“At the dawn of the twentieth century, few people had a clue that they were regularly being ripped off, drugged, and poisoned.”

This is at the end of chapter one, a chapter full of facts about what people used to put in their bodies! Yikes!
Moving from farming and growing your own food to relying on business for food opened people up to the unscrupulous industry. Adulteration occurred, adding cheaper materials or disguised rotten ingredients to appear, and smell, fresh. Talc, paraffin, and ground marble were just a few! Opium, morphine, and cocaine in medicines, even children’s cough syrups! Radium in others! And the special formula for Coca-Cola had cocaine in it until 1903!
Human guinea pigs? Poison eaters? WTF??? "The Poison Squads were more than several dozen young men brave enough to 'eat the fare'."

Dr. Harvey Wiley tried to fight the food industry, but politics, and the big money behind it, would not heed his warnings. It's a horrible, true story, and though it is written for young readers, everyone should read this, regardless of age! Especially during this time of the Trump administration, and its constant dismantling of regulatory agencies. He could put us back as poison eaters easily, and I'm sure he would, if the price was right! Big business, and 'men' like Trump, rarely do the right thing because it's the right thing. They do what's profitable. This book makes that point crystal clear!

p.s. - LOVE the cover skull and "crossbones"! ( )

Did you know that there was a time that no one controlled the food, drugs, and cosmetics that we use? Decades ago companies could label and sell anything --even if unclean and dangerous. Harvey Wiley, a chemist, set out to change this and this is the dramatic, 100% true, story of the formation of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. This is YA nonfiction at its best: concise, clear, and carefully researched. The illustrations support the text beautifully. ( )

Chronicles the history of making the country’s food and drug supply safe for consumers, thanks to the work of Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley, a government chemist, and numerous advocates. Because of Wiley’s efforts, today we have the FDA and safer consumer products. Compelling, reads almost like a thriller. Wiley portrayed as an outsized character, we see him as the kind of person who was born to this work. The author doesn’t outright say at the beginning about the FDA but states the history and builds the case for the reader why food safety is so important today. Savvy readers will realize early on that this is leading to creation of FDA. ( )