Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1908-12-16
NATIONAL EXPERTS
FOLLOW WISCONSIN
RULING OF DEPARTMENT OF AG,
RicuLTuRE UPON QUESTION
OF BLEAcHED FLOUR.
BADGER AND DAKOTA AUTHORS
TIES WERE LEADERS IN
THE FIGHT.

Wisconsin's dairy and food depart
ment has again been endorsed by the
authorities at Washington, this time
IN the determination of Secretary OF
Agriculture ia. H. Wilson that flour
bleached with nitrogen is an adulter-
ateed product under the law, and can
not be sold in the District OF Column
bia or the territories or be transport
ed in interstate commerce. The de-
cis:on to this effect was made by
Secretary Wilson yesterday and fol
lows the lead taken upon this question
by the dairy and food commissioners
of Wisconsin and the Dakotas. In
truth. it was not until the attention of
the department at Washington was
directed to the matter by the action
and effort of a conference of commits
sioners held in Madison last summer,
that particular attention was given to
the matter by the national authorities.
Wisconsin has been a leader, with
the Dakotas, in this fight against adul
iteration of flour. In his last report
Commissioner Emery said upon the
subject.
1.-The general law on the adul.era-
ton of articles of food makes it a
miSdemeanOr to adulterate an article
of food by adding any substance or
substances to such article of food so
as to lower or deprecate it's quality or
purity; or by any means to make it
appear better or of greater value than
it really is. The legal standard for
flour in Wisconsin is as follows. Flour
is the fine, clean, sound product made
by boiling wheat meal, and contains
not more than thirteen and onehal'
one and twelve hundredths per cent.
of nitrogen, not more than one per
cent. of ash, and not more than fifty
hundred per cent. of fiber.
Meal is the clean, sound product
made by grinding grain.
Oxides of nitrogen are therefore
held to be illegal constituents of flour
under the food laws of this state
This is notice to manufacturers OF
and dealers in -four that the sale OF
-four containing added oxides of nitro
gen will be contested as unlawful un
less such product is labeled and sold
as Chemically Bleached Flour, or Flour
and Oxides of Nitrogen. or by anyl
pound.
From investigations made in the
laboratory OF this commission, we are
led to the conclusion that the practice
of bleaching flour affords opportunity
for fraud. and that the baking quail
tiles of the flour and the flavor of the
bread therefrom are deprecated.
cit is the conclusion of some inves
!; gator. trat oxi]es of nitrogen con
tanned in food, even in very minute
quantities. are deleterious to health.
II further investigation corroborates
these conclusions. it will become the
duty Of the dairy and food commission
er to contest as unlawful the sale. I'M
der any name whatever. of flour
bleached with the oxides of nitrogen"
That the department at Washington
Fave endorsed the position Of Com
missioner Emery is evident in it's
action of Yesterday, for certainly sol
sweeping an order would not be made
if the experts bad not found that the
or doctored -four was del
eterious.
Secretary Wilson has decided, how
ever, that owing to the immense guam
tlty CT bleached -four now on hand, the
secretary will recommend no prosecu
tons of manufacturers or sellers for
six months from this date
This action of the government has
been anxiously watched for by the
western commissioners and at once
puts them upon advantage ground ill
their contest for purity in the chief
food product of the nation