WWI and Vegetarian Patriotism

Apologies for the lack of activity, alas, such is the nature of finishing a dissertation while also working on two simultaneous articles for publication and job applications. All goodness to be sure, and I promise a more consistent posts forthcoming. For today, I wanted to focus on patriotic, vegetarian recipes. In October 1917, the recently formed United States Food Administration under the direction of Herbert Hoover began encouraging American citizens to take part in its voluntary “Meatless Tuesdays” program, as well as pledge to have one meatless meal a day in order to save meat to ship to allied troops abroad. The idea was a means to prove the administration’s overriding slogan that “Food Will Win the War.” The campaign was aimed primarily at notions of housewives' dedication to the country, exploiting the growing home economics movement by connecting it with a notion of civil duty.

President Wilson’s resolution explaining the meatless program was bathed in the language of patriotism, duty and honor. Meatless and wheatless days were necessary because of reduced productivity and agricultural harvest in Europe, as well as the interruption of long distance trade routes. Wilson described dietary restriction as being “one of the most pressing obligations of the war,” and necessary because it served “the national interest." The President called on “every loyal American” to follow the guidelines of the Food Administration, and emphasized the role of women in ensuring that households follow the new rules.

The cookbook Wheatless and Meatless Days made the connection between vegetarian victuals and American nationalism explicit through nomenclature, giving meat substitutes patriotic sounding titles. The authors—home economics teachers from a San Diego high school—explained that conservation of food was part of the “battle array” in empowering housewives to help win the war. The “practical self-denial” of meatless days helped ensure success both at home and on the battlefield, “strengthening the arms and hearts” of all Americans. Most importantly, substituting for meat was a sacrifice possible to all who “follows the flag” with sincerity in their hearts.



A section of the book explicitly labeled foods as “meat substitutes,” in the same way as previous years’ vegetarian cooking guides. Recipes for common meat substitutes were provided, including a peanut loaf, as well as a bean and nut loaf. Unusual meat substitutes, including a mock crabmeat made of stale bread, mustard, flour and eggs expanded home cooks’ meatless repertoires. However, many of the recipes went further in their appropriation of vegetarian foods for the war effort. Recipes were given explicitly patriotic names, implying that the act of cooking and consuming were rife with political meaning. Combining walnuts, rice, breadcrumbs, cheese and Worcestershire sauce one could bake a “Liberty Loaf,” a meatless meal associated with democratic freedom. The McAdoo sauce mentioned was made of water, spices and pimientos.



Baked beans cooked with breadcrumbs, eggs, ketchup, onion and a mustard sauce produced a “Navy Loaf” with a “Gunner Sauce” that could make any midshipmen proud. Utilizing such names made the point explicit; food had political, social and cultural meaning, a point that American vegetarians had been expressing for nearly one hundred years. However, it was a far departure for vegetarians who in generations earlier proposed their diet specifically as a means to avoid war. A new vegetarianism (or at least components of its cuisine), attached with an ethos of self-improvement was seen as a patriotic act of self-sacrifice. Quite the interesting social shift.

Free soil, free men, Fremont and vegetables!

Among the more surprising bits of research that I have come across (and admittedly one of my favorites) is the following political cartoon from the famed printing firm of Currier and Ives.


This remarkable cartoon (which was reprinted in Democratic newspapers throughout the country), offers insight into popular fears of the newly formed reform-minded Republican Party. The new party was an amalgam of social and political interest, the first true national coalition. While the Republicans failed in their first attempts on a national level (Fremont, running under the campaign of free soil and free labor, barely lost the electoral college), the group's combining of interests--ranging from Eastern business speculators to social reformers--caused quite the political stir almost immediately. At the same time the drawing also provides an accurate summary of the state of American vegetarianism in the mid-1850s.

The caricature discusses the first Republican Presidential candidate John C. Fremont (led by his famous slogan of "Free soil, free men, Fremont and victory!"), and features a series of reformers a attempting to have their particular reform principle noted and acted upon by the new party. Included within this group are representatives from well-known reform movements, including a women’s suffragist, a socialist, abolitionist, free lover and a Catholic (Fremont was accused by some Democrats as being a closet Catholic). Fremont responds by promising each of the representatives what they desire if elected. To the far left stands a frail and weakened vegetarian--a constant source of popular mockery in the antebellum age--asking for a law banning the consumption of flesh, tobacco and alcohol. It is important to note that vegetarians did not seek any actual legislation regarding meat production in the United States; in this sense the lithograph is misleading. However, the inclusion of this request reflects the irrational fear of vegetarians felt by many American meat eaters, as well as the radical political ideology of the era's dietary reformers.

The vegetarian’s inclusion in this image does, however, speak to the movement’s recognized role at the time in formulating a reform critique in the antebellum era, placed along side the more well known movements of the era. Why have vegetarians become lost in the time period's history? Particularly as reform movements ranging from abolitionism through even spiritualism have garnered significant study? Perhaps this can be explained by a certain tendency to frame history within starkly positivist ideas. In other words, movements such as abolitionism and women's rights are worthy of study because they ultimately were successful in achieving a practical, tangible goal.

Vegetarians, on the other hand, sought no singular goal of legislative success or social equity. Rather, the group hoped to gain converts while simultaneously criticizing social evils such as slavery and gender oppression, through a dietary lens. Given the active role of vegetarians in these other organizations, the group still fits within a positivist historical model--helping accomplish these other movements' goals. On the flip side, vegetarians also helped expand dietary and medical consciousness throughout the nineteenth century; by expanding our notion of historical "success" it is possible to understand just how much the group accomplished. A source of mockery in the public eye throughout history, vegetarians were successful in having their identity and ideology recognized by society at large in the antebellum age, threatening enough to be mocked and discounted. A similar recognition of the group's historical role by scholars is needed as well.