Nutrition on the World War II Home Front: Enriched Bread, the Basic 7 and School Lunches

Part of the National Park Service series "The American Home Front and World War II". Written by Megan E. Springate, University of Maryland, for the NPS Cultural Resources Office of Interpretation and Education, with funding from the National Council on Public History.

"There's danger when people tire too easily; when minds are slow to think; when bodies can't fight disease." Poster, Make America Strong series, Government Printing Office, 1941. National Archives.

A young science

When World War II began, the science of nutrition was in its infancy. Before the 1930s, scientists knew a good diet needed protein, energy and minerals, and that something else mattered too — but not what.

In the Great Depression, hunger and malnutrition were widespread; a common lack of B vitamins left many people tired, nervous and depressed. Scientists began working out which vitamins and minerals people needed and recommending "protective foods" — milk, leafy vegetables, eggs, fish and organ meats.

As war approached, the government grew alarmed about nutrition in the military and at home — with reason: up to a quarter of men called up under the Selective Service Act of 1940 were malnourished and unfit to serve. Nutrition became tied to the future of the country, and of democracy itself.

Building a national programme

• 1940: the National Research Council founded the Food and Nutrition Board (FNB) to advise on nutrition for national defence and draw up a standard list of recommended nutrients. The same year, commercial bakeries volunteered to enrich bread, restoring B vitamins lost when wheat is milled into white flour and adding other vitamins and minerals — thiamin, niacin, riboflavin and iron. By the end of 1942 nearly three-quarters of white bread was enriched, and in January 1943 the government required it for all white bread.
• May 1941: 900 delegates — doctors, home economists, dietitians, farmers, union leaders and food industry people — met at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington for the National Nutrition Conference for Defense. The FNB presented draft recommendations, and the government launched the National Nutrition Campaign, with the less-than-catchy slogan "Eat Nutritional Food".
• 1943: after two years of refinement, the FNB published the nation's first Recommended Daily Allowances — for calories, protein, calcium, iron, vitamin A, thiamine (B1), riboflavin, niacin, ascorbic acid (vitamin C) and vitamin D, with suggested amounts of vitamin K, iodine and copper.

"U.S. Needs Us Strong. Eat Nutritional Food." Poster, Office of Defense Health and Welfare Services, about 1941–1945. National Archives.

The Basic 7

Numbers alone were not much help, so the FNB offered a sample diet, soon simplified into the "Basic 7" — a forerunner of today's food guides:

1. green and yellow vegetables — some raw, some cooked, frozen or canned;
2. oranges, tomatoes, grapefruit — or raw cabbage or salad greens;
3. potatoes and other vegetables and fruit;
4. milk and milk products — fluid, evaporated or dried milk, or cheese;
5. meat, poultry, fish or eggs — or dried beans, peas, nuts or peanut butter;
6. bread, flour and cereals — whole-grain, enriched or restored;
7. butter and fortified margarine, with added vitamin A.

"Eat the Basic 7 Every Day! Eat a Lunch That Packs a Punch!" Poster, War Food Administration, 1943. National Archives.

Vita-Min-Go. Companies whose factories had turned to war work wanted to stay in the public eye. The Servel Company of Evansville, Indiana — which made warplane wings instead of refrigerators — published a game in 1942: players scored points for six vitamins and minerals in the foods they ate, and "won" the day with at least 20 points in each. The prize, it said, was better health and more vigour; the penalty for losing, a greater chance of sickness.

School lunches

In 1942 the president created the Food Distribution Administration to control buying, storing and distributing food for the military, allies and civilians; it worked with the Office of Price Administration on rationing and ran the school lunch programme.

Government school lunches began in the Depression under the Works Progress Administration, using farm surpluses to feed hungry children and creating jobs for lunchroom staff.

Another million took part in the "penny milk" programme — half a pint for a cent. A 1943 War Food Administration pamphlet explained why: some parents could not afford the right food, some — more and more, as women took war jobs — had no time to pack a good lunch, and some did not know enough about nutrition. Lunches also raised attendance and learning and kept children healthier — important when a third of the country's doctors had gone to war.

"Every Child Needs a Good School Lunch." Poster, War Food Administration, 1944. National Archives.

"Doctors are scarce. One out of three has gone to war." Poster, Office of War Information, 1943 (detail). National Library of Medicine.

Shortcomings

• Few followed it. Despite an all-out campaign, less than half the population ate to the Basic 7, and only 7 percent reported getting their full daily allowances. Poorly fed people fall ill more easily — and with employers and government strongly discouraging time off, sick workers spread illness at work, costing war production.
• Cost. Wartime wages rose, but not evenly; one estimate put the National Nutrition Program beyond the means of 20 to 50 percent of Americans.
• Whose food? The Basic 7 ignored regional and cultural foods. It was built around European and New England diets — white bread, butter, potatoes, cow's milk, refined sugar. Since the Civil War, food familiar to New Englanders had been marketed as "American", building a common identity that was deliberately white and middle class; leaving out African American, Asian American, Latino and Native American foodways marked those groups as "other", and people who abandoned their traditional foods were seen as more American.
• Biology. Milk was hailed as a "perfect food", but many people whose ancestors did not keep dairy cattle tend to be lactose intolerant — including many of African and Asian descent, Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Pacific Islanders and Native Hawaiians. And New England foods ignored what grows elsewhere, steering people from local, seasonal foods toward imported and preserved ones.

Some pushed back. The Filipina food chemist Maria Orosa, trained in the United States, returned to the Philippines to develop recipes using local foods and teach people to grow and cook them, to free Filipinos from dependence on imported and preserved food.

"Save them this fate. Don't stay home from work!" Poster, War Production Board, about 1942–1943. National Archives.

Did you know? Eight glasses of water

In 1945 the FNB's revised allowances included how much water a person needs, based on energy used: for someone burning 2,000 calories a day, 64 ounces — widely read as eight 8-ounce glasses. But the report actually said a suitable allowance for adults was 2.5 litres (about 85 ounces) a day in most cases, and that most of it comes in prepared food. When more is needed — hard work, hot days — thirst is generally a good guide.

Sources

• National Park Service, "Nutrition on the Home Front in World War II," by Megan E. Springate. https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/nutrition-on-the-home-front-in-world-war-ii.htm
• The article draws on the Food and Nutrition Board's reports of 1943 and 1945; Food — in War and in Peace (New York State, 1944); Susan Levine, School Lunch Politics (2008); Hannah LeBlanc's dissertation on wartime food science (2019); Amy Bentley (1996); Sarah Wassberg Johnson's food history writing; and a 1978 General Accounting Office report.
• Several illustrations in the original — a 1942 magazine advertisement, a New York State publication, a university archive photograph, a college songbook cover and a Norman Rockwell poster — are not reproduced.
• Words on this page from people and organisations outside the federal government are paraphrased; rewritten in hubnx's own words.