Years ago, I found a post on the University of Michigan's Map Library blog. I consider it evergreen, as it is about two of my favorite things: Piggies and cartography! Now seems like a good time to write about it. After all, maps were the safest way to travel during the COVID19 pandemic. Old maps even allow one to travel in time, with sufficient imagination.
In lieu of the Map Library blog, I turned to Big Think's Strange Maps. I located this excellent post, National Porcineographic: Portrait of America as a Young Hog.
Helping humans by helping pigs
William E. Baker was a 19th century tailor. He made his fortune thanks to a strategic alliance with what became the Grover & Baker Sewing Machine Company. (It was later acquired by Singer Sewing Machines.) Baker's philanthropy was extensive, but centered on his Hygienic Farming and Sanitary Cookery initiative. He wanted to improve human health by helping pigs.
Unvirtuous circle: Boston was a cesspool
New England rapidly industrialized, and the population grew along with it. An ecosystem evolved but it was of a distinctly pragmatic sort. The City of Boston instituted a garbage pick-up service but then disposed of the garbage anywhere and everywhere possible. Typical locations for garbage dumping were on the outskirts of the city or in neighboring communities. It was NOT environmentally friendly! Town and nearby country dwellers developed a recycling response: They fed the garbage to pigs.
W.E. Baker believed that this practice was the cause of much disease, in both swine and the people who consumed unwholesome pork. In 1875, he introduced a 'Sanitary Piggery' in rural Massachusetts. It was the cornerstone of Baker's contribution to the pure food movement.
"Baker’s Sanitary Piggery involved a clean environment and wholesome food for its porcine residents - it was even rumored they had individual beds, and slept under sheets. That may have been hyperbole, but it underscores Baker’s belief that public health depended greatly on sanitary food production."
He didn't blame pigs for the filth and squalor in which they, um, wallowed.
The world’s finest example of porcineography
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| The Porcineograph |
