Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Short Story (Jan-Aug 1941)

19 ASK the modern housewife what the most important utensil in her kitchen is and she'll say the can opener. The time was when neighbors looked askance at the woman who went in for such new-fangled ideas as canned food but as modern civilization increased its pace canning became a major industry and today no household does not consume some canned food. Nowadays folks pick over and closely examine the fresh vegetables and meats they buy but they never worry about the food they buy in cans. They don't have to because many years ago a man named Harvey Wiley worried and did something about it. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's latest miniature "Watchdog of a Nation," shows how he has made canned foods safe to eat. Narrated by Carey Wilson the story the film relates begins during the Civil War. Young Harvey Wiley has dropped his chemistry studies to answer the call to arms. He is the picture of health, strong and zealous. Most of his life has been spent in the country. His food has always been home-prepared and healthful. As a soldier Wiley receives his first taste of canned and preserved food. The Army needed food that would "keep." It is strange-tasting stuff and the men don't like it. But it is that or nothing. So they manage to get it down. A few minutes later, like all the rest of the troop, Wiley is stricken with food poisoning. His rugged physique fights off the poisons, but he is left sick and declared unfit for active duty. Wiley promises himself that some day he will go back to chemistry and find the cause for all this. Later, at Purdue University, Wiley sets A He destroyed life on the battlefield and saved it in the laboratory . . . Carey Wilson pays tribute to Harvey Wiley, soldier and scientist . . . Thank him for the purity of the food you eat. himself up as a pioneer in food chemistry. He knows canned foods are inferior. Some, he discovers, are full of harmful bacteria. To Wiley this spells murder, so he denounces the manufacturers of such foods as killers. But the canners withstand the attacks and publish denials of Wiley's facts. Nevertheless, Wiley receives an opportunity to go to Washington as chief food chemist. He readily accepts. Wiley spends months on research, gathering evidence with which to expose the food racketeers. Some foods are found to have harmful chemicals, while others have tuberculin bacteria present. Finally, Wiley prepares his evidence and turns it over to the law makers, demanding a pure food law. But he, as had many pioneers before him, found "big business" against him, and wherever he went, even to publish truthful articles, the canners were a step ahead. So Wiley's suggestion for a pure food law is pushed aside. Further, Wiley is ordered to stick to purely routine matters. With the declaration of the SpanishAmerican War troops were again mobilized and naturally canned and preserved foods were needed. Wiley had failed to make officials see the light during peacetime. All he can do now is hope that the soldiers survive the impure foods they are served. Soon reports come that thousands are victims of food poisoning. Taking advantage of this psychological moment, Wiley launches another attack which stirs such interest that President McKinley starts an investigation. But again the hand of fate strikes. McKinley is assassinated. However, a strange coincidence occurs. The soldier whose Rough Riders died of food poisoning becomes President. Theodore Roosevelt supports Wiley's pure food bill despite the counter-attacks by the food canning interests. It quickly passes through Congress and goes to the President. To settle the argument properly, Roosevelt orders representatives of the food companies and Wiley to appear in his office. Wiley brings a portable chemical outfit, prepared to meet any dispute. Thus began an experiment which was unique in American history, an unofficial court scene with the President acting as judge. First, Wiley takes a sample can of meat, and through his experiments proves that it has harmful acids and that the meat itself is decayed. But immediately one spokesman rises and objects to this, claiming that the President shouldn't jump to conclu sions because of a single experiment. Things are liable to go wrong sometimes, he explains. With this, Wiley carries his challenge further and asks that any amount of canned and preserved goods be brought in from the outside and he will continue the experiments to prove he's right. This is done and each time Wiley discovers something wrong with the food. The President finally calls a halt to the experiments, shakes Wiley's hand and signs the pure food law. That tiny label on a jar or can reading: "Pure, wholesome, unadulterated" and "Prepared in strict conformity with the Federal Pure Foods and Drug Act," represents the lifetime struggle of Harvey Wiley. Don Douglas appears as Harvey Wiley in the one-reeler. Joe Newman directed from a script by Julian Hochfelder. Exploitation TARVEY WILEY and his life's work which resulted in the passage of the Pure Foods and Drug Act are well known to the editor of your local paper's food columns. She should certainly be invited to an advance screening. Her story can be based on the synopsis reproduced above. By all means supply the paper with stills from the film. Officials of your department of public health will be interested in your film. Get your newspaper to invite them to a screening. Based upon their information a good story can be written about minimum budgets and maximum nutrition through the wise choice of wholesome foods. The theme of "Watchdog of a Nation" lends itself to an appropriate cooperative ad idea. Why not get a number of local food stores to take a page in your newspaper in which they all pay tribute to Harvey AViley. Their angle would be to tell the public that they are carrying on the work Wiley began and sell only the best of foods. Arrangements have been made with Good Housekeping Magazine to carry a story on "Watchdog of a Nation." Since Wilej worked for the magazine for seventeen years and established its "Bureau of Standards" there is a good basis for cooperation with your showing on the part of the local distributor of the magazine. Get him to put imprinted wrap-arounds on the magazines calling attention to your showing. Also arrange with him for card announcements to be tacked on newsstands.