Fat land : how Americans became the fattest people in the world (25 page)

The single most important standard work, found in all major medical libraries, is the Handbook of Obesity, edited by the pre-eminent George A. Bray, Claude Bouchard, and W. P. T. James (New York: Marcel Dekker, 1998). This has been joined recently by the researchers at the World Health Organization, who have produced the fine Obesity: Preventing and Managing the Global Epidemic (WHO Technical Report Series No. 894, 2000); some of their work can be read at www.who.int/nut/obs.htm. For another comprehensive view of obesity's health impact, see "Obesity research: a JAMA theme issue," Journal of the American Medical Association, v. 282, October 27, 1999; the volume has some political value as well, indicating a turn in the sentiment of a body that long viewed obesity as a legitimate medical issue with undue skepticism. Lastly there is the more recent clarion call by the U.S. surgeon general, The Surgeon General's Call to Action to Prevent and Decrease Overweight and Obesity (Washington,

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D.C.: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2001), available on the Web at www.surgeongeneral.gov.

Introduction

3 "If obesity is left unchecked": Quoted in Associated Press, "Nearly All Americans Will One Day Be Overweight, Researchers Predict," Los Angeles Times, June 29, 1998, p. A33.

"See, for decades": Interview with James Hill. For an expansion of his views, see James O. Hill, Jeanne Goldberg, Russell Pate, and John Peters, "Introduction to special issue," Nutrition Reviews, v. 59, March 2001, pp. S4-S6 and S57-S62.

4 About 61 percent: David Satcher, Assistant Secretary for Health and Surgeon General, The Surgeon General's Call to Action to Prevent and Decrease Overweight and Obesity (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2001), p. 1. See also A. H. Mokdad, M. K. Serdula, W. H. Dietz, et al, "The spread of the obesity epidemic in the United States, 1991-1998," Journal of the American Medical Association, v. 282, October 27, 1999, pp. 1519-1522. The American Bariatric Society: Quoted in Atul Gawande, "The Man Who Couldn't Stop Eating," The New Yorker, July 9, 2001, p. 78.

Children are most at risk: Overweight in childhood is reached when a child exceeds the 85th percentile of his or her age group — that is, when the child weighs more than 85 percent of peers; childhood obesity is reached when a child exceeds the 95th percentile. For more, see Satcher, Surgeon General's Call, Figure 5, p. 5; see also Obesity: The Public Health Crisis (Washington, D.C.: American Obesity Association, 1999), p. 1; note also that Richard Strauss and Harold Pollack, "Epidemic increase in childhood overweight, 1986-1998," Journal of the American Medical Association, v. 286, 2001, pp. 2845-2848, offer a more nuanced look at the numbers, concluding that "by 1998, overweight prevalence increased to 21.5 percent of African-Americans, 21.8 percent among Hispanics, and 12.3 percent among non-Hispanic whites."

"Today," he told a group: David Satcher, Assistant Secretary for Health and Surgeon General, "Keynote Address: USDA Conference on Childhood Obesity" (Washington, D.C.: USDA Press Office, October 27, 1998).

5 "The lower rates": Deborah Galuska, Julie Will, Mary Serdula, and

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Earl Ford, "Are health care professionals advising obese patients to lose weight?" Journal of the American Medical Association, v. 282, 1999, P- 157.

/. Up Up Up! (Or, Where the Calories Came From)

Despite the fact that the Nixon-Ford years provided the framework for much of what we now take for granted as "globalism," "free trade," and "open markets," no single work by a major historian has yet plumbed the political economics of that decade. Two recent books, however, treat 1970s generational politics, David Frum's How We Got There (New York: Perseus, 2000) and Bruce J. Schulman's The Seventies (New York: Free Press, 2001). The former is the livelier, conservative take, the latter being a more scholarly, liberal assessment. Both are worth reading. There is virtually no published scholarship on Earl Butz, who, at ninety-three, was gracious enough to grant me an extended phone interview from his residence in West Lafayette, Indiana. The former secretary still maintains an ambitious speaking schedule, as well as an office at Purdue University's Department of Agricultural Economics. The same university's archives were helpful in providing me access to the Butz papers, as was the staff of the Gerald R. Ford Library, in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Correspondence with Arnold Gavin, who established the first modern palm oil factories in Malaysia, was vital to understanding the origins of food oil technology. John DeCourcy, a deputy in Butz's department in the mid-1970s, was a font of detail and wisdom about the man and his politics.

7 In Washington, Butz was an optimist: Interview with John DeCourcy. Also see Julius Duscha, "Up, Up, Up — Butz Makes Hay Down on the Farm," New York Times Magazine, April 16, 1972, p. 73; Lillian Price, "Earl Butz — Educator, Public Servant, and the Farmer's Friend," Lafayette Leader, November 14, 1997, p. 4. For an example of Butz's patriotic and religious rhetoric, see Earl Butz, "Who Will Speak for America?: A Nation Under God," address, Polish Legion Veterans' Convention, August 24, 1974, in Vital Speeches," v. 40, September 14, 1974, pp. 710-712.

There were his endless battles with Henry Kissinger: Interview with Earl Butz. For a full explication of the USDA-State Department antagonisms, see "Memorandum for Jerry Jones," Cabinet Meeting, October so, 1974, Box 3, James E. Conner Files, Gerald R. Ford Library.

NOTES

7 There was his constant. . . denigration of welfare: See Duscha, "Up, Up, Up . . . ," New York Times Magazine, p. 90. See also "Cabinet Meeting Notes," Cabinet Meeting, August 26, 1974, Box 3, Conner Files.

8 "That's what it was like trying to multiply the farm vote for Nixon!": Quoted in Duscha, "Up, Up, Up . . . ," New York Times Magazine, p. 91.

Cautious growers simply had not planted enough grain crops: For a full account of the 1972-1973 food shortages, see "Why a Food Scare in a Land of Plenty?" U.S. News & World Report, v. 75, July 16, 1973, pp. 15-20.

9 By early 1973, with food price inflation at an all-time high: See chart, "As Food Supplies Dwindle ... Prices Go Soaring," U.S. News, v. 75, July 16, 1973, p. 16. See also "A Threat of Food Shortage," Time, July

9, 1973, p. 55-

The movement even had its own graphics: "The Great Meat Furor," Newsweek, v. 81, April 9, 1973, p. 19.

In San Francisco ... In Houston: Ibid. Also see "A Buyers' Strike That Is Succeeding," U.S. News, April 8, 1974, p. 20. "Like it or not . . .": Lester R. Brown, "We Run the Risk of Empty Meat Counters," Newsweek, v. 75, July 16, 1973, p. 18. 10 "The only one thing in the middle of the road . . .": Quoted in Price, "Earl Butz ..." Lafayette Leader, p. 4.

To do so he launched an aggressive campaign: Earl Butz, "A Realistic Look at Food Reserves," address, December 11, 1973, in Vital Speeches, v. 40, January 15, 1974, pp. 197-199; Earl Butz, "Trade and Food Security," address, September 4, 1974, in Vital Speeches, v. 40, October 1, 1974, pp. 742-745; Earl R. Butz, "Meat Prices," address, June 29, 1972, in Vital Speeches, v. 38, August 15, 1972, pp. 647-649; Earl Butz, "Food, Farm Programs, and the Future," address, April 3, 1973, in Vital Speeches, v. 39, May 15, 1973, pp. 465-467; and Earl Butz, "Who Will Speak for America?" Vital Speeches, v. 40, p. 711.

For years, sugar prices: Interview, Stanley Segall, Drexel University professor of food technology. Segall is the foremost expert in the United States on added sweeteners in food processing. An outstanding overview of the need for alternatives to sugar can be found in L. Mark Hanover and John S. White, "Manufacturing, composition, and applications of fructose," American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, v. 58 (supp.), pp. S724-S732. See also John Long, Chapter 13, in Alternative Sweeteners, ed. Lyn O'Brien Nabors (New York: Marcel Dekker, 2001).

NOTES

io But in 1971 food scientists in Japan: Hanover and White, "Manufacturing ..." p. 724s; Y. Takasaki and Y. Kosugi, Fermentation Advances (New York: Academic Press, 1969); S. Akabori, K. Nehara, and I. Muramatsu, in Journal of the Chemical Society of Japan, v. 73, 1952, p. 311.

11 "I remember being told . . .": Segall interview. For production history of commercial fructose, see S. Vuilleumer, "Worldwide production of high-fructose syrup and crystalline fructose," American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, v. 58 (supp.), November 1993, pp. S733-S736.

12 Convenience foods and TV dinners ... a "... maid service": Duscha, "Up, Up, Up . . . ," New York Times Magazine, p. 88.

A cartoon: Ibid.

he liked to refer to the problem as "public enemy number one": In "Cabinet Meeting Notes," Cabinet Meeting, August 26, 1974, Box 3. Butz got a phone call from . . . Poage: DeCourcy interview.

13 if we were going to allow this "rat oil": DeCourcy interview; Butz interview. The entire palm oil debate is thoroughly reported, complete with Poage's remarks about "rat oil," in Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Oilseeds and Rice and the Subcommittee on Cotton, Committee on Agriculture, U.S. House of Representatives, Ninety-fourth Congress, Second Session, March 18, 1976; May 15, 1976; and August 5, 1976.

"It was back to square one . . .": Butz interview.

14 The stall thus lodged: DeCourcy interview. For details of Butz's "stall" as it appeared to one committee witness, see "Statement of Joe Rankin, Vice President, Texas Farmers' Union," Hearings . . . , May 15, 1976, p. 141-

Palm oil had been around: A fine modern history of palm oil can be found in Designer Oil Crops, ed. Denis J. Murphy (Weinheim, Germany: VCH Publishing, 1994), pp. 22-27; palm oil's political and economic history is traced in James Pletcher, "Regulation with growth: the political economy of palm oil in Malaysia," World Development, v. 19, no. 6, 1991, pp. 623-636. For a personal account of how palm oil was refined and made commercially viable, see Arnold Gavin, "Spurring Innovations in a Fifty-Year Career," in Scientia Gras: A Select History of Fat Science and Technology (Champaign, Illinois: AOCS Press, 2000), pp. 73-82.

15 "Palm oil is more highly saturated than hog lard": Hearings . . ., August 5, 1976, p. 75.

16 In Malaysia . . . Musa bin Hitam . . . : DeCourcy interview.

"You must realize ...": Ibid. See also David A. Andelman, "Business in Malaysia," New York Times, August 6, 1976, p. Di.

NOTES

"And he managed to get Hitam . . .": DeCourcy interview. Also, "Visit of H. E. Earl Butz, Secretary of Agriculture, U.S.A. and Delegation to Malaysia on 23rd April, [19176," Programme, Friday, April 23; typescript memo, "Malaysia Mission," Butz Papers, Purdue University.

To Hitam he wrote ... To DeCourcy he wrote . . . : Earl Butz, "Letter to The Honorable YB Musa bin Hitam," April 26, 1976; Earl Butz, "Letter to Mr. and Mrs. John DeCourcy, Agricultural Attache," April 24, 1976, Butz Papers.

His most infamous — and last — official transgression: There are a number of essays and personal observations on the Butz gaffe. Two good reportorial summaries are "Butz: A Tongue Out of Order," Newsweek, October 11, 1976, p. 27; "The Butz Affair: He Had to Pay the Price," U.S. News & World Report, October 18, 1976, p. 18. Prices on just about every single commodity: Darius Lakdawalla and Tomas Philipson, "The Growth of Obesity and Technological Change: A Theoretical and Empirical Examination," joint paper, presented to the American Enterprise Institute, October 18, 2001. See chart, "Changes in the Relative Price of Food in the U.S., 1951— 2000," p. 3.

In what would prove to be one of the single most: See "Coke Strikes Back," Fortune, June 1, 1981, p. 34; Katherine Isaac, "Tate & Lyle: The Granddaddy of Sugar," Multinational Monitor, April 1, 1989, p. 22; Coca-Cola USA, Annual Report, 1980, pp. 7-9; Coca-Cola US A, Annual Report, 1985, p. 33.

McDonald's, which . . . fried its potatoes in palm oil: Interview and correspondence with Arnold Gavin. Between 1963 and 1984 Gavin was chief technology executive with Engineering Management Inc., a leading developer of fat- and oil-processing equipment based in Des Plaines, Illinois. It was Gavin who, while stationed in Kuala Lumpur, oversaw the development and deployment of new palm oil fractionating devices in the mid-1980s.

2. Supersize Me (Who Got the Calories into Our Bellies)

Although a number of books examine the business practices of fast-food companies — the most recent being Eric Schlosser's best-selling Fast Food Nation (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001) — none treat the practice of supersizing in depth. Ray Kroc's Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's (Chicago: Contemporary Books, 1977) provides an entertaining in-

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side look at the company's early years. John F. Love's McDonald's: Behind the Arches (New York: Bantam, 1986) was an invaluable source of journalistic leads; it also provided a basis for my examination of David Wallerstein's role in the creation of large-size fries. A boosterish but nicely reported and written look at the trade by the trade is Charles Bernstein and Ron Paul's Winning the Chain Restaurant Game (New York: John Wiley, 1994). A number of leads from Mr. Bernstein, the pre-eminent chronicler of the business, paid off handsomely in interviews with key industry executives. Among them were Max Cooper, a McDonald's PR executive in the 1960s, now a franchisee in Birmingham, Alabama; John Martin, the creator of the value meal concept, now an independent businessman in Irvine, California; Bob Keyser, a longtime McDonald's executive, and Bob Charles, the onetime head of the McDonald's Franchisee Advertising Association, who gave invaluable accounts of the "franchisees' revolt"; and Nancy Izquierdo, currently in the McDonald's media department, who was helpful — until her superiors curtailed all communication with me. Joanne Jacobs, corporate communications manager for McDonald's, provided general information about the company's marketing goals. Dick Forst, former head of the Burger King Franchisee Association, gave insight into that organization's concerns. Three industry trade publications, Nation's Restaurant News, Brandweek, and Advertising Age, were indispensable for establishing chronology.