Chew On This: List 2

The arrival of new people, new customs, and new laws from the outside world brought many conveniences. But it also threatened the heart of the Yupik culture: the unique rituals and reverence surrounding food.

The U.S. government worried that selling junk food and soda violated the spirit of the National School Lunch Act. In 1977 the USDA blocked the sale of “foods of minimal nutritional value” in schools.

In a struggling Minnesota school district, General Mills gave $250 a month to ten elementary-school teachers. In return the teachers agreed to cover their cars in a vinyl wrap advertising a breakfast cereal named after a type of candy: Reese’s Puffs. General Mills called the teachers “freelance brand managers.”

“Young people in the small villages and towns of the Alaska bush often don’t have the same opportunities as their big-city counterparts,’’ Coca-Cola said in a press release announcing the visits.

“Many factors contribute to the formation of dental cavities,” the group wrote, “including diet, the level of oral hygiene, and access to professional dental care.” Despite the friendly tone, the underlying message of the letter was clear: Don’t blame soda for bad teeth.

So the three of them took over the Hanna Ranch, with help from a new foreman named Jim and from Uncle Jay, who owned the ranch next door.

They learned how to throw a lasso and sort cattle in the corral.

Ranchers and cowboys have always been symbols of the American West. Some historians have praised them as national heroes, the living embodiment of freedom and self-reliance. Others have condemned them for harming the environment and driving Native Americans off the land.

Many ranchers now argue that a few large corporations have gained a stranglehold on the market, using unfair tactics to force down the price of cattle.

The early twentieth century had trusts, but it also had trust busters, progressive government officials who believed that corporations with too much power were a threat to American freedom and democracy.

Other people who live in Greeley can’t stop thinking about the smell, even after years. It seeps into everything, gives them headaches, makes them nauseous, interferes with their sleep.

During the three months before slaughter, they eat special grain dumped into long concrete troughs that look like highway dividers.

The amount of waste created by the cattle that pass through Weld County is staggering.

When the owner flattened the pile with heavy equipment, the smoldering fire spread.

And it encouraged a system of production that turns many chicken farmers into economic serfs who must always obey company orders.

People in the United States were starting to eat a lot more chicken—a trend with worrisome implications for a fast-food chain that only sold hamburgers.

In 1994, Japanese scientists discovered that the origins of every chicken in the world could be traced back eight thousand years to a wild bird in Thailand called the red jungle fowl.

No chicken has ever been known to survive the scald tank.

On some days so many chickens would arrive there at once that workers didn’t have enough time to shackle every bird’s legs.

The book described a long list of slaughterhouse horrors that workers faced: severe back and shoulder injuries, deep cuts, amputated limbs, exposure to dangerous chemicals, and, memorably, a workplace accident in which a man fell into a vat and was turned into lard.

Human beings at the slaughterhouse, Sinclair argued, had been made into “cogs in the great packing machine,” easily replaced and entirely disposable.

Chemicals such as borax and glycerine were used to disguise the rancid smell of spoiled meat.

Employee Hospitalized for Neck Laceration from Flying Blade.

Employee's Arm Amputated in Meat Auger.

Employee Burned in Tallow Fire.

More than one quarter of the American population suffers a bout of food poisoning each year.

The risk of contamination begins in the feedlot.

Far from their optimal habitat on the prairie, cattle in feedlots become prone to all sorts of illnesses. They get little exercise and live amid pools of manure.

Far from their optimal habitat on the prairie, cattle in feedlots become prone to all sorts of illnesses. They get little exercise and live amid pools of manure.

McDonald’s relies heavily on dairy cattle for its hamburger supplies, since the animals are relatively cheap and yield leaner meat.