The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-10-01
Kansas Pure Food Law Went
Into Effect Today.
Druggists Have Great Deal of
Unsalab.e Goods.
NOT RIGHTLY MARKED
Some Manufacturers Would Not
COmply-Others Can't.
Grocers Have Less Trouble in
Complying With Law.

The state pure food law, studied out
last winter by DR.. Crumbine. went into
erect today, or rather, today is the
last day of grace to druggists. The
hour has come, and every druggist in
the state Is caught with a dead loss of
several hundred dollars. All of them
have large stocks of proprietary medi-
ctnes which are unstable because the
manufacturers are either out of bust
ness, or refused to furnish the stick
ers' denoting the contents.
r. a snow, a prominent local drug
g1st, IN attempting to comply with the
law, expended enough in postage to
buy drug stoek,-a drug stock such as
some of the ex-tointists use In at
tempting to get "stickers" for all his
proprietary medicines on hand he sent
4s5 letters to the manufacturers of the
many brands. To these he got 27S re-
plies. and stickers from a little over
half the number. Some of the manu-
facturers refused to furnish the stick
ers, on the grounds that their medicines
did not need pure food label. Others
refused on the grounds of expense
while still others tried to instruct the
druggist in new methods of evasion of
the law. Mr.. Snow has a bunch of 60
letters up to date, which have been re-
out of business" or address un-
known" One of these letters was writ
ten to A. L. ScoviIle & Co., of Cincin-
natl, Ohio. 1t was returned with this
terse remark from the postmaster: Out
of business. ScovilIe has been dead some
20 years.
I'VE cannot sell any of these medi-
c1nes, says Mr.. Snow, until the state
chemists get around to Analysing sam
pies of these medicines. Then we will
be graciously permitted to sell them, if
We print the stickers at our own ex-
pense."
The "stickers'' are usually small
slips of paper, bearing the serial num-
Der under which the contents of the
package or bottle are guaranteed ac-
cording to the United States pure drug
act In some cases these are INSULT
cient, as the Kansas legislature, with
its usual forethought in OVERRIDING
everything, made the state law more
drastic than the government act Each
medicine also bears a slip giving the
per cent of alcohol used in its manu-
facture- The per cent as shown on
the labels, runs from II per cent to
so per cent. Benzoate of sodium, a
preservative, is also used in some of
the medicines as well as food prod
ucts, such as pickles, catsup and pre-
serves. Oue-tenth of 1 per cent of
this is the usual amount used. This
preventative is also used in fruit
syrups or crushed fruit served at soda
fountains, and the new law requires
a sign, advising the customer of what
he is about to drink, being posted In
conspicuous places on the soda foun-
tain As benzoate of soda in broken
doses is a bsolutely harmless, this will
have little effect on the patrons of
soda fountains
In Topeka this afternoon are prob
ably five carloads of drugs and pro-
prietary medicines which the druggist
must not sell you, because he has been
unable to secure the 'stickers-' This
collection contains about $50 varie-
ties of goods. Some day: when they
have time, the state chemists will
sample some of these dead ones"
and give the druggist permission to
print some labels and sell the stuff
Then the druggist will be very glad,
as some of the tabooed medicines are
old family remedies-bftters, cough
syrups. toothache drops, ct cetera,
which have been household necessity
since the days of our grandfathers-
All pills in this list of dead ones
are dead loss. The state chemists
will not take the trouble to analyze
pills.
Not So Bad for Grocers.
The blow that struck the druggists
was not quite so severe OF the grocers
for several reasons The principal rea-
son was that a stock of groceries Is
turning over more rapidly than a stock
of drugs. The alarm was sounded far
enough in advance for the grocers to
prepare themselves for the crash, close
out their old stock and buy only goods
with the pure food stamp on the label
Some radical changes were made,
however, in the naming of several pop
ular groceries. Today you cannot buy
MOCHA and Java" coffee Pure maple
syrup is practically a thing of the past
and the price has jumped on even the
inlitat tons. Old reliable manufacturers
of "pure maple syrup" who swore on
their hope in the hereafter that their
product was absolutely pure" had to
come through with little labels admit
ting that their product was maple
syrup with cane sugar" or cane sugar
with maple syrup" This is a peculiar
distinction, but is based on the analysis,
cane or corn syrup, it must be branded
with the cane" first. If the prepon-
derance is maple, then the word ma
pie" may be used first The maple"
of the syrup is branded maple flavor"
Some manufacturers admit that 1t is
manufactured entirely from corn cobs-
Never again may we buy sardines at
or 10 cents per can, We may ger
but sardines come higher than "a cats
back
All the French condiments and canned
goods are on the black list, because the
dealers cannot get labels for them The
French manufacturers look upon the
American pure food idea as a huge joke.
Grocers were given to understand, after
the pure food law was passed, that i'm
ported goods which could pass the @ S.
were all right, but the KAN
sas law, with its usual foresight. nails
the danger tag to all French peas,
beans. pickles, condiments and spices.
because they are arttf1cialIy eolored
with copperas We feed copperas to
our chickens and hogs az a medicine,
but we are not allowed to eat it, even in
broken doses
Bert Greene. of Green & Sons, grocers,
explained the situation today
I'VE lose on our imported goods"
said Mr.. Greene, land what they did
to our coffee was a fright. We have
onIv one brand. the most expensive,
which is entitled to wear the title,
Mocha and Java without aiushing
Years ago. when coffee was cheaper