The Waterbury Democrat., 1931-04-22

By NEA Service
 | Washington--A mechanical set of false teeth that determines the ten- derness of meats, q glass stomach that digests food like human organs, a camera for photographing the in- 1 side of an egg, and rats and guinea pigs for other unique purposes--all Il | have a part in the U. s. Department of Agriculture's job of keeping food | fit for consumers.
 The primary purpose of the de- partment is to offer help and ad- vice to farmers, but about 25 years ago, through the shady work of some food canners, meat packers and dairymen, it was found neces- | sary to create the Food and Drug administration. This department sets standards for pure foods and drugs and sees that producers main- tain the standards.
 I Today this work is highly scien- tific and is carried R in IT offices of the department Throughout the country.
 | An idea of how designing packers have tried to work schemes for passing inferior foodstuffs on the market can be seen from one of many incidents reported by the de- partment.
 Some Fancy Sleuthing. | An inspector examining some i'm ported olive oil found, through an analysis of a few of the cans, that they contained nothing but cotton seed oil. It was determined that handles of the can had been re- moved and that the cottonseed oil was poured into the cans through the holes left by the handles. Then the handles were soldered back on In this way the importer saved | the expensive olive oil and put the wholesome, but much cheaper oil on the market. It never reached the consumer, however, for the en. tire lot was seized and the importer prosecuted.
 Laws of the pure food act saN that all food must be labeled. I inferior products are labeled sups \ rior to tests by government chem ists. the products are taken off th' market and the manufacturer mus relabel them.
 l Tn the last 24 years more thai l17.O0O cases of violation under thu food and drug act have been brough 10 justice by federal officials. Thii entailed the sampling of millions of lots of food All farm products, from vegetable! to meat that are to be put on tn' I market by commercial organizations l must be tested by chemists and othel experts of the department. These Lots are brought in and labeled fol for tests.
 If canned food, the cans are ex amined for content by weight ant volume and the purity of the con tents is tested. Then the label' are examined to see if the content! are misrepresented.. i,
 In some cases, when a product Il brought in which is advertised al being rich in nutritional value, thu food is fed to guinea pigs, rats. rab bits and cats to see if the advertised results are obtained. If not. th' product is removed from the market
 In corner. of one of these gov ernment test laboratories chem ist is testing bottle marked Smiths Malarial Remedy" H' tests the liquid to see how mucl ouinine it contains. If it does no contain enough quinine. it is brand ed illegal.
 Search for Impurities.
 Tn another corner is man test ing a yellow powder. This is drie' egg and is being tested to se' whether it is produced from fresl or rotten eggs. Next to this chem ist is a young woman studying substance through microscope. l
 proves to be a sample of preparet
 mustard and she is looking for par ticles of starch in it, which is for
 bidden by law.
 On the other side of her is an other chemist watching test tubes
 Into one of these he has placet
 some nutrient media" or bacterii food. Then he takes small DOT
 ton of the contents of a can o peas, for instance, If. after a da. or so, the contents of the tube be