Deborah Blum Books

In late nineteenth-century America, the industrial age had swept away traditional food preparation. Factories churned out processed meats, milk, and canned goods meant to reach millions. Yet the speed of industry was not matched by a concern for purity. There were no national standards defining what...

From The Poison Squad: One Chemist's Single-Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

Harvey Washington Wiley was not a man given to easy causes. Born in Indiana in 1844, he was a Civil War veteran, trained chemist, and professor before becoming chief chemist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. His quiet immersion in the chemical composition of food led him to a radical conclusion...

From The Poison Squad: One Chemist's Single-Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

When Charles Norris accepted the position of New York City’s first appointed Chief Medical Examiner in 1918, he inherited not just an office, but an ethical wasteland. The coroner system was riddled with political appointments and payoffs; autopsies were rare, evidence often discarded, and justice r...

From The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York

Gettler arrived at the Medical Examiner’s Office with a mind as precise as his beakers. A first-generation immigrant trained in chemistry, he was tireless, frugal, and astonishingly patient. While Norris battled political forces above, Gettler descended into the microscopic warfare of toxicology—whe...

From The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York