Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1916-01-21
CHAPTER 9

The apparent cause of the
little girls death was pneumonia.
The real cause was malnutrition,
low resistance, insidious starva-
ton.
The little girl who had been sick
from "overeating" liked bread or bis
cults deluged with table syrup" for
lunch. Her mother did not know
what life sustaining substances had
been removed from the bread and
the biscuits or what had been taken
out of the cornstarch that produced
the syrup.
She liked strawberry jam or some
other fruit jam from the grocery
store, with it's 10 per cent. of fruit
and its 10 per cent. of apple juice
made from the sulphured skins and
cores of the dried apple industry, with
its 10 per cent. of glucose, sweetened
with 10 per cent. of sugar and held
together with enough phosphoric acid
to supply the jellying quality, and
preserved with one-tenth of per
cent. benzoate of soda to prevent the
mass from fermenting. You do not
think such jam as this exists. / shall
prove to you that more than so per
cent. of all the jam consumed Is
exactly like this.
She liked the bright strawberry hue
of the sweetish stuff. which had been
supplied by the legal use of dye
known as amaranth. Only one-tenth
of / per cent. of benZoate of soda was
declared in fine print on the label, and
her mother had never noticed even
that, The presence of as much as
four more tenths of benzoate of soda
in many food products was determin-
ed by the commissioner of agricul-
ture of the State of Georgia The
Hn a.
chemist in Serial No. Sc. l have found
much more than four-tenths in many
foods.
The little girls doctor did not know
this. Besides he was not worried by
the presence of a little benzoate in
her jam.
She was also fond of pickles, hard
ened in a bath of alum. Her father
and mother had not been taught the
chemistry of food in the schools nor
the relationship which refined food or
juggled food or drugged food might
some day bear to their anaemic child.
But we must not go too fast. The
evening meal was quite suited to the
fathers needs. 1t consisted of chops,
or pot roast, or sausages, or baked
beans, and ham with vegetables OF
the season, fresh, or vegetables OF
some other season, canned, and a
bakery y-made pie or a homemade
pudding.
1t was the average American meal
and 1T is the average meal with which
we are concerned.
cry store down the street received
many of the pennies of the little girl
1t had existence for the purpose OF
attracting those pennies. There are
just 20,000,000 such pennies spent
each day in the United States by the
school children, according to the
roughest estimate that can be made
by consulting the candy industry.
So she feasted between meals on
dyed glucose purchased at the candy
store. She had been always of a deli
cate type. anaCmic, and nervous. Al
different times she had been treated
by the family physician FOR tonsilitis
acute chorea, and anaemic.
At the age of six she unGerwent an
operation for adenoids. In the United
States at the same time there were
more than 100000 such operations
among children. She had taken a
tonic of iron and manganese" Re-
member these words - Iron and
manganese"
At other times tonics of strychnia
were prescribed and on two occa-
sions she was given bichlorlde of mer-
curry and chloride of arsenic.
Her teeth, like those of other mill
lions of children. were decayed. At
times mother said, 'I wonder II we
feed Helen properly" but Aunt Jennie
always answered, Her ills are natural
to childhood and are to be expected.
She will outgrow them"
The neighbors told her that the less
attention she paid to her childs food
the better, because people who were
always worrying about food had the
toughest luck. Here and there O
| plump child was pointed out to hel