ASSOCIATION FOR CONSUMER RESEARCH

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Sugar and Snails: Consumption, Rationing and the Gendered Perception of Wartime Food Deprivation* Amy L. Bentley, University of Pennsylvania

[to cite]: Amy L. Bentley (1991) ," and Snails: Consumption, Rationing and the Gendered Perception of Wartime Food Deprivation*", in GCB - Gender and Consumer Behavior Volume 1, eds. Dr. Janeen Arnold Costa, Salt Lake City, UT : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 209-222.

[url]: http://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/15559/gender/v01/GCB-01

[copyright notice]: This work is copyrighted by The Association for Consumer Research. For permission to copy or use this work in whole or in part, please contact the Copyright Clearance Center at http://www.copyright.com/. Sugar and Snails: Consumption, Rationing and the Gendered Perception of Wartime Food Deprivation*

Amy L. Bentley, University of Pennsylvania

From our earliest moments to our last, humans preparation and consumption of highly valued depend on food to sustain life. But food is much foods. To take this exploration to another level, I more than ingesting nutrients for biological will examine how the rationing of symbolically survival. Because all peoples must acquire, important--and symbolically-Iaden--foods was prepare, and consume food--requiring from the experienced and felt along gender lines. I want to majority most of their time and energy--these take a provocative leap by suggesting that a useful activities over time have become intimately woven way to consider wartime rationing and the into societies' cultural practices and beliefs. Food differing wartime experiences of American men helps to designate gender and class, it plays a and women is to study the official rationing of the significant role in social relationships, it is a highly two most highly valued foods, red meat and sugar. symbolic element in religious and magical rites, By looking at the ways in which these foods have and it aids in developing and maintaining cultures' been historically laden with gendered identities. Thus the consumption of food is an "meanings"--redmeat as quintessentially male, and extraordinarily social activity fraught with complex sugar as female--and then by examining the and shifting layers of meaning. In fact, cultural federal government's policies toward the rationing foodways, one of the earliest formed layers of of these foods, the wartime publicity surrounding cuIture, are usually the last to erode.1 this rationing program, and different individuals' experiences of this rationing, we can get, I think, a During the Second World War food shortages in highly original and important insight into how North America were nowhere nearly as acute as Americans experienced the war, and experienced those in Europe or Asia--a fact United States it differently, according to gender. citizens realized- -but rationing and shortages, for some the only tangible indications of the terrible There is some evidence that men ate more meat war being fought overseas, still altered people's and women consumed more sugar during the war; lives. For those with insufficient inconles, but firmly establishing this phenomenon is not my rationing had little effect, except perhaps to primary intention here. I am more interested in heighten what was already an acute realization of exploring the symbolic and cultural associations their lack of resources for food.2 But for which exist in American society regarding gender, Americans with adequate incomes, food rationing red meat, and sugar. As a cultural historian, I upset their daily patterns and habits of eating, draw from anthropology and cultural studies to from their morning coffee to their traditional explore the associations between gender and meat Thanksgiving dinners. This wartime disruption of and sugar to suggest that at a symbolic level the food habits and rituals decreased the amount of rationing of and deprivation of meat and sugar individual control over these seemingly small but carries significant weight as a metaphor for significant matters of life. For many Americans, wartime Americans' experiences. My ideas are choosing between a steak or chops for dinner was meant to be exploratory, suggestive and evidence of having "made it," and the restriction of provocative. I want to try to identify how the this choice encroached on an important arena for "language"of food functioned to reinforce social control they had over their lives. roles and the social expectations, with their accompanying expectations about power and To learn more about what food rationing meant authority, of men and women during the war. to Americans during World War II it is illuminating to explore the symbolic importance of Gender and food food in general. I am especially interested in exploring the psychological nleanings of being In part because of the early division of labor deprived of important rituals surrounding the according to sex, in many cultures certain foods

209 _...... _------­ have become svmbolically linked and hence using other foods, especially sugar, to make up culturally associated with one sex: most commonly the caloric differences. Even with rising industrial meat with n1en, and "non-meats"with women, wages that increases the amount of money that especially grains, vegetables and . In can be spent on food these patterns tend to hold. Eastern thought, yin and yang associate meat with Mintz argues that "Everybody eats more sugar, the masculine yin and vegetables with the but women and children eat relatively n10re than feminine yang while as children in our own adult men; everybody gets some meat, but adult Westernized culture we learn that little boys are men get disproportionately more than women and made of "snails and puppydog tails" while little children.,,5 girls are made of "sugar and spice and everything nice." Numerous anthropologists have speculated Of course, this "hierarchy of meat distribution" about these cultural associations and, from both exists not only by sex, but by race and class as mentalist and _materialist orientations, have well. Meat products like pigs feet, ham hocks, documented strong cuI tural identifications chitterlings, chicken backs and giblets which are between women and sugar, and men and meat. associated with soul food, the African- American Noted anthropologist Sidney Mintz, for instance, cuisine that evolved under slavery, have been in his research found: usually historically regarded as inedible or "throw-aways,"and in fact were the leftovers that One (male) observer after another displays the white slave-owners discarded.6 Further, it has curious expectation that women will like sweet been well-documented for centuries that wealthier foods to achieve otherwise unattainable objectives; classes consume much larger quantities of meat and that sweet things are, in both literal and than do the poor.? figurative senses, more the domain of women than of men. Of course these frequent references are A Gallup poll taken in January 1945--perhaps the interesting in their own right: that there may be leanest time for Americans during the war--asked: links between women and sweet tastes is a "What one product that is now rationed do you research problem in itself.3 find it hardest to cut down on or get along without?"The top two items people mentioned Conversely, in Victorian An1erica women had a were sugar and meat: Twenty percent listed sugar strong, cuiturally predicated aversion to meat, an as being the hardest to do without and nineteen aversion that was powerfully reinforced by strong percent chose meat. What is particularly societal norms concerning femininity. For interesting is that the pollsters recorded that more Victorian women and girls (whose delicate women mentioned sugar than men, and a greater digestive systen1s, it was believed, could only proportion of men mentioned meat. At least in process softer, blander and sweeter foods) red this limited example, the gender associations of meat was especially troublesome; if females ate sugar and women and men and meat held true meat at all it was in small amounts, and it was when it came to food preferences.8 What these cooked until overdone. As Joan Jacobs Bromberg actual preferences mean is unknown, but they relates, "The flesh of animals was considered a raise interesting questions. If the poll is correct, heat-producing food...that stimulated...sexual why did women miss sugar more than men and development and activity [and] was linked to men miss meat more than women? I would adolescent insanity and nymphomania." Thus for suggest women and men missed their respective Victorian America, women's consumption of meat foods for different reasons. In the case of women, caused "great moral anxiety.,,4 I think the strong sense of deprivation was based in a highly symbolically important domestic In addition, there is considerable evidence that in activity that was much curtailed by wartin1e most societies, men eat more meat than do rationing--home baking. Women who baked at women, and women consume more sugar. home used sugar as a primary ingredient; Anthropological studies of both non-industrial receiving important recognition from their families societies and of working-class families in for this "special"contribution to the family diet. western-industrial societies document that in They also received deep personal satisfaction for households with limited resources a large portion providing their families with home-baked goods, of the family's meat/protein supply goes to the and also perhaps because baking was for them a father, while the women and children go without, pleasurable activity. Men, who did not bake nearly

210 as much, did not notice sugar "the ingredient" supplies of meat to keep citizens on the missing as much as they did the baked items homefront mentally as well as physically strong (which were also available from commercial and healthy enough to win the war. Red meat--the bakeries). Instead, men were much more consummate syn1bol of virility-received primary cognizant of the lack of a steak on their dinner status from the government during the war. I1 plate at night. The symbolic importance of baking Citizens felt well-fed if they could get meat; as part of women's contribution to the household without it morale went down. Even though there economy, and the felt absence of this important were other sources of protein ritual of dom.estic nurture during the war available--particularly eggs and beans as well as heightened American women's sense of what it an abundance of the so-called "variety was they were sacrificing. Men were more meats--eating red meat was crucial to homefront cognizant of missing meat, perhaps because for psychological well-being.12 Public opinion surveys many men the role of being a good provider was bear this out: A Gallup poll released two days reinforced by making sure the family had plenty before the bombing of Pearl Harbor asked of meat on their plates. In any case, what I want Americans, "Would the health of your family be to argue here is that men's preferences--and the better if you had more money to spend on food?" symbolic importance of n1en's desires--were Thirty-nine percent responded "yes"and sixty-one accorded higher status by the entire culture, percent responded "no."However, of those with a including the government, during the war. The "lower income" (the poll did not reveal how this symbolic associations of men with meat and was defined) fifty-seven percent responded "yes, "a women with sugar were actively reinforced by difference of eighteen percentage points. Those wartime government policy, advertising, and even who responded in the affirmative were asked: "If commercial cookbooks. As a metaphor for power you had more money, what foods would you in the political economy of wartime America, the spend it on?" Topping the list with forty-five differences in the images and associations of meat percent was meat, followed by vegetables, dairy and sugar are highly suggestive and illustrative of products and fruits. the many ways in which power, authority, and male desire are insinuated in seemingly Those wartime experts advising the government insignificant details of daily life, including the on proper food rationing strategies realized the family meal. To develop this argument, I will first symbolic power of red meat, and knew that for turn to a brief discussion of the media's wartime Americans to comply with rationing they would association of meat and masculinity, and then turn need to feel that this sacrifice of their desired and to the relationship between women and sugar. highest-status food was for the "good of the country." A report by the Committee on Food Meat and World War II Habits, a group of social scientists studying the psychological effects and cultural implications of With the abundance of well-paying war-related rationing, discussed this connection: jobs, more Americans could afford more expensive cuts of red meat. An increased demand A study of menus in different income groups has for meat coupled with a drastically decreased shown that families feel well fed if n1eat is supply (sixty percent of U.S. choice cuts of beef included in the menu. Interviews in lower income went to the military), created shortages of red groups in New York showed that people were meat for civilians.9 Scrambling to set in, place often willing to cut down on every other essential some controls over' the nation's food supplies the in order to purchase meat. It is recognized that in federal government early in 1942 introduced a some parts of the country the very poor do not "Share-the-Meat"campaign which urged depend upon meat, but, for the country as a Americans voluntarily to limit their weekly meat whole. meat is the core of the diet. Probably more intake to 2.5 pounds per person.10 In 1943 the than any other food, meat combines the idea of government began rationing most cuts of beef, self-preservation, strength, racial preservation pork and lamb according to a point system. (through the strong belief that meat and virility are connected) and growth, with the demands of The symbolic importance of meat on Americans' taste and appetite. Restrictions in meat demand table was never lost to government officials, who very careful planning.13 knew the importance of providing sufficient

211 The government, reinforcing this connection Although red meat was important to citizen between psychological well-being and physical morale back at the homefront, most Americans well-being, knew that allotting the largest portion were willing to sacrifice the choicest cuts to of U.S. choice meat to the military would provide strengthen the "boys overseas." Despite bitter enough meat to satisfy the soldiers both complaints about domestic n1eat shortages, it symbolically and physically. In an attempt to made Americans hopeful to know that the military convince skeptical Americans why the resumption were getting so much good, red meat. A magazine of meat rationing was necessary after the quotas article, "Variety Meats: They are Good, Abundant, had been lifted for seven months, the Office of Highly Nutritious,"berated those Americans for Price Administration in December 1944 explained: depriving G.I. Joe his hefty allotment of red meat:

FRESH MEAT IS AN IMPORTANT PART OF The steak, chops~ and roasts which have been OUR SOLDIERS' DIETS [sic]....Portable field standard fare on most tables are now being served kitchens and refrigeration vans move up with to the men in uniform at home and abroad....The advancing troops to provide them daily with hot Army does not want the "variety meats" because meals and huge supplies of fresh meats. Troops in they spoil easily, take time to prepare and the the field now get fresh meats at three meals a men don't like them. These objections, valid for week and the aim of the Quartermaster Corps is the Army, make no sense when cited by to provide fresh meat and butter at least two civilians.18 meals a day. Bacon on the breakfast menu would further increase the huge supplies of meat needed. A poem by Langston Hughes, "Speaking of Food," The Quartermaster promises fresh food for every printed in the African-American weekly the meal...provided the supplies are available.14 :aaltimore Afro-American echoed this same sentiment; Hughes makes clear how widespread Indeed, during the war a soldier received about was the understanding of the importance of two-and-a-half times more meat--about a pound a sacrificing meat for the war effort: day--than a U.S. civilian.15 The Armour Company (not surprisingly, since it processed meat I hear folks talking products) in one advertisement declared the U.S. About coffee's hard to get, soldier as "the greatest meat eater in the world," And they don't know how claiming, "Notone man in ten ate as nourishing, They're gonna live without it. well-balanced meals at home as he gets in the Navy today.,,16 I hear some others saying They can't buy no meat to fry, In "How to Stow and Take Care of Food on Ship And the way they say it Board," the official manual of the War Shipping You'd think they're gonna die. Administration Food Control Division, the section entitled HMeat--YourMost Important Item" If I was to sit down describes meat as the "mainstay of many a well­ And write Uncle Sam, u balanced meal : I'd tell him that I reckon I can make it without ham. Meat is one of the major providers of life-essential complete proteins needed to repair body tissue as I'd say, "Feed those fighting forces it wears out, and to furnish the bUilding blocks for For they're the ones today new muscle and sinew in husky, hardy men who That need to have the victuals follow the sea. To wipe our foes away"

But meat is more than that. Looks like to me That's what we ought to say.19 It is the provider of those savory aromas that awaken the appetite--the part of a meal that There were numerous such writings and media makes a man finish feeling well-fed. Meat "sticks images associating men with red meat during to the ribs" (italics added).17 wartime. Many of them were government pitches for compliance with rationing quotas, which

212 condemned civilian men specifically for eating meat is scarce in wartime, but I think you are more than their fair share of meat. The Office of overdoing it just a bit.,,21 war Information (OWl), the government propaganda and censorship agency, provided To ease the burden on beef producers and newspapers with an anti-black market piece maintain Americans' health the government and entitled "THE BLACKETEER!"--apicture of a others urged the use of al ternate supplies of man looking at the reader, a large hand holding a protein, specifically beans and eggs, both of which steak under his nose, and the following poem: were in plentiful supply throughout the war. But, unlike the government's attempts to get men to To causes like the U.S.O. eat less meat, its campaign to get Americans to He even gives a pint of blood... use these alternative protein sources was aimed at But even so, he's still a dud. women, the food preparers. Through the influence of women it was hoped men would decrease their For here's a man who eats his steak meat intake by substituting other protein-rich And has his coupons, too! foods. For instance, there was much publicity The price he lets black markets take about the nutritional importance of Shoots prices up for you. soybeans--considered to be the new "miracle"food of the future. Mildred Lager, in her wartime Each time he cheats it costs you dough cookbook, The Useful Soybean: A Plus Factor in What's more, he gets your share. Modern Living, sung the praises of the soybean, It's up to YQ!! to let him know calling it "a little round bean roll[ing] forth to play He, to, must share...play square. a spectacular and gigantic role in our agriculture, commerce, industry and nutrition."Z2Lager saw Attempting to explain to the American public why the An1erican male and his carnivorous desires as so much food was being shipped overseas, the the main impediment to getting soybeans on every OWl --appropriating the meat-as-male metaphor American table (in great quantities): as well as the "hierarchy of meat" distribution--created an illustration and text which It is never easy...to change food habits or to was sent to rural newspapers across the country. introduce new foods. For the average American male, the soybean, or any bean for that matter, When you divide up a small meat loaf at the table has little appeal; its wondrous protein content is you may give a great big piece to Johnny, who is overshadowed by his memory of a thick juicy on the basketball team, a reasonably large piece steak. The chances are good that he is not the to yourself, a fair-sized piece to the Mrs., and a least bit interested in soybeans, does not even tiny one to three-year-old Suzy. want to try them, and feels he can get along nicely without them. But such a rebelling male can fet That's about the way-eon the basis of needs not his beans without suspecting their presence.2 wants--rhat the War Food Administration divides the U.S. food supply among the armed forces, Lager went on to reveal the underhanded ways a civilians, Allies, and other"claimant" woman could sneak soybeans into her man's diet groups....Only the WFA does it on a much bigger so he might remain unaware he was eating the scale and calls it "allocations.,,20 dreaded bean.

The OWl also provided cartoons to newspaper Eggs had long been touted as an adequate and magazines which dealt with men and meat. alternate source of protein to red meat. The One OWl cartoon shows a butcher, from behind government can1paigned constantly for American the meat counter, saying to a man with a black women to increase their use of eggs; the eye: "Sorry, Mr. Claybourne, but we must government's propaganda bureau even declared conserve beefsteak!" Another OWl cartoon, them a "VictorySpecial," which meant that by printed in both the Mission Times of Mission, buying the oversupply of eggs American women Texas, and the Independent. of Jordan, could demonstrate their patriotism.24 The Minnesota, shows a woman talking to a man in a OWl-prepared Women's Ra~io Guide, in one home overrun by rabbits: "Ofcourse, Wilbur, release titled, "Use More Eggs," explained why Americans should eat more of the surplus eggs. The Guide instructed radio announcers that three-fourths of the U.S. sugar supply were now "Womenplan the daily meals and can do most to in Japanese control; and because there was a lack relieve the emergency caused by the ten1porary of ships available to import sugar from Puerto super-abundance of eggs. Urge your listeners to Rico and Cuba.28 Throughout the war the use more eggs in every way possible for the next average yearly ration of sugar for U.S. several weeks. Points to be stressed: 1. Nutritional civilians--adults and children alike .. -was about value of eggs. 2. Economical to buy. 3. Eggs are twenty-four pounds per person, approximately half not rationed."25 of 19411evels.29

Given the strong belief in meat as the ultimate Though the sugar supply was much greater than strength-producing, protein rich food, it is not in Europe, Americans could not satisfy their surprising that meat was never portrayed wartime sweet tooth. Gallup polls reveal the negatively (unlike sugar, which was regarded as an importance of sugar for all Americans.. but "energy food" but most knew it contained no especially for women who used much sugar for nutrients and was fattening). During wartime family baking and canning. As previously cited.. a rationing Americans were advised to eat less poll taken in January 1945 showed sugar the top meat, but never to change permanently their vote-getter of items people found hardest to cut eating habits in the hopes of reducing meat down or do without.. with women more likely to consu~tion after the war, as was the case with mention sugar than men. A March 1942 Gallup sugar. In fact the only public reference to the poll asked housewives, "Abouthow many pounds wartime meat shortage being beneficial to of sugar a week does your family use?" and found Americans' health came from an American the median average to be one pound per person. woman who lived most of her life outside the When asked, "What is the smallest amount of United States, in a country which ate very little sugar your family could get along on each week?" meat. Nobel Prize winning writer Pearl S. Buck, the "housewives"related a median average of in her introduction to the cookbook, How to Cook nine.. and-a-half ounces per person; this amount and Eat in Chinese by Chao Bu..wei Yang, writes: was one-and-a-half ounces more than the eight ounces per week the twenty-four pound-a-year It is of inestimable value to the war effort and allotment provided. When asked in July of 1945 also to the economy of peace if [Americans] will "Ifyou could have anyone of these four things, learn to use meat for its taste in a dish of which would you prefer: 15 gallons of gasoline, 25 something else, instead of using it chiefly for its pounds of sugar, 5 pounds of butter, or 5 pounds substance....We have known, abstractly, that the of beefsteak?", forty-seven percent of those Chinese people is one of the oldest and most questioned chose the sugar, as opposed to civilized on earth. But this book proves it. Only twenty-nine percent who chose beef, the runner.. the profoundly civilized can feed upon such food. up. _.. Pearl S. Buck27 It is not known whether women actually ate more Sugar and the War sugar than men, but during the war there was a common assumption reinforced by the media that Sugar was the first food item to be rationed, just a this was in fact true. Just as publications told men few months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, to stop eating so much meat, women were told to and the last to be taken off in 1946. Wartime curb their sugar intake for the duration of the shortages were even more acutely felt since during war. In her cookbook of dessert recipes, Sweets the Depression years sugar had been plentiful and Without Sugar, which aimed to provide women low-priced. Shortages occurred not because the with tempting recipes using sugar substitutes such soldiers needed large quantities of sugar in the as , , and corn , Marion White field, as was often mentioned in the case of red could not resist informing American women about meat, although some was used in the making of the consequences of their cravings for : explosives. Rather, shortages resulted from three sources: a lack of domestic labor available to The woman who eats one piece of plant and harvest the crop; because immediately desires another piece of candy; countries such as Java, the Dutch East Indies and nothing else will satisfy the longing. Sugar spoils the Philippines which formerly produced

214 the appetite for other foods, but increases the more; this longing was compounded by media appetite for more sugar.30 images that continually made explicit connections between women and sugar (as they did meat with An article in the Fort Worth Star Telegram men). A reason for this linkage was probably the entitled "Where's the Sugar?" pondered about to central importance of baking. Anthropologists why there was such a sugar shortage: have long noticed that baking (as opposed to roasting) is symbolically associated with women.33 One of the principal reasons why we now are One male writer who produced a weekly column short of sugar is that we ate it last year. Civilians on food for men entitled "For Men Only" in the consumed approximately 500,000 tons more sugar Chicago Daily Tribune during the 1940s made in 1944 than the nation could afford, eating into clear the connection: "Personally, I am of the firm stocks on hand until they were left at an opinion that [baked items such as bread and abnormally low level. desserts] should be the sole prerogative of the Little Woman of the household."Instead of Chiefly responsible for this sugar "overdraft"was baking thems~lves he encouraged his bachelor the home-canning sugar program. Much of the readers to buy bakery items or prepared, frozen over-liberal issuance of sugar for canning items.34 Women did most (if not all) of family purposes, it is suspected, went into the making of baking in mid-twentieth century America. Indeed cakes, and other delicacies for which women, especially women in middle-class wartime shortages whetted an appetite. American households, equated the careful Housewives are having to learn this year that they preparation and serving of food with maternal can not eat their cake and have their canning sugar, love and nurture.35 Baked items, especially, too (italics mine).31 carried the symbolic nlessage of nurturance and care; thus baking brought women extra attention In the cookbook Home Canning for Victory editor and recognition, which was important to their Anne Pierce, before giving canning recipes using identity as homemaker as well as their sense of less sugar, gave her own lecture to women about self. Since the cakes, cookies and pies they made "The Sugar Situation." were special and "different"from the every day fare they served their families, baking these items Nobody knows just what the sugar situation is, or were probably pleasurable activities as well. When when or how often it may change. Nevertheless, sugar (and fats too) became scarce and women there is one, and don't blame your government for could not do as much baking, they lost an that....sugar is needed to make industrial alcohol important way of gaining family recognition, of used in making explosives. Would you like to nurturing their family, and of participating in an leave our men at the front or our allies without enjoyable activity often done in a group, as with necessary tools and munitions so that you could canning or Christmas . have more sugar in your coffee, cakes, and preserves? Use your imagination and see the The media strongly equated baking and providing sugar you save multiplied by fifty million or so, love and nurturance for one's family. Even in the and you will feel it is worth while. face of admonitions to women to stop using and eating sugar, because of the importance of baking Peirce ends her instruction with the advice, "Save as nurturance, the cultural stereotype equating 'eating' sugar for food preservation.,,32 This successful mothering with a full cookie jar still refrain, "Cut down on your sugar intake, it's good held. Margaret Mills's cookbook, Cooking on a for you," was repeated often by those writing Ration, hinted that despite sugar rationing, which about the wartime sugar shortage. Most told their meant limiting sweet desserts, one place not to readers sugar was an energy source they could skimp was the cookie jar--such treats could simply easily reduce or eliminate, especially as knowledge be made with the unrationed molasses" about vitamins became widespread, and sugar was or honey: "Itwill be a sorry day for the small fry condemned as empty calories. whep Mother doesn't manage to keep the cookie jar filled," Mills warned. "We've always contended Although it is not known whether women ate it takes a well-filled cookie jar to make a house a more sugar than men, women seemed to miss it home.It And not only would the kids benefit from this small but significant gesture, but so would

215 their father: "Dad,"Mills reminded, "who is only tlourishing right now, and home baking is small fry grown up when it comes to cookies, becoming a lost art.38 makes for that jar, too."36 Indeed, housewives were being given short shrift Because of the in1portance of baking for her when it came to sugar allotments. Commercial family (as well as for herself) many women were bakeries received a disproportionate amount of frustrated at the rationing system which did not sugar, approximately seventy percent of prewar provide enough fats, and particularly sugar, with levels (which was raised to eighty percent in 1944) which to produce their accustomed amount of as opposed to the private citizens' fifty percent baked goods. The campaign to encourage extra levels. It was especially disconcerting to won1en consumption of eggs, for instance, did not go over when the government gave further extra well with some women, especially because sugar allotments of sugar to commercial bakers. was rationed. Mrs. George M. Coffey of Ronan, Commercial bakeries were given more sugar, Montana wrote to her congressman, pointing out according to the OPA, because they "wasted"less the inconsistencies of urging women to buy and sugar than housewives who used such small use more eggs without allowing them more sugar amounts; and second, in order to use up quickly to cook with. the tremendous egg surplus.39 The government's main excuse, that more women working outside We were told over the radio the other day how the home in war-related jobs had less time to n1any tons of eggs are in storage and how many bake at home, still penalized the majority of tons there is no storage space for. The speaker women who did not have such employment, and suggested the housewives purchase a few extra had no choice but to buy from the bakeries.40 The dozen eggs and store them in their refrigerators, War Food Administration, recognizing this "What nonsense, positively idiotic." [sic] discrepancy, weakly admitted "Some [will] feel insufficient if baking is done at home," but was It set me thinking that I'm using fewer eggs than I quick to add, "Urban consumers tend to feel it used to use, and why? Because I haven't sugar to sufficient.,,41 Although their families could still bake with nor occasionally make ice cream or have store bought baked items, they were not sherbet. Give us housewives more sugar and baked by Mother. watch the eggs disappear--People can only eat so many cooked eggs or they will become nauseated The discrepancy in sugar allotments was made of them, therefore, you cannot increase the even clearer to women when it came to the consumption of cooked eggs very much.,,37 increased amount of commercially-produced candy that was available. A memo by an OPA staff In her letter Mrs. Coffey, assuming that sugar member discussed the problem: shortages were caused by the same factors as were meat shortages admonished Congress to At the moment grocery stores and others have determine "whether the housewife is being counters full of candy. This includes candy bars as allowed all the sugar she in entitled to without well as sacks of assorted candy. Conversation taking really necessary sugar from our soldiers. If overheard in these stores indicates perplexity on our soldiers needed every cup full of sugar they the part of housewives. They're saying, "Ifsugar is are getting, we'll say no more about it, they are plentiful, why can't we have some?" "If welcome to it." She went on to point out the manufacturers can make candy for Christmas, why blatant discrimination against women when it can't we make it at home?" Consumer mail is came to sugar distribution: asking for extra sugar rations for making Christmas sweets. It seems to me that the The bakers are now doing an enormous business situation calls for immediate clarification. because they are allowed more and more sugar to Obviously there is something incongruous in a continue increasing their business, while the situation in which OPA tells the American public housewife gets such a stingy amount she is that Industrial Use [sic] of sugar is not increasing compelled to buy most of her cookies, cakes, and when for the first time since the be~inning of the pies at the bakery....The bakeries will strongly war candy stores are full of candy.4 object to the housewives being allowed more sugar because their business is certainly

216 Moreover, many women were unable to get even which were presented in the media in the United their allotted extra sugar ration for canning, States during World War II, but also to discuss another activity which brought much recognition larger, more pervasive issues connecting the and self- satisfaction--and was heartily endorsed production and consumption of food with power by the government in order to free domestic and wartime sacrifices, especially as they relate to canned goods supplies to send overseas.43 Again, gender. Apart from the higher nutritional content feeling powerless against the bureaucracy, many of meat, it is important to ask whether the gender women complained to the government. Mrs. H.C. association of sugar with (less-valued) women, and Jones of New Market, Alabama wrote her senator meat with (highly valued) men contributed to this about her frustrations with the sugar shortage. "I presentation by the media. It is possible that red didn't rush in and apply for canning sugar so I did meat was applauded so loudly--and the reasons not get 20 lbs as many did," Mrs. Jones explains, for sacrificing it were made so clear--because of its association with virility and potency, precisely I didn't get 15 lbs as a lot more did. Because my the qualities needed to fight this "total war," the fruit was not yet ripe and I wasn't in any great war most demanding of social resources in U.S. hurry--foolishly thinking...that rationing authorities history. Similarly, it is plausible to argue that meant what they said--I don't get any at all. sugar--used by women as a symbolic way to Well--I guess I just don't.44 nurture her husband and children--was regarded as more frivolous because it was associated with One of Mrs. Jones' main concerns, however, is the (less important) female. just exactly where and for what the sugar supply is going. Afraid that Cuban sugar is being used for Just as Sweetness and Power (the title of Sidney less than vital purposes, she asks Senator Lister, Mintz's Path-breaking anthropological study which "HOW MANY TONS OF CUBAN POTENTIAL connects the growth of sugar production and SUGAR WILL INSTEAD BE MADE INTO consumption to European colonialism) succinctly RUM? I think those of us who do not care for makes plain, sugar as well as meat consumption rum but would like to see our children nourished during WW II involved clear issues of power--only are entitled to this information." She goes on, in this instance involving gender instead of class describing her sacrifice of sugar for the others in or race. There is strong evidence to suggest that the family, in this case an elderly woman and a media images regarding meat and sugar rationing male child: helped to reinforce gender roles, but perhaps it is possible to go further and suggest that they helped My 79 year old mother drinks coffee for to construct them. More research needs to be breakfast--my growing son eats cereal; I do done to more clearly determine the extent of neither, trying to make the sugar allowance influence regarding these media images and stretch. We don't have desserts and if sugar is an socialized gender roles. What is known, however, energy food we just don't have any. I can do is that food, particularly the preparation and without it for the services, for the liberated people serving of it, has much to do with issues of power and for other good and sufficient reasons with and control. In an insightful essay about food and good grace, but it galls to be deprived because the power Joan Jacobs Brumberg surmises: OPA balked on a measly 1/4 cent per pound [extra to Cuban sugar growers]. I hope to Heaven The question of who gathers and prepares food is Truman will clean that crowd out and get a critical problem in contemporary gender someone in it that has to live on rationed meals politics....The politics of food remains germane instead of at hotels. precisely because the production, consumption and distribution of food always involves issues of Mrs. Jones ends her letter with "Anyhow--please power and cultural authority. To think that food advise me about the volun1e of Cuban rum--I'm has disappeared from politics would be sadly much interested.,,45 n1isguided.46

CONCLUSION As historian Phyllis Palmer observed regarding men's and women's roles in domestic food The purpose of this paper has been to show not production and consumption, "Much of the feeling only the gender associations of meat and sugar

217 of greatness (of power) comes from being Evolution, (Philadelphia: Temple U. Press, 1987): served.,,47 18-22; Marshall Sahlins, Culture and Practical Reason, (University of Chicago Press, 1976): 62; During World War II in the United States, the Claude Levi-Strauss, "The Roasted and the chaos resulting from the country going to war Boiled," in The Anthropologists' Cookbook, ed., caused for many a reordering or disruption of Jessica Kupper, (NY: Universe Books, 1977): 225. prescribed gender roles, particularly as so many women went to work outside the home. For many, 4Joan Jacobs Brumberg, Fasting Girls: The these prescribed gender roles--such as were History of Anorexia Nervosa, (Cambridge: reinforced by the media's association of meat and Harvard U. Press, 1988): 176. sugar to gender--were a reflection of an ordered society. An "ordered"and thus stable society 5Mintz, 145. See also Janet M. Fitchen, "Hunger, seemed a necessity for the country to wage war Malnutrition, and Poverty in the Contemporary effectively, and socially prescribed gender United States: Some Observations on Their Social roles--including the unbalanced power that often and Cultural Context," in Food and Foodways, accompanied them--was for many a sure indicator (vol. 2, 1988): 320,323. A note in the New York that American society was still strong. Times Magazine, (27 September 1942) helps to confirm this phenomenon during WWII: "There's nothing really new in the finding of a study of the British worker's diet that mothers give to fathers *1 would like to thank Brett Gary, whose and children the lion's share of rationed foods. perceptive comments and careful editing Other studies of family diets have revealed these contributed much to this paper. Thanks also to deep-rooted habits, common to mothers the conference reviewers for their helpful everywhere, of which there is plenty of evidence at suggestions. first hand. When there isn't enough chicken to go around, mother prefers the neck" (32). ISusan Kalcik, "Ethnic Foodways in America: Symbol and the Performance of Identity," Ethnic 6Marvelene H. Styles, "Soul, Black Women and and Regional Foodways in the United States, Food,"in A Woman's Conflict: The Soecial Linda Keller Brown and Kay Mussell, eds., Relationship Between Women and Food, ed., (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1984): Jane Rachel Kaplan, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: 39. Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1980): 168.

2People with low incomes, for instance, were not 7See Norbert Elias, The Civilizing Process, trans., much affected by the rationing of red meat. A Edmund Jephcott, (NY: Urizen Books, 1978): study commissioned by the Committee on Food 117-118; Carol J. Adams, The Sexual Politics of Habits, a government advisory body, recorded Meat, (NY: Continuum, 1990) 30. It is important many poor, to note that race and class are important to immigrant women's comments about meat consider, along with gender, when discussing suga~ rationing such as "We use the same amount of and meat rationing, for the coveted red meat and meat, since we didn't use much before," and "I sugar were not as commonly eaten by some don't think we poor people are affected much by groups as they were in the mainstreanl. Before rationing. We manage to get along O.K. on our and during the war different groups' cuisines used points. Its [sic] the money we're afraid won't hold sugar in different quantities. For example, many out." Earl Loman and Ruth E. Thoreson, ethnic groups such as Italian Americans and "Nutritionand the Low-Income Family," (1942): 6~ African Americans did not traditionally eat much Records of the Committee on Food Habits, refined sugar, and thus the emphasis and "fuss" National Research Council, National academy of over the loss of sugar supplies did not affect them Sciences, Washington, D.C. as severely. In addition, many Americans were simply too poor to buy their allotted amount of 3Sidney Mintz, Sweetness and Power: The Place sugar or meat. of Sugar in Modern History. (NY: Viking, 1985): 150. For information on the linking of meat and men see Eric Ross, "Introduction,''Food and

218 8The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935-1971.2 being part of a "meat market." These references, vols. New York: Random House, 1973. The poll however, serve to reinforce my argument, as on unfortunately does not provide actual numbers. It the level of metaphor, it is men using these terms reads: "Womenare more inclined to name sugar who are desiring to "consume"women as they do and butter than men, while a greater proportion food, connoting issues of control and domination. of men mention meat and gasoline." Admittedly, Women are thus classified as edible there is little direct evidence that during the war items--meat--consumed for the purpose of the the government regarded food and gender as men's enjoyment. See Carol Adams The Sexual related in this way; however, a 2/14/42 memo by Politics of Meat for a lengthy discussion of this Margaret Mead about future projects the CFH idea. Also, contrast the describing of women as could conduct does mention the notion. Mead is meat to the way lovers use "sweet"images to refer interested in exploring food habits characteristic to each other: sweetie, honey, sugarplum, etc. of heterosexual social contacts: "As more and Although these "sweet"images can also be used more sex segregation is necessitated by war time threateningly, they are used both by women and conditions, it will be important to know which men to refer to each other. Mintz is currently types of food have been associated with two sex, doing work on this use of "sweet"language. and which with one sex groups" (emphasis mine). Records of the Committee on Food Habits, File: 12It is interesting to speculate why steak was so A &P 1941 -44 CFH Projects, Archives of the much more symbolically important than an egg in National Research Council, National Academy of this case. Although I cannot provide concrete Science, Washington, DC. evidence, my opinion is that a steak is more maSCUline, while eggs--a symbol of female fertility, 9"ThePinch in Food,"The National Week (10 an10ng other things--is considered more female, October 1944): 22. and thus less desirable. lOTwo and a half pounds of meat a week comes 13Carl E. Guthe, "Comments on the National to .36 of a pound per day, or 130 pounds per Nutrition Campaign," (10 January 1942): 8-9, person per year of red meat. Between 1935 and Records of the Committee on Food Habits, 1939, the Depression years, Americans ate an Archives of the National Research Council, average of 126 pounds of red meat a year, National Academy of Science, Washington, D.C. significantly less than the all-time high of 163 pounds in 1908. Even so, under Share-the-Meat, 14RG 188, Box 670, File: Butter. National Americans still got more meat per week than they Archives, Washington, D.C. did in the 1930s (130 versus 127 pounds per year), but significantly lower than the 1941 figure 15Three hundred and sixty-five pounds a year! of 141 pounds per person per year, an amazing jump of eleven pounds per person in only two 16Good Housekeeping, VoL 115 (November years. The per capita consumption in 1 942 turned 1942): 9. out to be 138, so while the Share the Meat plan was moderately successful in getting people to 17How to Stow and Take Care of Food on Ship reduce their meat intake, compulsory rationing Board, War Shipping Administration, Food was needed to do the job. ("Facts about the Meat Control Division, 1945: 9. Schlesinger Library, Situation,"October 1944, War Food Radcliffe Collage, Cambridge MA. Administration, RG 188, Box 782, File: program improvements. See also RB 188, Box 670, File: 18"VarietyMeats: They Are Good, Abundant, Butter. Other figures: 1943: 135 Ibs.;1944: 148 Highly Nutritious,"MS 2010, Box 71 File: CMC Ibs.;1945: 1271bs. RG 188, Box 670, File: Butter. "F"Scrapbook. Maryland Historical Society, National Archives, Washington, D.C. Baltimore, MD.

11 I feel confident in my argument associating red 19Langston Hughes, "Speaking of Food,"The meat with masculine traits. It is true that women Baltimore Afro-American, (3 April 1943): 7. also have been symbolically associated with meat, Hughes is not being ironic in this poem. Although such as being referred to as "pieces of meat" or Negro newspapers such as the Afro-American were vocal about the poor treatment blac~ I

219 soldiers and citizens received in the midst of Archives of the National Research Council, fighting an enemy in the name of "democracy,"the National Academy of Science, Washington, D.C. paper strove to be as patriotic concerning the war, and as supportive of U.S. soldiers, as any 2S"Use More Eggs," Women's Radio Guide, RG American newspaper. 208, Entry 66, Box 6, File: FFFF--surplus foods. National Archives, Suitland, MD. 20Although at first glance distributing meat according to weight or (perhaps) activity level 26For instance, Dr. Algernon Jackson, in his might seem logical, numerous studies done regular column "AFROHealth Talk," in the recently show that vitamin and protein needs for Baltimore Afro-American, warned his readers, "It infants, children, and lactating and pregnant is possible that the shortage of sugar is a blessing women are often actually higher than for adult in disguise, for the opportunity is given us to use men (See Ross and Harris, page 570, for healthier substitutes. Eat more fruit daily and instance). Thus giving the largest amounts of forget the sugar shortage. (28 March 1942): 6. protein to adult males and depriving women and children from adequate amounts (contributing to 27Pearl S. Buck, "Introduction,'How to Cook and the higher mortality rates) in some societies acts Eat in Chinese, Chao Bu-Wei Yang, (NY: John as a population control. Day, 1945): xi. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA. 21All OWl material found in RG 208, Entry 66, Box 8, File: FFFF-general. National Archives, 28A "RADIOTALK BY MAX McCULLOUGH, Suitland, MD. There were, however, an estimated DEPUTY OPA ADMINISTRATORFOR 250,000 to 3 million vegetarians in the U.S. who RATIONING,THURSDAY, JULY 19, 1945, AT consumed no meat. See "3 Million Vegetarians 4:15 P.M., OVER THE ABC NETWORK"RG Seen 'Short Changed' Under OPA Program," 188, Box 674, File: sugar rationing, 5-6. National Greenville, SC News, Feb. 5, 1943. A letter from Archives, Washington, D.C. Symon Gould, Associate Editor of The American Vegetarian to Claude Wickard, Dec. 2, 1942: "If 29Roy A. Ballinger, Sugar During World War II, [cheese, butter, milk, beans, etc] are to be USDA Bureau of Agricultural Economics, (June rationed in the same degree that meat will be 1946): 1-3. In addition, each person could apply rationed, we feel that the vegetarians should corne for an extra allotment of sugar--from 10 to 20 under a special regulation enabling them to pounds--for home canning and preserving. This substitute for unwanted meat rations these other figure also does not include sugar people ingested food materials...similar to the food regulations in commercially canned iten1s, baked goods and applying to vegetarians in Great Britain." RG 188, soft drinks--combining for a total of 71.5 pounds Box 802, File: Meat Consumption Patterns, per year in 1945, compared to 89 pounds in 1944. 1942-5. National Archives, Washington, D.C. See: OWl Advance Release for Tuesday Morning papers, May 1 , 1945. RG 188, Box 674, File: 22Mildred Lager, The Useful Soybean: A Plus Food Rationing Division 1945--Sugar. National Factor in Modern Living, (NY: McGraw-Hill, Archives, Washington, D.C. 1945): 1. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA. 30Marion White, Sweets Without Sugar, (Garden City, NY: Blue Ribbon Books, 1945): 12. 23Ibid. 175. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA. 24The Committee on Food Habits stated the obvious: "In all daily matters of food choice and 31July 19, 1945, RG 188, Box 674'1 File: Food preparation, women, and particularly mothers and Rationing Division 1945--Sugar. National wives, playa, or, the leading role. A national Archives, Washington, D.C. campaign for dietary bettern1ent, to succeed, must make sure of their active participation." CFH 32Anne Peirce, ed., Home Canning for Victory, "ProvisionalProgran1 of Action," Feb. 28,194l. (NY: M. Barrows and Co., 1942): 88-89. File: Program of Action, Records of the CFH, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, MA.

220 33Levi-Strauss, 225. (rationing from 1 January 1944). National Archives, Washington, D.C. See also Roy A. 34Morrison Wood, With a Jug of Wine. (NY: Ballinger, Sugar During World War II. (USDA Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 1949): 366. Bureau of Agricultural Economics, June 1946): 13; Betty Crocker--a fictitious woman created in the 35See Ruth S. Cowan, More Work for Mother: 1930s to give homemakers a friendly female face The Ironies of Household Technology from the with which to identify--was the only homemaker Open Hearth to the Microwave, (NY: Basic to get an increased allotnlent of sugar. By Books, 1983): chapter four; Phyllis Palmer, allotting the mostly male-owned and operated Domesticity and Dirt: Housewives and Domestic commercial bakeries 20 percent (and then 30 Servants in the United States 1920-1945, (Phila: percent) more sugar than homemakers the Temple U. Press, 1989): 23. governnlent reified the power of the public, "masculine"arena of the commercial bakery at the 36Marjorie Mills, Cooking on a Ration: Food is expense of the woman in her private, and less Still Fun, (NY: Houghton Mifflin, 1943): 17. powerful sphere of influence. See Linda K. Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Kerber, "Separate Spheres, Female Worlds, MA. Woman's Places: The Rhetoric of Women's History," (Journal of American Historv, 75(June 37Mrs. George M. Coffey, letter to Congressman 1988): 9-39, for an in-depth discussion of physical Mansfield, (no date). RG 16, Entry 42, Box: 1944 space designated by gender. war corresp. WAR, File: WAR & (s) (July 2, 1944-Sept. 21, 1944). National Archives, 41"Analysisof TENTATIVE sugar allocations for Washington, D.C. the year beginning April 1 , 1944 and their relation to the WFA General Food Program, Feb. 38Ibid. 11 , 1944." RG 16, Entry 42, Box 233, File: WAR 7 (s) (rationing). National Archives, Washington, 39A letter from War Food Adnlinistrator Marvin D.C. Jones to office of Price Administrator Chester Bowles, June 12, 1944, on the egg surplus: "We 42Memo to Jim Kelley from Judy Russell, are faced with an emergency storage problem that November 19, 1945. RG 188, Box 674, File: sugar threatens the loss of hundreds of carloads of eggs rationing. National Archives, Washington, D.C. unless every possible means of moving them into consumption can be used....We have taken a 43Jozien Jobse-van Putten, "Outlineof the nation-wide campaign through all possible media, Development of Food Preservation in the Past urging housewives to take home an extra dozen of Hundred Years," in Food Conservation: eggs and store them in the refrigerator to help Ethnological Studies, eds., Astri Riddervold and meet this problem. We are asking retailers, Andreas Riddervold, (London: Prospect Books, through their national association headquarters, to 1988): 120,125. join with us in this campaign. We are asking hotels and restaurants... But these efforts will not 44Mrs., H.C. Jones, letter to Senator Lister Hill, be enough. We need immediately an incentive for (18 May 1945), RG 16, EntIY 42, Box 312, File: increased industrial use of eggs. This, we believe, war 6 (s) (priorities rationing June 14-19, 1945). can most effectively be done by increasing sugar National Archives, Washington, D.C. allocations to bakers. It is imperative that allocations for this use be increased for a period 45 Ibid. "In 1944, about 900,000 tons of Cuban of thirty days." [Bowles approves the measure.] production were diverted from sugar to high-test RG 188, Box 633, File: Surplus egg situation. molasses for industrial alcohol. As a result of the National Archives, Washington, D.C. "Household improvement of the alcohol situation, the consumers complained bitterly." RG 188, Box 977, Government gave distillers a "holiday"from File: Institutional users, p. 226. National Archives, making industrial alcohol to permit production of Washington, D.C. beverage alcohol. Othet unessential uses of alcohol also have been authorized and liberalized. 40Marvin Jones, letter to Hugh Fulton, (29 April The United States had record crops of wheat and 1944). RG 16, Box 231 ,Fila: WAR 7 (t), corn in 1944 and we are facing large carryovers of

221 these grains at the end of the current crop year. The increased utilization of grains for alcohol will help to hold down the carry-over to more normal levels. In view of the above uses of alcohol, the surplus grains, and furthermore, the shortage of sugar, no diversion of sugar to alcohol should be made in 1945. (From "Chronologyof Sugar Rationing"RG 199, Box 674, File: Sugar Rationing, 12. National Archives, Washington, D.C.

46Joan Jacobs Brumberg, "Feed Your Head," Nation, (9 April 1990): 496.

47palmer, 159.

222