Postcards Regarding the Chicago Meatpacking Industry.

On October 9, 1907, Robert Bacon, serving as the Assistant Secretary of State before he was appointed Secretary of State on January 27, 1909, wrote a letter to the U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, Whitelaw Reid.

The letter discussed the circulation of postcards in South Africa attacking Chicago's meatpacking industry. Messrs. Armour & Company, in bringing the matter to the Department's notice, state that these cards are working great harm to their business.
 

To meet the wishes of Messrs. Armour & Company, the Department trusts your good judgment to bring the matter as appropriately and emphatically as you may to the attention of the British Government.

Robert Bacon

Assistant Secretary of State

The book "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair was published serially (by chapter) in 1905 and as a single-volume book in 1906. This was the catalyst for the production of the postcards.

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SUMMARY OF THE JUNGLE

Upton Sinclair’s novel, The Jungle, shocked respectable Americans in 1905. Repeated economic crises punctuated rapidly growing industrial output, casting millions of people out of work and onto the streets. Conventional thinking was that these events were transient phenomena and that hard work and clean living would deliver individual prosperity in time. Many Americans saw slums, vice, and squalor as signs of individual shortcomings – nothing more than new immigrants bringing bad habits and poor discipline with them from the old countries. The Jungle turned that way of thinking on its head.

The economic system Sinclair portrayed took decent, hard-working immigrants and stripped them of their savings, health, dignity and frequently their lives in pursuit of shoddy, unsafe consumer products. It rewarded crime and political corruption while crushing anyone foolish enough to demand fair treatment and a decent life. Unfortunately, Sinclair’s exposé of meat processing conditions in Chicago was the only part of his novel to truly upset respectable Americans’ stomachs. Food safety standards were raised quickly, but improving working conditions would take decades longer. More than one hundred years on, the same questions of food quality and exploitation of the many for the benefit of a few once again resonate in debates on inequality, processed foods, and pesticide residues.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Christopher, Illinois in Franklin County, a Coal Town, Incorporated 1903.

Christopher is located 20 miles north of Carbondale, Illinois. According to the 2020 census, the city has a total area of 1.58 square miles and a population of 2,382.

Before 1880, Christopher was merely a trading post in a sparsely settled area. However, with the construction of the railroad through the area, growth was inevitable. The first railroad engine arrived on November 16, 1879. A meeting was held in James B. Pharsis store, where Christopher was selected as the town's name. It was named after Christopher Harrison, a grandson of one of the early settlers, Isham Harrison, who represented the county as a delegate to the Illinois First Constitutional Convention held in Kaskaskia in 1818.

In 1879, the local people banded together and built the first railroad depot; thus, Christopher, Illinois, was born. The first Post Office was inaugurated on January 19, 1880, and was located in the general store owned by Mr. Pharsis, who was the first Post Master (1880-1882). On September 28, 1903, Christopher voted to become a village by a 30 to 16-vote margin.

The sinking of Christopher's one and only coal mine began in January 1906. This mine was the North Mine, located just north of the city and west of the Christopher to Sesser Road. A seam of coal eleven feet thick was found at a depth of 517 feet. Following the success of the coal mine, Christopher started to grow. The village voted to become a city on January 11, 1910, with a 72 to 36 margin. Then on April 10, 1910, the first Mayor was elected.

On July 28, 1915, eight men were killed, eight seriously wounded, and a dozen slightly hurt by a gas explosion in the United Coal Mining Company Mine No. 1, one-fourth of a mile east of Christopher. The blast occurred in the sixth, southeast entry, where more than 100 men were working. The cause of the explosion was never discovered and remains unknown today.

Even though Christopher's current population stands at about 2400, it once had a population above 10,000. The city had four theaters, three-three-story hotels, 28 grocery stores, five bakeries, a swimming pool, a miniature golf course, a skating rink, a dance hall, a bowling alley, nine automobile dealers, two banks, five pool halls, two lumber yards, nine dry goods stores, six furniture stores, eight ladies' ready-to-wear stores, nine men's stores, 12 service stations, and more.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.