In the early 1900s, food safety was an incredibly unfamiliar and overlooked part of America’s food industry. Written by muckraker Upton Sinclair, The Jungle, was a controversial novel that depicted the harsh living and working conditions of immigrants working in the food industry. After the release of The Jungle, thousands of meat-eating Americans were horrified at what had been happening in factories. Disgusting yet accurate details presented in The Jungle were the basis for the creation of laws to stop food production from becoming so unsanitary.
The Jungle follows a young Lithuanian immigrant named Jurgis Rudkis and his teenage wife Ona. Together, the couple struggles to provide for themselves and for Ona’s family. Jurgis maintains a job
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There were no food-related inspections or prerequisites that protected consumers from buying unhealthy or tainted meat. This lack of protection was alarming, as more than two-hundred diseases can be spread through food. There were also few laws that restricted the freedoms of business owners, which made it extremely easy for these owners to abuse their workers. The working conditions in most meat-plants were blatantly gruesome. There were usually no restrooms for the workers, so a corner or the floor were utilized as substitutes. The rooms were dark and musty, from a lack of windows. The machines had sharp parts made for crushing meat, which caused fingers and other body parts of workers to be severed and grinded into the meat. Rat infestations lead to rat droppings, rat poison, and rat corpses finding their way into the meat as well. Many of these factors caused food poisoning to reach its highest peak in United States history in the early 1900s. Fortunately, when Sinclair revealed these detestable aspects of the meat industry, thousands of progressive Americans demanded a …show more content…
Fortunately, this revolutionary novel was a catalyst to the creation of various laws and agencies established to protect the safety of American consumers. The book was an eye-opening slap in the face to consumers who, unknowingly, were constantly being put in danger by the food they ate every night. The Jungle also revealed the horrors of working in these unsanitary meat plants. Fortunately, The Jungle has caused food safety to become a much more relevant and serious topic today, keeping consumers and workers safe from the dangers experienced inside the meat-packing factories of the
There was a kind of labors in the U.S. food industry stood on the floor with half an inch deep blood, and put up with the stench. But not only that, they worked faster, but earned less. In fact, they were immigrant labors, and this horrible treatment of them truly happened in the beginning of twenty centuries. The Jungle which was written by Upton Sinclair documented this inhuman treatment. However, a hundred years later, immigrants still suffer the harsh treatment in the modern food industry.
Sinclair worked undercover in a meatpacking plant to gather information firsthand, before he began writing the book. Its influence on the labor practices and regulations governing the food industry cannot be understated. It tackles subjects as varied as the poor living conditions of the immigrants, exploitation of cheap labor by industrialists, and the unsanitary conditions of the meatpacking plants and stockyards of Chicago. The descriptions of the disgusting processes that were conducted in the meatpacking plants made for shocking reading and turned the book into a bestseller. The President Teddy Roosevelt ordered an investigation into the lack of sanitation in meatpacking plants and caused the creation of legislation governing the food industry in the form of the Food and Drugs Act of 1906.
In the early 1900s, there were so many unbearable conditions that needed to be reformed such as factory injuries, overcrowded cities , starvation, wages and so on. Millions of immigrants came to the United States looking for a better life. The working conditions were inhumane and brutal since there were too many labors and those big businesses’ owners were looking for a way to minimize the input and maximize the profit. The meat packing industry was exposed to the public when Upton Sinclair published his book “The Jungle”. This industry was unsanitary and hazardous to workers and consumers.
“The Jungle” was horrifying to many Americans, because they had not been aware of what was going on. After the book was published, many laws were put in place and many changes were made to the working conditions of these factories. In 1906, after the release of “The Jungle”, the Food and Drug Act was passed. The Food and Drug Act created many laws that ensured the food we were consuming was safe to eat. If Upton Sinclair hadn’t fought for what he thought was right, our food may have still been made under unhealthy conditions.
The President at the time, Roosevelt, summoned a meeting with Sinclair, in which they discussed what he had written about. A few months later, after inspections of meat producing companies had been done, President Roosevelt established the Meat Inspection Act Of 1906. This prevented any bad meat from making its way into stores or other places the public could buy it. He also signed a law regulating food and drugs called the Pure Food and Drug Act which prohibited mislabeling of food and drugs. The Jungle saved many lives and ensured confidence in many people after laws for food safety were
The first food adulteration was brought to the attention of the people during the Spanish American War of 1898. The press reported that there were large amounts of rotten meat that was being shipped to the American troops with the smell of boracic acid, causing many soldiers to get sick and disable the soldiers from fighting. For every one man who fought and died in battle, seven soldiers died from illness and diseases. The death rate from the soldiers with diseases was 110 thousand soldiers per year. Because of this, Harvey Wiley decided to begin his own investigation with the goal of “clearing the good name of American meats” (qtd. 1, 44).
These factory owners truly value their profits more than the health of their workers and consumers. All of these disturbing truths are brought to light more and more throughout the novel. After the release of The Jungle, there was an immediate reaction to this crisis in the meat packaging industry. The Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906 and the Federal Meat Inspection Act followed as an attempt of the United States government to stabilize this growing
The Jungle was released to expose meatpacking industries’ ways of treating workers and meat. With this release, changes occurred. President Roosevelt urged Congress to pass the Meat Inspection Act of 1906. This act required the Department of Agriculture to inspect every hog and steer whose carcass state lines. In other words, it required companies to pay to get their facilities and practices checked by an inspector to assure everything was being done correctly.
Food inspection has been one of the biggest issues for humans health. And back in the day there was no inspection for it. And many people would get sick from the meat especially they would buy, it was an essential source of protein and back then there wasn’t vegan people everyone used meat. Based on document D meats would get stored in a dark room of course rat is one of the big problem when it come to food.
Although it may seem that the meat packing industry is still in turmoil because of their unwillingness to make known what foods have Genetically Modified organisms present, the meat packing industry was much worse during the 1900’s because of the unsafe working conditions, and uncleanliness of the food. Body 1: The meat packing industry’s working conditions were much worse in the 1900’s than they are today. In the novel The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair, working conditions were horrible for immigrants who were employed in these factories. People in these factories were worked very hard and used up till they could not work anymore. In the novel Jurgis broke his ankle because of the unsafe
During the 1900’s working conditions were undeniably horrible. In Packingtown everyday got more difficult as the days went on. In the meat packing business things were supposed to be done quick. Inside the factories packing, chopping, inspecting and people actions didn’t mix. Not only did the people in the factories suffered, the people outside of the factory also suffered.
Upton Sinclair portrays the economic tension in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries through his novel “The Jungle”. He used the story of a Lithuanian immigrant, Jurgis Rudkus, to show the harsh situation that immigrants had to face in the United States, the unsanitary and unsafe working conditions in the meatpacking plants, as well as the tension between the capitalism and socialism in the United States during the early 1900s. In the late 19th century and early 20th centuries, there were massive immigrants move into the United States, and most of them were from Europe. The protagonist, Jurgis Rudkus, like many other immigrants, have the “America Dream” which they believe America is heaven to them, where they can
Revealing the harsh treatment of meatpacking workers and showing the reality of the disgusting conditions found in butchery shops to the public, Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle became an enduring classic by American readers throughout the early twentieth century the prompted the later creation of the Federal Drug Administration. In the early 1900s, America was explosively transitioning from an agricultural society to a thriving manufacturing-based nation. As production demand in factories grew throughout the country, the work force needed to run those factories also expanded. A new type of demanding and dangerous work became prevalent throughout the nation, as immigrants coming into the “Land of Opportunity” found themselves desperate
Upton Sinclair’s, The Jungle is a novel, which affected the food industry in 1900’s but also in America today. People have learned over the years the truths about the food industry, revealed through Sinclair’s detailed evidence. Sinclair meant to aim at the public’s heart but instead he shot straight at their stomachs. One would easily be convinced to never again buy or eat meat again. Fortunately, people have seen changes from 1906 and have been currently trying to repair the Food Industry.
Camila Casanova U.S. History 1302: S67 Mr. Isaac G. Pietrzak February 9, 2018 Critical Review: The Jungle Sinclair, Upton. The Jungle. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2003.