he ladled it into a cup.

Then, a few weeks ago, with another work event requiring punch, I decided I didn't want to risk transporting one of my own precious punch bowls. I had dropped off some clothes at our local thrift store (which supports our local SPCA!) and lo an behold, not only did the store have THREE punch bowls to choose from, but housewares were 50% off. Which means I got a punch bowl and six cups for - are you ready? - $2.50. 

As the lovely volunteers at the register were wrapping it one commented on how cheap the punch bowl was. The other said, "Yes, no one really buys them anymore." I said, "Except me! This is the second one I've bought from you." It might have been the third, to be honest.

Friends - what a travesty! Punch is so wonderful and versatile. And so easy on the host or hostess! You make it once, guests can serve themselves, and it feels so much more festive than an assortment of sodas, beers, and a bottle of wine. And it's certainly easier and less expensive than making everyone individual cocktails when you have a crowd.

I don't know when I decided to start making punch. Probably when I found a gorgeous and giant swirl-patterned milk glass punch bowl (with 11 matching punch cups) at a thrift store for $8 not long after we moved into our little house and I finally had room for such things. Years later, I found a matching one for $10, more milk glass punch cups of a different style, and in between I found a $5 cut glass punch bowl and cups at the SPCA thrift store. Whenever I throw a large party, I always serve punch. Usually two: an alcoholic one and a non-alcoholic one. Lately I've been feeling the non-alcoholic variations. Not only because we are not big drinkers in my house, but also because so many of our friends eschew alcohol for one reason or another. 

The punch I grew up with was VERY sweet. A mixture of bright red and syrupy sweet "fruit punch," 7UP, and sherbet was usually served at my grandma's house for Christmas (it was an uncle's favorite). Sometimes you'd see similar punches at weddings, although usually without the sherbet. I've found I vastly prefer punches that are not neon colors and so I pour accordingly.

The history of punch is a bit murky, but it seems to have arisen in the Western world in the early 17th century, possibly in India, but more likely in association with the production of rum in the Caribbean (a barrel unit of which was called a "puncheon"). Regardless, by the 18th century highly alcoholic punches were de rigueur at the parties of wealthy Westerners, served in exquisitely expensive punch bowls: cut crystal and silver for the fabulously wealthy, fine porcelain or glass for the upper-middle classes. Ingredients were also expensive - imported citrus, tea, expensive liquors like rum (which was pricey in Europe but cheap in the Americas), and sparkling or fortified wines, not to mention plenty of still-expensive-but-getting-cheaper-thanks-to-the-slave-trade sugar. 

By the mid-19th century punch was falling out of favor and individual cocktails were gaining popularity. But the Temperance movement was horning in on alcohol consumption more generally, and non-alcoholic punches were making narrow inroads. By the Progressive Era, and certainly by Prohibition, champagne, wine, and alcoholic punches were being replaced by fruit punches made with tea, sparkling water, ginger ale, and exotic fruits and syrups. 

These days, it's easier than ever to make non-alcoholic beverages thanks to companies making analogs out of white tea, botanicals, and spices. But a good, old-fashioned punch doesn't need pricey substitutes to taste good. 
​

I have a small but increasing obsession with Peter Pauper Press books from this time period. Here's a nice overview of the history of the company, including information about some of the artists and graphic designers they hired. Sadly, although it looks like these small style books continued until the 1980s, if not later, the modern incarnation of the company seems to have abandoned this style of little book, more's the pity. 

I did, however, treat myself to a few more copies of editions I don't have, since I love them so much, including Festive Chocolate, with recipes by the excellent and pioneering food historian Peter G. Rose! Happy Christmas to me! 

As you celebrate the holidays or any cultural or life event, I hope you'll consider adding punch to your party repertoire. Punch bowls can often be had very inexpensively at thrift stores, but a pretty mixing bowl and a ladle will do in a pinch. You can break out the fancy punch cups, or go the disposable route. Either way, I hope your family and friends react with the same pleasure that visitor did. 

Did you grow up drinking punch? Do you make it now? What's your favorite?

Back when I was researching historic cookies for theKitchn.com's Cookie Time Machine, one of the options for the 1920s was snickerdoodles. My husband had requested them, and I'd found several recipes in my 1920s cookbooks. So I scanned a recipe and sent it to my editor, only to have her respond with, "Snickerdoodles are great, but why does this recipe call for raisins?" 

I was horrified. I hadn't even realized raisins were in the recipe. We ended up choosing Orange Drop Cookies, as they fit the trends of the decade better, but I got curious. I started looking up other Snickerdoodle recipes from the 1920s. And friends, they ALL had raisins in them. 

​What on earth was going on? 

I dug a little deeper, and the trend continued.

1903 - the October, 1903 issue of Home Science Magazine has Mary Johnson Bailey Lincoln's recipe for snickerdoodles with, you guessed it, raisins.

1908 - The L.W. Cook Book snickerdoodle recipe calls for just "a few raisins." 

1911 - the July, 1911 issue of Good Housekeeping​ magazine has a snickerdoodle recipe with raisins in it.

1911 - Cook Book of the Ladies Village Improvement Society of East Hampton, Long Island calls their snickerdoodle recipe a "Pennsylvania Dutch" dish, and calls for running the raisins through a meat grinder.

1914 - The "Home" Cook Book from the Children's Summer Home of Cinnaminson, NJ has recipes for snickerdoodles with and without raisins. 

1916 - The August 1, 1916 issue of The Gas Age magazine has a snickerdoodle recipe that calls for both dates and nuts. 

1917 - the Tried and True Cook Book by the Women's War League of Mexico City has a snickerdoodle recipe that calls for raisins, but suggests that "nuts or shredded cocoanut may be substituted for the raisins." 

1918 - Even the December, 1918 issue of Gleanings in Bee Culture, a magazine for beekeepers, has a snickerdoodle recipe that calls for honey and, you guessed it, raisins.

1920 - The Home-maker's Cook Book by Mabel Marie Horton snickerdoodle recipe calls for currants, instead of raisins.

1920 - the July, 1920 issue of Gas And Electric News has a snickerdoodle recipe that calls "dates or raisins" AND nuts "peanuts are good!"

1922 - the Delta Gamma Cook Book snickerdoodle recipe calls for currants, instead of raisins.

1922 - the Kato Cook Book snickerdoodle recipe also calls for currants.

Not everyone was on the raisin train. The A.A. Cook Book (1895), The Home-Maker (April, 1889), Good Living and How to Prepare It (1905), Recipes Collected by the Ladies of the Presbyterian Church of Kingston, Penn'a (1907), Tried and True: A Collection of Approved Recipes (1907), The Bon Ton Cook Book (1909), Two Hundred Recipes for Making Desserts (1912), The Skaneateles Cook Book (1915), and The Cooking Club Magazine (July, 1916) all have snickerdoodle recipes without raisins, currants, dates, or any other ingredients other than cinnamon and sugar (usually).

Snickerdoodles themselves don't seem to enter the lexicon under that name until 1895, which was the earliest recipe I could find under that name. I find it interesting that the two 19th century recipes I could find do not call for raisins or currants, but by the time we're in the 20th century, they do. This might have something to do with the proliferation of the seedless raisin industry in California at the end of the 19th century. Today, nearly all table grapes and raisins sold in the US are seedless, based in large part on the viticulture and research of William Thompson in the 19th century. It was he who developed seedless grapes and introduced them to California in the late 19th century. California's mild temperatures made it ideal for growing grapes, and its many days of sunshine made turning grapes into raisins simple and economical. 

Prior to Thompson's innovations, most raisins were sold with the seeds inside. They had to be laboriously "stoned," or cut open to remove the seeds. This was a time-consuming and labor-intensive task, usually reserved only for special occasions or the households of the wealthy. Thompson's seedless raisins removed all of that work, making it far easier to cook and bake with raisins. 

The introduction of this new type of raisin is probably why we see their proliferation as an ingredient in snickerdoodles, among other recipes. 

I decided to try a raisin-based snickerdoodle recipe myself. The F.W. McNess' Cook Book, published in the 1920s, is one from my personal library, and the first snickerdoodle recipe I initially found. McNess was a spice and flavoring company. So I decided to give it a go.

Here's the original recipe, as written:

1 cup Light Brown Sugar,
1 Egg,
1/2 cup Chopped Raisins,
2 cups Flour
2 tablespoons Butter,
1/2 cup Milk,
2 teaspoons McNess Baking Powder
Sugar and McNess Cinnamon

Drop by spoonfuls and sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon. Nuts or cocoanut may be substituted for raisins.

Not many directions in that one! But I know the general rule for cookies. I creamed the sugar and butter together, added the egg, then the flour and baking powder, then the milk, and lastly currants, because I didn't have any raisins and was too lazy to chop them anyway. I dropped them onto a greased cookie sheet, dredged a mix of granulated sugar and ground cinnamon over top, and popped them in a 350 F oven for 10-12 minutes, until they were golden brown around the edges. 

The end result? Not too shabby, but it definitely would have been better without the raisins/currants. They have more of a tea cake texture than a chewy sugar cookie. And sprinkling the cinnamon and sugar on top was not super effective. Perhaps bakers in the early 20th century were trying to be more old-fashioned? More in line with currant-based tea cakes or scones? Maybe they were just reveling in the opportunity to bake with raisins without having to spend an hour picking out all the seeds first? Who knows? 

At any rate, although I do enjoy raisins (and currants) quite a bit, I think it's safe to say that snickerdoodles are better off without them. What do you think? Would you eat snickerdoodles if they had raisins in them?

​The Food Historian is supported by patrons on Patreon, subscribers on Substack, and people who leave tips. Your support helps keep this blog free and open to everyone. Thank you!

​(Note: A version of this article was originally published in the High Plains Reader, December 30th, 2021. Today is Sankta Luciasdag, so I'm re-posting this in honor of the December 13th holiday. Enjoy!)

​It was 1998. I was in the basement of Elim Lutheran Church in Fargo, putting on a white robe and a tinsel crown. The Swedish Cultural Heritage Society of the Red River Valley (which we all just called the Swedish Society) was celebrating another Sankta Lucia Dag. At age 13, I was still one of the attendants to Lucia. There were usually a lot of us girls, although I was the oldest there that day. And there were always a few star boys, everyone in white smocks or robes. The girls got silver string belts, tinsel crowns, and to carry electric candles. The boys got pointed posterboard hats held on with elastic and spangled with tinfoil stars and a long stick with a silver star on the end. A college student was always Lucia, but this year, the girl who promised, didn’t show. As the oldest girl present, I was immediately elected to fill in, to my chagrin. And my mom’s chagrin, since I had barely dressed up for the occasion, in typical moody teenager style. But I pulled myself together and tried to walk down the church aisle wearing my crown of electric candles and the red sash with my head held high.

Sankta Lucia (also known as Saint Lucy), was an early Christian saint who was credited with relieving a famine in Dalarna, Sweden in the 18th century. She is celebrated in Sweden every December 13th (or thereabouts) with early morning or late evening parades and ceremonies and with lussekatter or Lucia buns – a saffron flavored yeast bun swirled into an S shape with raisins in the curls. But although that’s what the whole world associates with Santka Lucias Dag, that’s not what I remember. Instead, I remember what happened AFTER the Lucia ceremony – gathering in the church basement for coffee (yuck) and about a million different Scandinavian and American Christmas cookies and other treats.

Scores of white-haired ladies in festive sweaters brought paper plates and Tupperware containers laden with pepparkakor, krumkake (which were always protected with crinkled waxed paper to keep them from breaking), sandbakkelse, kringle, rosettes, spritz, almond cake, and other Scandinavian treats alongside more American desserts like molasses crinkles, peanut butter blossoms, sugar cookies, Russian tea cakes, shortbreads, divinity, and fudge. A few savories like lefse, round cinnamon bread spread with Cheese Whiz and a sliced green olive (my favorite, except for the olive), pickled herring, Wasa rye crackers with butter, and super-thin homemade flatbread (which my Norwegian Grandma Eunice made every year at home) were also present. Although I didn’t know it at the time, the fact that I wanted to taste one of everything was a pretty good indicator of a lifelong obsession with food.

Scandinavian baking infused nearly every holiday I can remember. In particular I remember Grandma Eunice’s paper-thin flatbread, frosted tea ring dotted with candied cherries, and fragile spicy pepparkakor, always in star or heart shapes. Family tradition says that if you place a heart-shaped pepparkakor in your palm and press a finger in the middle, if it breaks into three even pieces, you can make a wish. Grandma’s were so thin, it didn’t take much pressure to break them. But although I have fond memories of baking at home, it was those Scandinavian community events that stick with me, and Christmas was bracketed with them – Sankta Lucia Dag before Christmas, and Tjuegondedag Knut after Christmas, in January. Both featured potlucks heavy on the Scandinavian Christmas treats.

About twelve years ago [ed. note - 15 now!] I moved back east to the Hudson Valley of New York. And while I love my life out here, one of the things I miss most from “back home” is the opportunity to be involved in my Scandinavian heritage again. Sure, there’s a Sons of Norway out here, but it’s small and located far from where I live. And it certainly doesn’t have its own building like the one back home in Fargo does! Could I keep the food traditions up myself? I sure could, but going it alone is hard.

I study food professionally now, and so when researching historic Christmas cookie recipes for a lecture, I ran across a gem – “Recipes From Many Lands, Furnished by the North Dakota Homemaker’s Club” compiled by Dorothy Ayers Loudon, and published by Agricultural Extension Division of the North Dakota Agricultural College (now NDSU) in Fargo, North Dakota. Published as Extension Circular 77 in July of 1927, this little cookbook is a treasure trove of immigrant recipes, including Scandinavian ones. And while there is no specific Christmas section, Scandinavian baked goods feature prominently. There are twenty-six different recipes for fattigman, ten different sandbakkels recipes, and multiple recipes each for krumkake, lefse, kringle, rosettes, rice pudding, rommegrot, and others. Not to mention a whole bunch of other recipes, including cakes, breads, meats, and more. Each recipe lists the woman who submitted it and which homemaker’s club she belonged to, and her location. The recipes brought the memories of those Scandinavian community events and their groaning boards rushing back to the surface, and I got terribly homesick.

I think about the women (and occasionally some men) who baked for those events. Did they learn to bake from their parents or grandparents? Did they bake from their own heritage, or learn for a spouse? Did they hone a specialty they took pride in? Did they get joy from sharing their baking with the community, or did they just bring something because they felt obligated? Was the treat they brought a favorite of theirs, or did they make it for someone else? When they saw some teenager filling a plate, did they feel happy, or did they roll their eyes at gluttonous kids?

I’m not a white haired little old lady yet. I’m not widowed (thank goodness) and I’m not retired (sadly). So while I don’t have as much time on my hands as some of those bakers maybe did, it’s not as if I couldn’t keep the traditions. I’ve got the krumkake iron and rolling cone, the sandbakkel tins, I’ve even got a heart-shaped waffle iron. And I do make my split pea soup just like they always did for Tjuegondedag Knut. Maybe this year I’ll dig them out and do them justice, sharing my family traditions with friends, instead of just the folks back home. I don’t always agree with blind adherence to tradition, but traditions can connect us – to the past, to family, to each other.

To that end, I’m sharing two recipes with you. One is old, but new to me. A sandbakkel recipe from “Recipes From Many Lands.” The other is my Grandma Eunice’s flatbread recipe, which was published in the Elim Lutheran Church Centennial Cookbook. Flatbreads aren't as popular as the sugary cookies and other sweet confections. But I could tell the grownups always enjoyed them, and I always ate at least a few every year. While Grandma passed away a few years ago, her recipe lives on. But only someone who has experienced her baking can tell you that the flatbreads have to be so thin they practically break when you pick them up, and they have to be patterned with the weave of the floured pastry cloth she always rolled them out on. And only someone who has tasted them can tell you about their subtle, nutty sweetness. 

That's the thing about keeping traditions - if they aren't passed on from generation to generation, you lose something that can't be conveyed printed in a book. 

1 ¼ c. buttermilk
¾ c. sweet cream
½ c. sugar (scant)
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. soda (scant)
½ c. melted butter
​3 ½ c. flour
​(not listed: whole wheat flour)

Mix together – alternate dry ingredients with liquids. Roll in whole wheat flour. Bake at 400. Roll in small balls and flatten with rolling pin. Roll thin & watch closely. Bake until slightly brown.

1 cup softened butter (2 sticks)
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon almond extract
2 cups flour (plus more to knead)

Preheat the oven to 350 F. In a large bowl, cream the butter and the sugar together, then add the egg and extract and mix until smooth. Add the flour, a little at a time, until the dough starts to come together, then knead with the hands until smooth. Take half dollar sized pieces of dough and press into the tart tin, pressing the dough all the way out to the edge of the tin, but not over the edges. Make sure to press well to ensure good fluting. The dough is buttery enough that you won't need to grease the tins.

Place tins on a sheet pan and bake 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool in the tins. ​

​And there ends the original article, but like any good writer and historian, I thought I'd add a few more notes and some context, for folks who don't live in the Fargo-Moorhead area.

If you've never made sandbakkelse before, you're going to need to get some special tins. Bethany Housewares, based in Iowa, makes them (along with tons of other Scandinavian baking tools), and they are conveniently available on Amazon (affiliate link). If you live somewhere in the Midwest, you may be able to find scores of them at thrift stores, which was how my mom amassed her collection, which is now mine.

Scandinavian holiday desserts mostly consist of butter, cream (see: Rommegrot, rice pudding), sugar, white flour, and occasionally some almonds and cinnamon. They're rich and melting and oh-so-delicious. But pepparkokkar and lussekatter aside, they can start to taste a little too alike if you make them all at once. I recommend adding one or two to your holiday baking rotation, and see how they go. Sandbakkelse are extremely easy to make, if you have the tins. And if you don't, try pressing them into muffin tins, or even a pie plate, and see how they go. 

​Happy Sankta Lucias Dag, alle! 

(Note: A version of this article originally appeared as a patrons-only post on Patreon.) 
​
Rømmegrøt is a Norwegian immigrant food that has been part of my life for a very long time. When I was just a baby, my mom told me, she took me to the big annual summer Scandinavian Festival in my hometown. My Grandma Ruby (mom's mom) was visiting and unbeknownst to mom, fed me some rømmegrøt. I was apparently hooked from the start.

Rømmegrøt has all the makings of a good baby food, and is often associated with births and holiday celebrations. Rømmegrøt is a type of flour and cream porridge. Very thick and smooth and rich, it's typically served at Christmastime here in the U.S., although historically it was also served at midsummer and other special occasions. Serious stick-to-your-ribs food, it joins a long line of other, grain-based pudding type dishes throughout Europe. 

In Norway, it is often left out on Christmas Eve as a treat for the nisse - the red-capped house elf who cares for animals and the home during the winter months. Artist Lennart Helje made some of the most famous tomte/nisse paintings around. Nisse are said to be friends with all animals, with special affinity for cats. But I love the Helje paintings featuring foxes the best.

Rømmegrøt in Norway was typically made with soured cream and was more often served with dried meats than cinnamon and sugar (a much later addition). In fact, if we break down the word we get "rømme" or sour cream and "grøt" or porridge. Modern Norwegian recipes usually call for dairy sour cream today. But they have a very different flavor from the kind I grew up with. 

As my mother pointed out, rømmegrøt is easy to make, calorie-rich, and tastes special without costing that much. Typically reserved for very special occasions like Christmas, midsummer, and births, rømmegrøt was also used as a food for new mothers to help build up their strength, which makes sense considering how rich-tasting it is.

In the United States, ready access in the late 19th and early 20th century to refined white flour and sugar made rømmegrøt easy and cheap to make if you kept dairy cows, like my great-grandparents on my mom's side of the family. It's not clear why Scandinavian Americans stopped using sour cream, but my guess is that because most American dairy farmers were sending their milk to cooperative dairies, instead of processing it at home, they had far more access to heavy cream than sour cream. In fact, both sets of my mom's grandparents were dairy farmers, and during the Great Depression, the "cream check" from the dairy was often the only thing keeping the family in store-bought goods. The cows, chickens, and huge kitchen gardens did the bulk of the heavy lifting in feeding families of 11 and 10 children, respectively. 

Although I have eaten rømmegrøt many a time at Scandinavian heritage festivals, those are few and far between out here in the Northeast. So I decided to try my hand at making rømmegrøt from scratch. I decided to use a recipe from the 90th Anniversary Elim Lutheran Church Cookbook, which was the church my grandfather (dad's dad) was pastor at for decades.

This recipe comes from Nellie Anderson and Erna Tronsgard - two ladies I never met, but likely my grandmother Eunice (who also contributed a recipe to this cookbook) knew well. Here's their original recipe:

1 pint heavy cream
1 cup boiling milk
1/2 cup flour

Bring the cream to a boil and boil for 10 min. Sift in flour, reduce heat and stir until thick. In a few minute the butter will separate - remove this and save. Add milk which has been brought to boiling, add a little at a time, stirring hard. This will get smooth. This will get smooth. Now add 1 tablespoon sugar and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Ladle in dishes, top with cinnamon, sugar, and the butter that was cooked out.

With only three cups of liquid I knew this recipe wouldn't make much, and I wanted to make a big batch, so I doubled the recipe:
1 quart heavy cream (4 cups)
2 cups boiling milk
1 cup flour

I found a few tiny issues with this recipe. The first one is that 1 cup flour seemed like too much, so feel free to make it a scant cup, or add more hot milk. The other is that as you are boiling the cream, you have to keep stirring or it will boil over!

Once you add the flour, you're essentially making a type of roux, which is why a sauce whisk comes in very handy for this type of thing. The key is to keep stirring ​as it keeps cooking and then all of a sudden the mixture will "break" and the butter will automatically cook out by itself! Let the butter keep cooking out and use a deep spoon or small ladle to remove as much as you can (reserve the melted butter for topping later). Then add the hot milk and beat vigorously until smooth - it will look like a very thick white sauce. Then add the salt and sugar which are listed in the instructions, but not the "top" of the recipe measurements. Because the recipe was written by home cooks, not polished, published professionals!

As you can see, mine turned out VERY thick, and it will only thicken more as it sits. I had JUST enough milk left (trying to eat down the fridge before going out of town for the holidays), but I would add more in the future. 

Serve it warm or hot with cinnamon and sugar (pre-mixed is best) and traditionally it's also served with some of the melted butter on top. I find that to be too rich, for me. I like a lot of cinnamon and sugar with mine, as this is not really sweetened at all. But it's nice for people to be able to add theirs to taste. 

No lie, I added more cinnamon and sugar to this bowl after tasting, because even though the recipe calls for a smidge of sugar, it's really not sweet at all. And this is about the serving size you want at it is extremely rich. But some folks like to add the butter back as a topping, and if you were living in dark, frigid, 18th century Norway, you'd probably want all the extra fat you could get in your diet. However, the butter is always too much for me. I've yet to find a decent use for the leftover semi-clarified butter, however. Maybe I just need to use it on bread! Or maybe lefse? But that's a Scandinavian treat tale for another day.

My mother-in-law, who had never had it before, said the flavor reminded her of rice pudding, which it does - creamy and thick and cinnamon-sugary. And rice pudding is super common in Norway and other Scandinavian countries at Christmastime. But rømmegrøt is much older, as rice was not imported to Scandinavia until the 18th century. 

To me, it tasted of nostalgia. Made me think of summer Scandinavian festivals, but still tasted like Christmas and the Midwest. With the advent of central heat, rømmegrøt is definitely not an everyday food, but it still connects us to the past in a way that reading about it never quite does. 

Have you ever had rømmegrøt? What Christmas food traditions in your family bring back fond memories or connect you to your heritage?

​The Food Historian is supported by patrons on Patreon, subscribers on Substack, and people who leave tips. Your support helps keep this blog free and open to everyone. Thank you!

Earlier this month, I posted an article on my Substack about grocery prices, price gouging, and price fixing. I mentioned the investigation of meat packers during and after the war, but I hadn't yet done much digging on the subject. When browsing a February, 1919 issue of The Delineator, imagine my surprise when I came across this advertisement from Swift & Company!

One thing I've been researching for my book is the continuation of wartime measures after November 11, 1918. This whole issue of the New-York-based magazine is chock-full of references to food conservation, and the ads are no exception. But unlike the others, this advertisement isn't touting how their products can be used to meet food conservation goals. Instead, it is a company defending itself from criticism. 

It reads:

The head of a Philadelphia family writes to ask us why the price of meat is so high. He wants to know especially about the increase during the past four years.

There are, of course, many reasons.

The heavy demand for meat, caused by large orders from the Allies and by high wages at home, has helped to boost prices. The lower purchasing power of the dollar has also caused the prices of all commodities to increase.

But one important factor is the high cost of producing and marketing meat along the line from farm to retailer.

The retailer, for example, must pay higher wages to clerks and more for delivery service, in fact, everything entering into store operation has advanced tremendously.

And the retailer has to get a much higher price for meat, because he has to pay the packers more for it.

The packers, in turn, are in the same position as the retailers. It costs them more to do business. Labor, transportation, machinery, materials - all items in the packing business - have mounted rapdily. Wages of packing house laborers, for example, have increased over 100 per cent in the past three years. But here again the packers have to get higher prices for meat when they have to pay such high prices for live stock.

During the past four years, cattle prices to Swift & Company advanced 74 per cent, whereas the price received for beef by Swift & Company has advanced only 61 per cent during the same period.

The farmers have had to get more for cattle because it costs more to raise them. 

Cor, for example, has doubled during the past four years; farm labor is scarce and wages are high.

But even with these higher production costs, the price of meat has gone up no more than the price of other foodstuffs - and this is in face of the enormous quantities sent overseas to our Army and to the Allies. 

During the past five years, flour has increased 100 per cent, corn meal 133 per cent, sugar 65 per cent. During the past year alone, fruits have advanced 30 per cent.

If the packers were to eliminate their profits entirely, there would be practically no change in the price of meat. Swift & Company's profits average only a fraction of a cent per pound of meat.

Well! Quite the claim there, and I'm not sure how effective it was. But why was a major meat packing company spending their advertising budget on a full-page ad defending themselves? Well, as it turns out, since the U.S. entrance into World War I, Swift & Company had been under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), alongside other meat packers, for price fixing and unlawful collusion. Although ordinary citizens had been encouraged to voluntarily reduce their consumption of meat in order to free up supply for the Allies and American armed forces, meat prices were quite high throughout the war. President Woodrow Wilson had ordered an investigation of the meatpackers by the FTC as soon as the U.S. entered the war.

Considering that the big four meat packers of 2024 (JBL, Tyson, Cargill, and National Beef) were all sued for price fixing last month just reinforces how much the history of World War I repeats itself approximately 100 years later (for other instances, see one of my earlier blog posts).   

Swift & Company had already been under fire since 1902, when President Theodore Roosevelt investigated the Beef Trust. The U.S. government took them to court in 1905 and the Swift & Co. v. United States Supreme Court case sided with the Roosevelt Administration. Thanks in large part to Upton Sinclair's book The Jungle in 1905, which detailed the horrific conditions of the meatpacking industry, Teddy got to go even further. Sinclair had been trying to get the public to support labor reform. Instead, he terrified them into sanitation and food safety reform. Theodore Roosevelt passed the Federal Meat Inspection Act of 1906. Meatpackers like Swift were no longer able to have as much free rein as they did before the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, but despite regulatory gains, there was still work to be done.

But this one little ad wasn't the end of Swift & Company's attempt to exonerate themselves in the public eye.

The advertisement in The Delineator was one of many Swift & Co. released that February. This was another, touting its 1919 yearbook as providing "both sides" of the argument at hand. It reads:

Do you want to know both sides? 
Swift & Company's 1919 Year Book, just out, tells you

What Swift & Company profits were in 1918,
The truth about the Federal Trade Commission's investigation,
Why the prices of butter and eggs are so high,
And many other vital facts.

Whether or not you agree with us after reading this Year Book, you will at least know both sides.

You will find it interesting; Americans like to hear about big things done in a big way.

You will also discover that we are merely human beings like yourself, doing in the best possible way a necessary service.

Legislation is pending in Washington; as a good American citizen you want to know both sides of this question. It concerns you, as well as one of the most important industries in the country.

Do not hesitate to send for a copy of this booklet. Your name and address are all we need. 

I have yet to find a digitized copy of their 1919 yearbook, but I did manage to find this interesting gem from 1919, The Meatpacking Industry in America: An Illustrated Lecture, issued by Swift & Company. It explains not only how Swift & Company operate their meatpacking plants, but it also touts their sanitation and safety measures, including employee healthcare! And of course, how little profit they actually make.

Unfortunately for them and their meatpacking compatriots, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) did not agree. In a six volume report published in the summer of 1919 (you can read volumes 1-2 here, and volumes 3-6 here), the FTC found that the five major meatpackers, including Swift & Company, had violated anti-trust laws by colluding to control production, prices, and competition through vertical integration. Their report read:

"The rapid rise of the packers to power and immense wealth and their present strangle hold on food supplies were not based necessarily on their ownership of packing houses but upon their control of the channels of distribution particularly the stockyards, private car lines, cold storage plants, and branch houses. Similarly great profits which they have secured and are now securing are not primarily due to exceptional efficiency in operating packing houses and manufacturing plants, but are secured through their monopolistic control of the distributive machinery This applies not only to the meat industry but to the other branches of the food industry which they control as is evidenced by the fact that, particularly in recent years, they have made far greater efforts to secure control of the distribution of the product than to secure manufacturing plants in the case of such products as cheese and canned goods."

"As long as the packers control these distributive utilities, producers will be at the mercy of the big packers competition will be restrained, and consumers generally will continue to pay the price of monopoly. Control and manipulation of the live stock markets have been the great factors in the discouragement of live stock production Control of the transportation and marketing facilities have been the instruments by which competitors have been crushed."

Their solution? Complete government takeover. No wonder Swift & Company were spending money right and left to convince the public of the justice of their business model!

Ultimately Swift & Company was not brought under government control. It was, however, restricted only to meatpacking operations. Alexander Mitchell Palmer, attorney general of the United States under President Wilson, forced major meat packers to a consent decree to get out of anything but meatpacking. For the public, it wasn't enough. In 1921, Congress passed the Packers and Stockyards Act of 1921, also known as the Packers Bill, and it was signed into law by President William G. Harding, President Woodrow Wilson's Republican successor. 

The Packers and Stockyards Act substantially curtailed the expansion of the major meatpackers into other foodstuffs and prevented them from vertically integrating - that is owning the stockyards and even railroads that transported livestock to their slaughterhouses. Of course, litigation began almost immediately, as did amendments to the Act.

In their first annual report, the Packers and Stockyards Administration, under the auspices of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), outlined not only brief biographies of some of their staff, but also the names and locations of the stockyards subject to the rules. The report also outlined complaints against packers and stockyards, including short-weight butter sales (selling 1 pound cartons of butter that contained only 15 ounces), as well as deceptive marketing of livestock, anti-competitive behavior, and general fraud. 

The Packers and Stockyards Administration is today the Grain Inspection, Packers, and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA), part of the USDA. It still operates and regulates meatpacking, stockyards, and now grain markets in the United States. Like the Food & Drug Administration oversees the safety, accuracy, and sales of manufactured foods and drugs, GIPSA oversees the safety, accuracy, and sales of grain and livestock. 

This advertising campaign from Swift & Co. is just one example of the many ways in which the First World War had a lasting impact on the American economy and government. Even though many of the regulatory agencies of the war were designed to be temporary - notably the United States Food Administration - other regulatory bodies like the Packers and Stockyards Administration had their roots in the Progressive Era and lasted long beyond the war. 

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