State secrets in east Tennessee

Hundreds of young American women poured onto trains heading South, all uninformed about their destination. It was 1943 and women didn’t ask details about the work they were glad to have as it might help take their minds away from everyday difficulties like rations, metal drives, the draft, and whether their families would receive a telegram announcing the loss of a loved one.

The women were united by one thought: their work in the civil service would “bring a speedy and victorious end to the war.”  

Denise Kiernan interviewed dozens of people to discover the effect of the Manhattan Project upon the East Tennessee area, though her text narrows in on nine women (one is black and eight are white) working there before the secrecy of Oak Ridge, Tenn.’s, wartime industry was unveiled. Celia Szapka had escaped her mining town of Shenandoah, Penn., for work in Washington, D.C., New Jersey, and Manhattan before signing to head south without knowing any specifics about where she was going, the how long the work would last, or what she would be doing. Women like her filled a variety of roles from secretarial and janitorial to technical and scientific.

{module Share this!|none}Other women, like Clinton, Tenn., native Toni Peters kept close watch on what was taking shape just down the road. As a member of the class of 1943, she wanted a job after graduation. However, Peters’ family was one of region’s families to have tousled with the government over land rights, a topic that colored mountain development through the New Deal and construction of the Norris Dam and Great Smoky Mountain National Park among other projects. Peters’ sparkplug personality was well-aligned with the Rosie the Riveter model of femininity promoted for women during the era thus helping her land a job with the Project. 

Kiernan’s lively narrative brings warmth to an otherwise mechanical and cold nuclear industry lacking warmth and happiness given tragic associations in our mind such as Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Chernobyl, and most recently Fukushima Daiichi. In telling Oak Ridge’s story through its workers’ anecdotes and contributions to the Manhattan Project, Kiernan derives deeper meaning from this industry’s legacy upon the region and its people.  

In 1999, there was a secret meeting during which the heads of the food industry met and decided they might—or might not—make a “sincere effort to be part of the solution” after studies revealed that America’s obesity problem was related to the industry’s culpability in providing “ubiquity of inexpensive, good-tasting, supersized, energy-dense foods” to consumers. 

Michael Moss spills the beans on the science of how the food industry has hooked consumers on processed foods. In this brilliant tome of investigative reportage, Moss takes readers into laboratories where food scientists manipulate consumers into craving fat that has been chemically altered and processed foods that are specifically designed to make them feel hungrier so that consumers will buy and eat more of the product. He details marketing campaigns designed to deflect consumers concerns about the health risks of products with “smoke and mirrors” redirection of their attention. Readers learn about the bliss point, “the precise amount of sugar or fat that will send consumers over the moon” and essentially guarantee that profits keep rolling in. 

The prologue alone is filled with scary tricks and tips that will send a food enthusiast reeling. Moss shares the mathematical equation for the ideal snack: taste and convenience. He then goes on to reveal jaw-dropping, behind-the-scenes information that readers really may well not want to know about their food. Moss cites Nestle as one of the heavyweights in the game because the company has the largest research operation and also has the wealth to solve the obesity problems not just for humans but our canine and feline brethren—they own the Purina brand as well.  

Reliance on processed foods has integrated into cafeterias, restaurants, and grocery stores and lifestyles demand quick, easy and tasty food. The food industry gave us everything we wanted, and for cheap, too, but at a much greater cost than assumed.