War rations for Pennsylvanians; the story of the operations of the federal food administration in Pennsylvania, including personal and biographical sketches of its officers and members, with dramatic, humorous and unusual episodes in the experience of county administrators during the world war

Front matter

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Foreword

This volume is not intended to be a statistical record of the work of the Federal Food Administration in Pennsylvania; a record that necessarily would be replete with prosy facts, arid figures, and dull reports of no striking value from the human interest standpoint. While a complete roster of volunteer chiefs, directors and administrators is given not every county is represented in the narrative. It was not so intended originally. There are counties in which no incidents outside the commonplace occurred; in others no reports were filed, and personal requests for information failed to elicit a response. These are omitted. There also may be disappointment that the names of volunteer assistants who rendered splendid and patriotic service are not included. This was found to be impossible, not alone because it would have defeated the purpose of the work, but because a list of all Food Administration volunteers in Pennsylvania would make a respectably sized volume in itself.

Contents

PAGE

Foreword 3

General Introduction 5

Chap. I. Organizing the Administration 19

" II. The Executive Council 30

" III. Unpublished Incidents 39

" V. And Pennsylvania Led 56

" VI. In Philadelphia 67

" VII. Secret Service and Court 75

*' VIII. Feeding Ten Millions 85

" IX. A Vital Problem 102

" X. Inside Facts iii

" XI. A Man with an Idea. 120

*' XII. The Comedy Element 129

** XIII. How THE Newspapers Helped 139

" XIV. Woman's Work 146

" XV. Interesting Episodes 156

'* XVI. Striking Personalities 167

" XVIII. The Strangest Story of All 201

'* XIX. Both Ends of the State 216

" XX. Unusual Experiences 225

" XXI. Huns at Home 238

Conclusion 248

The Official Roster 250

Thumb Nail Sketches 254

Howard Heinz Federal Food Administrator for Pennsylvania

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

This is a story of men who in the greatest period of trial and struggle that the United States has ever known laid aside for more than a year all business and professional responsibilities to assume, under governmental direction, a task that demanded wide experience, calm judgment, and capacity for exacting labor, without compensation or desire of reward of any kind whatever. Coincidentally, history presents no parallel to the world-wide conditions which demanded this service. Of all nations the United States was the most fortunate in having among its people men capable and willing to undertake this self-imposed task.

This, therefore, is the story of volunteers, a unit in the totality of states, who in the aggregate formed what will be known in the commonwealth's history as the Federal Food Administration in Pennsylvania. In their hands was placed the vital questions of food supply and food conservation, principally the latter, for the ten million people of the state; one- tenth the population of the entire country. Less than one hundred persons comprised the executive staff; a state administrator and his vice-administrator, twenty-four department chiefs and sixty-seven county representatives. This was the directive force whose work was vitahzed and rendered operative only through the unselfish and devoted efforts of hundreds of other patriotic men and women, the staff aids and assistants of the county administrators.

Among the chiefs of division forming the headquarters staff were men appointed because of their pecuHar knowledge and experience in certain lines of food production and distribution. Experts, specially chosen because this same knowledge had contributed to their success in business life. In the selection of a chief of division or any other responsible official, no question of politics, religion or personal bias was permitted to intervene. The individual was drafted, his selection officially confirmed by Washington, and without even the nominal salary of one dollar per annum he entered upon his work.

It was the one civilian activity associated with the winning of the World War that was unaccompanied by colorful accessories, martial display, or inspirational music. No uniforms, insignia or chevrons were worn by its members as distinguishing marks of oflScial position. The emblem of the National Food Administration was a seal consisting of a shield of the national colors on a groundwork of gold, surrounded by a wreath of wheat embossed in yellow on a circle of white. This in form of a button five-eighths of an inch in diameter, mounted in gold, was usually worn by executive oflficers and county administrators, though its significance as a badge of office was nullified by the fact that these buttons in celluloid and base metal were manufactured by the million and offered for sale and worn indiscriminately throughout the country.

Being preeminently an organization of civilian volunteers, this idea of service was carried to the last extreme. The sole exceptions were the clerical assistants, practically all of whom were women, who were paid prevailing war time salaries. In almost every county in the state, however, young women of leisure, older women who could be spared from the home, and high school students, gave their time ungrudgingly in this capacity. Every county administrator had on his official staff from five to fifty volunteer workers of both sexes. Some of these, under stress of circumstances, or the necessity for earning a livelihood, could devote but a portion of the day to food administration work, but the vaster number practically devoted all their time to the service. Individuals, real estate firms, and business men in many instances gave offices rent free; in many counties the administrators not only devoted their entire time to the work, but contributed liberally from their private funds for current expenses.

Unlike the personnel of other civilian war activities the very nature of food administration work demanded the services of experts in all lines of production and distribution that had to do with food commodities. Experts not only in production, but in the marketing of every staple that formed a part of the daily menu of the American home; whose knowledge of crop conditions extended over a period of years and who were willing to place the sum of their experience at the disposal of the administration.

In Pennsylvania the list of volunteer experts embraced men familiar with the supply and demand of farm products, perishable fruits and vegetables, and mill and refinery products of flour and sugar, including transportation facilities and trade distribution. Almost without exception the men chosen for this work either as chiefs of division or expert counsellors, had devoted years to the study or handling of these commodities. Some of them controlled great business enterprises directly or indirectly connected with the manufacture or distribution of food in its varied forms. While criticism of trade experts arose at intervals in other sections of the country, in the Federal Food Administration in Pennsylvania there was not a single instance in which any one of its volunteer technical advisers withheld information of value or declined to proffer helpful advice to the solution of complex problems. It was a matter of personal knowledge to every member of the headquarters staff in Philadelphia that in numerous instances specialists suggested oflScial action that was distinctly inimical to their own business and financial interests. The knowledge that men of commanding positions in certain trade lines were supplying the administration with inside information, undoubtedly had a salutary effect upon smaller and less patriotic dealers who, otherwise, might have taken advantage of market conditions to profiteer at the public expense.

The vast extent of the administration's work, the diversified interests which it was compelled to recognize, and at times direct and control, can be appreciated only in the enumeration of some of its headquarters divisions, each under a separate director or chief, but directly responsible to State Administrator Heinz, viz., food supply and distribution; railroad traffic; supervision of retail stores; hotels, eating houses, clubs and cafes; supervision and direction of bakeries; milk and ice distribution; flour, sugar and meat survey, their supply and distribution; examination and auditing of books and accounts of mercantile and manufacturing establishments and price interpretation. In addition there were agricultural co-operation, dairy husbandry, and grain threshing. Among other divisions of co-ordinated activity was the maintenance of a Legal Department or Division of Enforcement, with chief counsel and associates to pass upon and interpret the numerous government rulings. A trial court was maintained by this department for cases of violation of regulations and the imposition of penalties. There was a division of investigation and secret service; of county inspectors ; and public education in food conservation. A food conservation railroad train visited every county in the state carrying a group of domestic science experts to present another phase of administration activity. There was work among state Hbraries, colleges and universities, public schools, churches, sabbath schools and secret societies; a woman's state organization was perfected and a woman's food army was organized in Philadelphia.

The above does not comprise all of the divisions nor the full list of departmental activities into which the work of the administration was divided. Intimate co-operation was maintained with the State Departments of Agriculture and Labor, the Farm Extension Bureau and the State College. A chain of curb markets was established over the state where farmers, in the interest of economy and the conservation of food, were encouraged to sell directly to the consumer without the intervention of middlemen.

Newspaper publicity was the direst punishment, from the offenders' standpoint, that could be inflicted. In Philadelphia, where violations of the food laws were prevalent, prayers and entreaties were of no avail to save the guilty from this deserved penalty. Every artifice that the slacker could invent or the cunning brain of his legal adviser devise was resorted to at times to keep the names of those convicted of violations out of the newspapers. One concern offered $10,000 if its name could be omitted from the public prints as among those found guilty.

There were, undoubtedly, occasions when the criticism was justified that the sentences inflicted upon food law violators were not in proportion to the gravity of the offense. Yet it should be remembered that in the large cities, where the administration was subjected to covert and vituperative attacks, refusals to observe the regulations were confined principally to the ignorant and the alien. In a number of cases, not alone in the large cities but in mining and manufacturing centers of large alien population, the offenses were committed because the offender assumed that everybody else was equally guilty. The number of second offenses, taking into account the total number of food law violations in the state, was comparatively small. The disgrace of being pilloried in the press and compelled to hang a placard in the shop window emblazoning the fact that the place was closed for violation of food regulations, had a deterrent effect upon shopkeepers who for the sake of paltry gain would, otherwise, have taken another chance at attempting to deceive the administration.

It was an appreciation of the difficulties in the enforcement of exacting regulations equally applicable to every household and individual in the state, that rendered Howard Heinz and his associates particularly careful in the selection of men to be county administrators or chiefs of division.

How were selections for these responsible positions made?

It was a sort of endless chain procedure. If it was found necessary to organize a new division or to divide the work of a large one into two, thus requiring the selection of a new chief, some member of the staff usually recalled the name of an individual who had the necessary abiUty and experience to qualify for the position. These appointees in turn suggested others. The individual, usually a man active in business life, was invited to headquarters for a conference. The plea was sometimes advanced:

"I cannot leave my business. I recognize the necessity and the fact that every man in this crisis should do his duty, but isn't it possible for you to find some one else who is not carrying the load of responsibility that I am? To undertake this work will mean serious financial loss to me."

And the headquarters' reply was:

"It is because you have great responsibilities and are a busy man that you have been chosen for this work. You would not be busy if you were not successful. We have got to have a man of your ability and experience in charge of this division. Shift your responsibilities to the shoulders of your business associates. You would be compelled to do this if you were within the draft qualifying limit and were conscripted for service in France. You have been drafted for service in the Food Administration and you are expected to take your place with other men who have undertaken service in the organization under conditions similar to your own."

And this argument invariably won.

There were not more than one or two men who escaped this civilian conscription. Two chiefs of division at headquarters resigned to undertake other government service where they felt a greater need for them existed. Others, although exempted from the draft, resigned to enter the army. In the entire force of the Food Administration at headquarters there were but two cases of men eligible for military service who did not resign. One was rejected and the other was retained because of peculiar ability required in connection with administration work.

In the selection of a county administrator suggestions were invited from the leading business and financial interests of the county. In several instances men who had been county chairmen of the Committee of Public Safety were appointed and filled the dual positions. Usually a discreet system of inquiry was inaugurated as to character, standing in the community, probity and sound judgment. A member of the Executive Council, familiar with the county, visited it and conducted the inquiry after which, the report being favorable, the gentleman was asked to accept the position. In no war work did politics play such an unimportant part. A man whose appointment was urged by a political leader for a position of responsibility instantly fell under suspicion. The work demanded a high degree of business or professional ability, not political acumen or skill. Yet in the Executive Council of the administration were representatives of every political party: Republicans, Democrats, Progressives, Prohibitionists and Single Taxers. It was not a question whether a man was a Democrat or a Republican; the paramount issue was, ** Is he capable of handling the job?" "Can he put it over?"

On one occasion a member of the Philadelphia bar appearing for a client who had been a persistent violator of administration rules, fortified himself with a letter from a prominent state leader, a fact he discreetly announced to the chief of one of the important divisions.

"I'd advise you to keep that letter in your pocket," said the official. "It'll certainly not do your client any good, and it may injure his case. This is war, not politics."

The letter never saw the light of day so far as any member of the administration was aware.

Nor did the question of wealth or social position influence the selection of the individual. There were men serving in the organization whose modest income rendered their activity a great sacrifice; there were others who were masters in the world of finance and who not only contributed their services, working longer hours and under less congenial conditions than they had ever done before, but in addition bore all the expenses of office management supplemented from time to time by liberal contributions to other phases of the work.

While the law of the Food Administration required that every administrator or chief of a division must be a volunteer serving the Government without salary, there were hundreds of other men and women in the state equally as patriotic serving as volunteers in less responsible but none the less necessary positions. With the exception of a secretary or perhaps one or two stenographers, every county administrator organized his staff on the basis of volunteer service. The monthly expenses of some of the county administrators seemed ridiculously disproportionate to the amount of work performed and results accomplished.

The administration in Pennsylvania was particularly fortunate from the outstart in receiving liberal aid from the state fund of the Committee of Public Safety and Council of National Defense. It would have been impossible otherwise to have maintained the high standard of efficiency which was the administration's distinguishing characteristic. One of the finest records made by Pennsylvania in its contribution to the winning of the World War, next to that of its sons in the field, was the liberality with which it assisted in financing the Federal Food Administration work within its borders.

In an organization the size and character of the Food Administration it would have been little short of the marvelous not to have found occasions for misunderstandings among men of diversified views, temperament and training. There were one or two instances of county administrators in which an exaggerated idea of their own importance led them to place their own interpretation upon Washington's rulings; but they were soon brought to a realization of their error.

That criticism should be directed against the administration was inevitable. Adverse criticism subdivided itself into three classes: First, from pro-German or pacificist sources; second, from those who had violated food laws and suffered accordingly, and third, from individuals who declaimed from lack of proper information concerning administration work. All such railing, as a rule, made its devious way by the spoken work through the channels of street gossip. The newspaper press, which was kept intimately informed of the actions and purposes of the administration, was in a position to speak impartially and threw its vast influence on the side of the administration with a power for good that was incalculable. Not that the newspapers refrained from criticising or censuring the judgment that dictated certain rulings, but the knowledge that it was a war necessity whose reflex action might tell mightily on the fate of civilization, tempered their utterances to a point where the animadversion became helpful comment.

The conspicuous position that the Pennsylvania organization held in the esteem of Washington was predicated not alone upon its efficiency, but for the reason that in several notable instances, through the acumen and farsightedness of its chief counsel, Charles J. Hepburn, Esq., it had devised machinery for the punishment of food violators so perfect, that it was impossible for this traitorous element to escape. The "unfair order" devised by Mr. Hepburn was first put in operation in this state and was adopted by Washington and extended to every other state in the union. In connection with its operation the "Red Cross Penalty," another of his clever expedients, had its first imposition in this state. The farseeing plans of Herbert G. Stockwell, Chief of the Division of Audits, for revolutionizing retail trade to the benefit of those engaged in it as well as to the consumer, made a profound impression in Washington. These, combined with the unceasing activity of the organization, the perfection of its machinery, and the constant succession of new ideas evolved, rendered Pennsylvania conspicuous among the states.

The most notable tribute to the character of the personnel of the Pennsylvania organization was the proffer of high executive positions in Washington to members of the headquarters staff. Only one of these was accepted ; the appointment of Howard Heinz to be Director of Food Relief for Southeastern Europe, with headquarters in Constantinople. This position was not accepted until it became apparent that the activities of the Food Administration in Pennsylvania were practically at an end and that a new field among the stricken countries of Europe presented itself for the exercise of his remarkable abilities as an organizer.

Chapter I Organizing The Administration

Appointment of Howard Heinz as Food Administrator FOR Pennsylvania — Forming A Volunteer Working Force.

The genesis of the Federal Food Administration in Pennsylvania was devoid of the romantic or unusual. Its foundations were laid months before the Act of Congress called the National Organization into existence. Preceding and following the declaration of war against the Hun there came chronologically :

The appointment by Governor Martin G. Brumbaugh in March, 191 7, of a Committee of Public Safety. Its organization into fifteen departments or committees by its Chairman, George Wharton Pepper, Esq., with Howard Heinz of Pittsburgh as Director of the Department of Food Supply.

An act of the Legislature in May, creating a Commission of Public Safety and appropriating $2,000,000 for state defense and the exigencies of war.

The Committee of Public Safety early in August, 191 7, became known as the Council of National Defense and Public Safety.

The creation of a United States Food Administration under Act of Congress, August lo, 191 7.

The appointment in September, 1917, of Howard Heinz, Director of the Food Supply Department of the Committee of PubHc Safety to be Federal Food Administrator for the state.

It was on this foundation that the great structure of the Federal Food Administration in Pennsylvania, with its diverse interests, had its beginnings.

It is doubtful if Howard Heinz, the man who organized and carried this work to successful completion, really visualized at the time of his appointment the magnitude of the task that was to develop under his hands. Four months of experience as Director of the Food Supply Department of the Public Safety Committee had afforded him an insight into methods of state organization, and strengthened his grasp upon essentials. The federal work, however, was something immeasurably larger and more potential; behind its mandates and rulings loomed the majestic power of the United States Government.

The man selected first as Director of the Committee on Food Supply in the Pennsylvania Safety Organization, and later as food administrator for the state, was a Pennsylvanian by birth whose entire business career, in association with his father and brothers, was that of a manufacturer of food products, H. J. Heinz Company of Pittsburgh, with branch factories throughout the United

States and Canada, being the largest of its kind in the world. The estabhshment was founded by the elder Heinz in a small way years before the future food administrator was born. From this modest beginning came the vast concern with its organized powers of distribution and its sales agencies all over the world.

The selection of Howard Heinz was a fortuitous choice. Not only familiar with important phases of the food question, he was so situated with the accessory of an ample fortune that he could adjust his business interests in such fashion to enable him to devote his entire time to the demands of his Government. There were criticisms over his appointment, just as there were complimentary references based on his known integrity and fitness for the place. The animadversions were shortlived. The career of Howard Heinz in his official position emphasized the fact that the adverse criticisms were based upon unfounded misconceptions. There are temperamental characteristics which in every human are manifested as individual traits inseparable from his personality. Howard Heinz, let it be frankly said, possessed no more of these than any other red-blooded man whose development had been along business lines of an exacting daily experience. He knew men. He was a tactician. In the face of difficulties, and they were of daily and ofttimes of hourly occurrence, he was at once a diplomat and a fighter. Upon one occasion it became necessary to display to a certain firm the iron hand within the velvet glove. The revelation was a surprise to him, but the report of the chief of the division revealed the ugly facts.

"That concern has been one of the best customers of our firm for years. Vm sorry for them, but if you are sure of your facts go after them. They deserve no consideration whatever under the circumstances."

Of medium height, slender, cordial and sympathetic in his intercourse with men, never brusque or given to the use of expletives, with a keenness born of experience that readily gave him an insight into the motives of men, the consensus of opinion of those intimately associated with him during his official career was that of a man peculiarly fitted for the position which he so successfully filled to his own honor and that of his government.

The evidence of the high personal esteem in which Mr. Heinz was held by his associates was manifested toward the close of his administration in the presentation, at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel, Philadelphia, of a silver service, the gift of members of the Executive Council and the County Administrators of the state.

The events antecedent to his appointment as food administrator for Pennsylvania can be dismissed with brief reference. His first act after his appointment as director of the Department of Food Supply of the Committee of Public

Safety was the selection of an Advisory Committee of sixteen selected from men prominent in the business and professional life of the state. They included Lewis S. Sadler of Carlisle, who filled the responsible position of executive manager for the Committee of Public Safety and whose abilities were later recognized by Governor Sproul in his appointment as State Commissioner of Highways; J. S. Crutchfield, who became vicefood administrator under Mr. Heinz; Hon. E. L. Tustin of Philadelphia, former state senator and city official of Philadelphia; Hon. E. V. Babcock of Pittsburgh, a prominent business man and former mayor of that city; W. L. Clause, also of Pittsburgh, and A. W. Mellon, conspicuous in the financial life of that western metropolis; Hon. Frank B. McClain, lieutenant-governor; Hon. Joseph Buffington, of the United States Court; M. E. Bushong of Quarry^^ille, subsequently food administrator for Lancaster County; J. Russell Smith of Philadelphia; C. B. Ewing of Mount Union; John MacSparren, head of the State Grange; Prof. M. S. McDowell, noted educator and publicist of State College, and Mrs. Charles M. Lea who, later, became chief of the Woman's Division of the Food Administration, a position she filled with distinguished success.

Headquarters were established in Philadelphia. This provoked a protest from those who felt that being a native of Pittsburgh, the director of the department should have located his headquarters in that city. In default of any information from Howard Heinz on the subject, it is presumed that a desire to render the fullest service in his new position prompted the decision. In Philadelphia he was in direct touch with every prominent inter-state line of communication by rail and river, and a market whose sources of supply were drawn from three famous gardening states in the East. The personal equation in the decision doubtless was that in Pittsburgh he would be in closer touch with business associates which would encourage the intrusion upon his time of extraneous matters to the detriment of his official duties. J. S. Crutchfield was made vice-director of the Department of Food Supplies. As one of the most successful merchants in the country, specializing in the marketing of fruits and vegetables that embraced products from the orange groves of California to the potato fields of Aroostook County, Maine, his grasp upon the Pennsylvania situation was instant and comprehensive.

Three cardinal principles were adopted by Mr. Heinz as an undeviating working rule, viz. :

To increase the food productiveness of the commonwealth.

To conserve its food supply and reduce its waste.

To facilitate food distribution and marketing.

These principles can be recognized as the essence of all that the Food Administration subsequently attempted and achieved.

Rapidly summarizing this period of pre-administration work, food supply chairmen were appointed in every county; they in turn appointed committees throughout their districts. Farm work was well advanced before these organizations were perfected, yet where requests were made for fertilizers, implements, seed and labor, they were supplied as far as possible. People were urged to cultivate vacant land. City war gardens were planned. Informative literature, posters, bulletins and placards were exhibited and leaflets by the hundred thousand were distributed with inspiring suggestions. Community markets, the precursors of the curb markets of administration days, were encouraged where farmers could dispose of surplus stocks that were too valuable to throw away, yet not valuable enough to ship to distant markets. Unconsciously, the people under the inspiration of the Committee of Public Safety of which Geo. Wharton Pepper, descendant of the first chairman of the first Committee of Public Safety in the historic dawn of the republic, was chairman, with eager hands were laying the foundation of a greater structure.

The clamor of the war tocsin as the days went by could not drown the cries of protest that went up from every part of the country over the rapidly advancing prices of food commodities. It became apparent even to the less astute that remedial legislation must be enacted to prevent a carnival of profiteering. Herbert Hoover, the Californian mining engineer who had driven the wolf of famine from the door of Belgium, was looked to as the new Joshua that was to overthrow the Midianites of profiteers. Men in Congress with the wider vision took up the question and on the loth of August, 1917, the act creating a National Food Administration became a law, and Herbert Hoover was appointed food administrator for the nation. His Belgian experience had prepared him for the position. Organization was his master key.

The Food Administration edifice began rising with the celerity of a modern steel skyscraper. Howard Heinz was the one conspicuous name suggested at Washington for state food administrator. It was a suggestion born of the work that had been accomplished under his direction in organizing the forces of food supply and distribution in Pennsylvania. The groundwork for the greater structure of the Federal Food Administration was already in place. The appointment of Mr. Heinz was made in September by President Wilson, through the advice and suggestion of Herbert Hoover. He retained to the end his position of director of the Food Supply Department of the Committe of Public Safety of Pennsylvania, associating with it the larger service of Federal Food Administrator for the state. With a common purpose and a complete absence of conflicting interests the harmonious blending of these vast economic activities was maintained to the end of hostilities.