REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER. 



EOOD SUBSTITUTES. 



As a compensation for the falling off in actual food produc- 

 tion, wastes have been transformed into food products, showing 

 how highly organized is the efficiency of our manufacturing 

 industries, even if the producing population is continually tend- 

 ing away to the non-producing labor. I am referring now 

 particularly to the dairy industry. 



In the last ten years the number of cows in the State of 

 Massachusetts has decreased fifty- four thousand; in New 

 Hampshire, twenty-seven thousand ; in Maine, thirty-three 

 thousand ; in Vermont, the percentage of decrease has been as 

 large, although the exact figures are not available. This would 

 naturally mean that the price of milk and butter would advance ; 

 or, comparing this industry with a manufacturing industry, if 

 the output decreased by one-fifth, the increase of price would 

 be very noticeable Yet, at the present time, the price of milk 

 and butter throughout New England is not more than it was 

 during the war, fifty years ago. 



The difficulty is that the tendency is entirely toward milk 

 production in the New England states and the shipment of milk 

 and cream, rather than the making of butter. The making of 

 butter at the present time is but an incident, and, if the price 

 of butter goes above a certain figure, people are urged by the 

 manufacturers (and their agents who are distributed every- 

 where) to use oleomargarine in its place. The argument is con- 

 tinually put up that this grease is made under the most sanitary 

 conditions and is very nearly the equal of butter. 



Now, if there is anyone who, from choice, prefers oleomar- 

 garine to butter, I am perfectly willing that they should use it, 

 but I wish to assure the public as a whole that oleomargarine, 

 in its best condition, is very much inferior in cleanliness and 

 health fulness to the poorest butter. This stufif is shipped into 

 the State of Maine, not only in carloads but in trainloads and 

 the people in Maine are gradually becoming grease eaters in- 

 stead of butter eaters, and, as it is entirely involuntary on 

 their part, that is the reason I call attention to it. 



I have attempted to follow shipments of tallow from this 

 state to its final destination, the oleomargarine factory, but it 

 passes through too many hands to make the shipment absolutely 

 certain. It is pretended that this is done under government 



