Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1894-03-15
TEN CENTS A DAY.
Cheap Living Tried by a Professional
Man.


country of abundant food was the
question of cost of food so pressing as
in this present winter, when lack of
work causes lack of cash. Even to one
who has money to buy food, what to
buy and how TO get most value for the
money, may be important questions.
Following the valuable address of Prof
Woods ON Human Sustenance," re-
ported in part on page 1877, we copy
from Mrs. Rorer's Household News an
account. by a Philadelphia physician.
Of an experiment by himself in cheap
living.
Believing that the great outcry
among the unemployed in this city
about starving to death, was more the
result of ignorance on the subject of
diet combined with pigheadedpess as
to what was or was not eft to eat" I
tried the experiment of living on food
that cost me ten cents a week. The
diet list given below was hastily ar
ranged, and is in nowise a complete or
Well-balanced ration. 1t could be i'm
proved in quantity and quality at no
feSSiOnal work during the weeks trial,
I could not give the diet the attention
it deserved. The following details of
my physical condition are all that are
necessary to teach the value of this
experiment:
am feet, 8 II inches high; weight,
145 pounds the morning Of the beginning
T.
ing the entire week averaged ) ID
hours per day. The second night I
was in bed only 90 minutes, and spent
the rest of the time with a fatiguing
case, after which I walked home Il II
miles,, about 5:45 am. In attending to
my professional duties I drove about
Is miles day, the weather about
half the time being cold and damp.
Besides this. there was the usual
amount of street-car riding and short
walk and stair climbing. Naturally. 7
am very heavy feeder, especially Of
animal food. No liquors were used. To
bacco limited to my usual one cigar
before retiring.
The food purchased in open markets
ana stores were as fOllOWS:
Beef, 1 10. steak trimmings. -. .$004
Pork 1 H., for krout and baked
Deans. $500. 10
Mutton, ga 10, neck piece. 10
Sour Krout, 1 quart. ............. .06
Beans, 1 quart. ................ .0S
Sugar, So tb.(white granulate0. -. .03
Rice, 1-3 10. Cbroken, a .O6 perlb).. .02
Corn Meal, 1 quart g h., .05
Dat Meal 1 ID. .04
Bread. I loaf home-bread, from
whole-wheat flour. ............. .03
Butter IA ID. (Swifts best
Butterine).. ............... .05
Lentils, pint. .U
Coffee, 1-3 ID. (Rio, q 18c. per lbD. .OG
SO.75
In addition to this, one pint Of
skinned milk per day was used over
the oat meal and corn meal mush. No
financial value is given to this, be-
cause at the time this experiment was
made the Dairymen's association was
running thousands of quarts of
skim-milk into the sewers, finding no
purchasers for it, and an offer to de-
liver gratis a hundred cans a day
about three thousand quarts) to the
poor in the Kensington district was de-
clinedi
The meals were taken about as fol-
lows:
Breakfast, 7:3O am.
Dat meal q ounces dry meaD, a large
soup plate full.
Half pint Of milk and teaspoonful Of
sugar over the meal.
Corn dodgers or cut corn mush baked
on griddle Coffee milk and sugar
Dinner, 30 pm.
Meat three and three-quarter pounds !
in seven days)
Krout, baked beans or lentil soup.
Supper, $50 pm.
Corn meal mush, hoiled-half
pint milk. Whole Wheat
bread, butter. Boiled rice,
sugar and milk.
I weighed myself after breakfast |
each morning, and found that I had |
gained 1 IL pounds during the first |
three days, and then gradually lost, /
until at the end Of the week my weight !
was the same as when I began the ex-
pertinent, 145 pounds. There was some !
which I was not used to. but it pro-
luced no inconvenience. My appetite !
was well satisfied, and physically and .
there seemed to be no change
n my capacity for work. If there
was any change in the latter it was
FOR the better, as I believe I felt i
brighter on the lesser quantity of ami !!
nal food than I had been accustomed /
% taking. AS the change from my
'egular mode of feeding, which is
'ather excessive, to that of the diet
herein given was not followed by any
disturbance, it shows that
he food selected by mere chance was
about all that I really required, and
hat I had evidently not been absorb
ne and obtaining full value from my
previous regular diet.
i recognize that this experiment is ]
Yery crude, imperfect, and susceptible {
# great improvement, and hence of /,
much greater usefulness, yet feel thai
he following conclusions are justi-
liable:
The cost of this diet for a family of I
i've. including three children, ought to ]
,e from ten to twenty per cent. less, ]
because children eat less, and the loss s
q cooking for five is not so great =,
IS where everything has to be prepared s
specially for one, as was my case. I