Connecticut western news., 1919-01-02

Mr. Landers and MT. Sheehan have been with the Focd .Adrinistra- tion continuously as Assistant Food lAdministratcr and Director of Edu- cation respectively. In the latter the Food Administration and The State Food Department removed from their original offices, at No. 36 Pearl Street in Hartford to more commodious quarters, at No. A8 Lewis Street, Mir. Durant retired on account of i'll health and Joseph H. Lawler, an ex-mayor of Hartford, was appointed as Assistant Food Administrator in charge of the En- forcement Division. Farwell Knapp was appointed office manager and executive secretary of the Food Ad- ministration, January 1, 1918, and when he entered the Field Artillery service in May, 1918, his place was taken by Bernard Greenberg, a New Haven lawyer. Isidore Wise, head of large department store in Hart ford, was the State Merchant Repre- sentative of the Foqd Administra- ton in Connecticut. State Librarian George S. Goddard was the State Library Director and he was ably assisted at all times by Miss Dorothy Weir of Ridgefield. Miss M. Estella Sprague of the Connecticut Agricul- tural College faculty was State Home Economies Director and her assistant was Miss Bertha Birdsey. On January 1, 1918, Francis B. Coo ley, a volunteer for several months, was apointed Administration Audi tor. Enforcement Cases
 Among the earliest cases coming to the attention of the Enforcement Division of the Food Administration were attempted profiteering on sugar, combination sales of sugar (prohibited December 8, 1917) and reflections of carloads of foodstuffs. Very many complaints were investi- gated, but about 90 per cent. failed to warrant action. 1t was in Con- necticut, however, that the United
 States Food Administration scored iS5 first arrest, prosecution and con- viction for hoarding. A prominent farmer of New Haven County was arrested on a federal warrant and presented before the United States Court, in February, 1918, on a plea of guilty of hoarding sugar and flonr. 4Le was scored by Judge Edwin $. Thomas, who in imposing the fine of i$lGJ. and costs, said th2t he was re- luctant to follow the United States District Attorneys lenient reccm- mendation that, because it was first offense, the penalty should bc a fine rather than a jail sentence. Again in June, 1918, when numerous com plaints were received that certain families appeared to have plenty of sugar, while others did not, the Food Administration sent secret service agents to the home of Hartford citizen and there an excessive quan- tity of sugar was discovered with the result that the man and lis wife were arrested by United States marshall. After publicity, which covered not only the entire state, but was prominently published in New York papers, the case was quashed in the belief that sufficient good results had been secured. In another instance, secret service agents raided the residence of a re- tired Bridgeport manufactures, whose wife had boasted that when ever she needed sugar, she secured it on a canning certificate and then "just forgot to can". The penalty imposed by MT. Scoville in this case attracted wide attention. Instead of ordering an arrest made, he wrote a scathing letter, which was given to the press, in which the hoarder was placed in a class by himself, apart from patriots, and informed that not only would he not be arrested, but that he would not be relieved of his excessive holdings of sugar which he might use to sweeten his bitter thought that everyone in his com munity knew that he had plenty of sugar while others more deserving had none.
 Educational and Publicity ! With the same loyal generosity that characterized their coopera- tion in other war movements, the entire press of the State, daily and weekly, from tho very beginning did their utmost for the Focd Adminis- traticn in Connecticut. Following the conference of Educational Di- rectors at Washington in February, 1918, several columns of plate mat 1 ter on an average were distributed each month to the Connecticut pa- pers using plate and this method was found to be quite as effective as was predicted at the Washington con- ference. The Connecticut food ad- lministration issued no printed bu!le- tins, but depended chiefly upon the newspapers and upon the weekly and semi-weekly news-letters sent to the one hundred and sixty-eight food directors. Sugar Distribution
 When the sugar certificate distri-