We watched "The Poison Squad" about Dr. Harvey Wiley, a chemist. The Poison Squad was shown, I guess, in episodes on the PBS show "American Experience" but after trying, we found it more convenient to watch it on Amazon Prime. There, it is available as a single movie. It's about going from food and drink manufacturers going about the business of selling their products without supervision to working with government oversight and laws to protect the consumer. Harvey Wiley was born in 1844. He became a chemistry professor and was appalled at what he could show about the American food supply and the chemicals and additives in it. As an adult, he tried to complain and warn and was repeatedly told he had no right and no authority to question and publicize his complaints and warnings.
The title, "The Poison Squad" came from the public after people learned he had engaged a group of young healthy men to sample the foods he knew were steadily given added substances that degraded the foods and made them dangerous or worse. After years of work, the author Upton Sinclair, born in 1878. wrote the novel The Jungle in 1906, describing the conditions and practices in the Chicago stockyards. The outrage and disgust that followed helped Wiley's efforts to have the American food supply reliably cleaned up.
