The Republican journal., 1915-04-29
Maine Man Makes Good.
Prof. Edwin Fremont Laid Graduate of
U. of NJ, instrumental in Working Pure
Food Reforms and Discloses Fertilizer
Swindie

| Prot. Edwin Fremont Laid Graduate of
| U. of NJ, Instrumental in Working Pure
Food Reforms and Discloses Fertilizer
Swindie.
'"The most popular man in the State"
says North Dakota newspaper in speak
ing of Professor Edwin Fremont Ladd,
who graduated from the University of
| Maine in 1885. Professor L add is ma
tive of Maine, born on a Maine farm,
receiving his education in the backwoods.
! After graduating from here in the chem
/ istry department, he went to the New
| York Experiment Station as assistant to
Chief Chemist Babcock, famous as the
/ inventor of the Babcock Milk Test.
| Three years later, in 1890. he went to
North Dakota to help found the State
! Agricultural School and Experiment Sta
ton. His first work in the West was to
analyze brand of widely known fertili-
ger which was costing the manufacturers
dollar and half ton, and which was
put on the market tor $50, the farmers
paying the freight.
Professor Ladd put these figures in the
hands of the Legislators who made it
law that fertilizer manufacturers should
label each product, putting on the label
the name and proportion of each ingre-
dent used. Thereafter fertilizers which
did not fertlllZe were put out of the
North Dakota market.
A the present time Professor Ladd
teaches Chemistry in the State Agricul-
tural College, is chief chemist of the
Agricultural Experiment Station and
| also State food commissioner and foe
to every kind of fraud. He is paid S4,-
600 year by the State of N. Dakota.
| In 1895, Professor Ladd made an at
tempt to have pure food law passed
/ by the State Legislature. Not men,
| Der of the house would introduce the bill
F., and two years later he tried again. The
| bill passed the Senate but was killed in
| the lower house. But with the people
with him, in 1901, the bill became law.
Too late he discovered the appropriation
for its enforcement had been cut out.
He was at once appointed pure food COM
missioner and began business. The board
of trustees granted him $3.50 as enforce
ment fund, and soon after his tour was
ended, Experiment Station Bulletin, No.
So, was issued. The bulletin listed brands
dyes that were being sold in the State,
also brands of fruit that were preserved
a., in saccharine, diluted with water and
| were sold as short weight.
+ Manufacturers of adulterated and pois-
oned foods who believed that the teeth
of the pure food law had been pulled
when the appropriation was defeated,
| became active at once and entered hum
(, dred thousand dollar suit against Ladd.
At the same time they sent word to the
| commissioner that if he would retract
statements in Bulletin No. So, they would
not press suit.
T'll retract nothing. l repeat all l
! said in the bulletins half the truth
| hasn't been told!' was Ladd's reply.
The pure food law was attacked as I'M
constitutional and when the Federal Dis
trict Court ruled for Ladd, the case was
appealed to the Supreme Court which
also upheld the law. The libel suit
never came to trial.
! Professor Ladd's work comes nearer
affecting every individual in North Da-
kota than the work of any other citizen
or official. He has been instrumental in
giving the State pure food law, a
strong drug and patent medicine law, the
best paint law in the nation, cold stor-
age law, an honest advertising law, and
an effective sanitary law. And they
have proven real laws as they are en-
forced by the man who wrote them.
In the course of his fight against fraud,
Professor Ladd has had to defend him
self eight times before the Supreme
Court of the United States; but he has
the student annual of North Dakota Ag-
ricultural College each member of the
faculty is credited with his favorite say
ing, and opposite Professor Ladd's name
appears: 81 won't bulge an inch," a
atafemant which his career has nrovon