by Maureen Ogle
Here is what I learned about Holman (other than the fact that he played loose with facts): He grew up in Sioux City, where he worked for a time in a Swift packing plant, first on the floor hauling sheep guts, and then in the office. But most of his pre-IBP meat career was spent as a cattle buyer. According to Jonathan Kwitny, a Wall Street Journal reporter who covered the IBP conspiracy and Mafia scandal, and who wrote the 1979 Vicious Circles: The Mafia in the Marketplace, Anderson and Holman met each other in Sioux City sometime before Anderson moved to Denison. By that time (the late 1950s), Holman was operating a cattle-buying business. Holman told Kwitny that the two men often discussed the idea of building a revolutionary new meatpacking plant. But Holman relayed these events nearly twenty years after the fact, and as near as I can tell, Kwitny did not verify that information with Anderson. Kwitny interviewed Holman’s friends and family from the Sioux City area, and according to them, Holman was annoyed by the way union recalcitrance drained the profits out of meatpacking and determined to build a modern, and presumably nonunion, plant. That may be the case, and presumably it’s true that Holman and Anderson knew each other before Anderson moved to Denison. But I found evidence that in May 1960, when Anderson was laying plans and raising money for his new company, Holman was still living in Sioux City and, according to family and friends, working seven days a week as a cattle buyer. In other words, I found nothing to indicate that he cofounded IBP (except in the sense that he was hired before the doors opened). (I did not, I should add, attempt to persuade what is now IBP to let me look at early company records. If those still exist, they may tell a different story.)
[>] “I never bribed anybody”: Quoted in “Rough Riders,” Forbes 113 (June 1974): 66.
[>] “victim of the extortionate practices”: Quoted in “Iowa Beef and Its Cochairman Convicted for Plotting to Bribe Union and Retailers,” Wall Street Journal, October 8, 1974, p. 4. Holman’s saga, at times tragic, at others comical, was detailed in newspaper and meat industry trade journals and in Jonathan Kwitny, Vicious Circles: The Mafia in the Marketplace (W. W. Norton & Company, 1979).
[>] Holman avoided jail: According to Jonathan Kwitny, the Wall Street Journal reporter who tracked the IBP case and wrote about the Mafia’s involvement in the food industry, after the ruling, IBP continued to make payments to union officials on the East Coast, payments that the company made no attempt to conceal.
[>] “ancient and obsolete plants”: Quoted in U.S. House, Prohibit Feeding of Livestock, 229. For the Armour operation, see Jerrold Lanes, “Meat-Packing Progress,” Barron’s National Business and Financial Weekly 42, no. 7 (February 12, 1962): 18.
[>] “people would stand waiting”: Quoted in Kwitny, Vicious Circles, 282.
[>] “Turbo-chill”: Dana L. Thomas, “More Meat on the Bones: The Lean Years May Be Over for the Nation’s Packers,” Barron’s National Business and Financial Weekly 39, no. 30 (July 27, 1959): 15.
[>] “We’re going to spend”: Quoted in Richard F. Janssen, “Packers on the Move: Meat Concerns Step Up Outlays on New Plants. Aim to Fatten Profits,” Wall Street Journal, July 5, 1961, p. 1. Useful information about this situation is in [Arval L. Erikson], “Change Has Been Key Word in Industry Except for Consistently Low Earnings,” National Provisioner 147, no. 14 (October 6, 1962): 52–54.
[>] “moved from very big”: Quoted in Harold B. Meyers, “For the Old Meatpackers, Things Are Tough All Over,” Fortune 79 (February 1969): 92.
[>] “Suppose the moonshot fails”: Quoted in Paul Ingrassia, “Repackaged Packer: As Fresh-Meat Business Grows Leaner, Swift Samples Other Fare,” Wall Street Journal, August 10, 1978, p. 29.
[>] “half a cent”: Quoted in Richard Elliott Jr., “Sow’s Ear or Silk Purse?” Barron’s National Business and Financial Weekly 47, no. 15 (April 10, 1967): 14.
[>] “What meat packing assets”: Quoted in ibid.
[>] “After World War II”: Quoted in “Meatpackers Beef It Up,” Business Week, August 30, 1969, pp. 83, 84.
[>] “A year ago”: Quoted in “Doubts Voiced in Bigger Cattle Push,” Aberdeen (SD) American News, July 17, 1973, p. 6.
[>] “We’ve taken beatings”: Quoted in Bill Hosokawa, “In Colorado, Bad Days for a Cattleman,” New York Times, May 31, 1974, p. 33.
[>] “It seemed like a good idea”: Quoted in “Taking a Bath in Beef,” Forbes 113, no. 9 (May 1, 1974): 18.
[>] “I’ll boycott”: Quoted in “Rising Clamor for Tough Price Controls,” Time, April 16, 1973; accessed online.
[>] “two men with good appetites”: Quoted in “The Great Meat Furor,” Newsweek, April 9, 1973, p. 19.
[>] “Don’t Eat Beef!”: See the ad in John Russell, “What the Producers Should Learn from . . . the Meat Price Uproar,” Farm Journal 97 (May 1973): 15.
[>] “appalled by how little”: Quoted in Marian Burros, “A Maverick’s Views,” Washington Post, January 8, 1976, p. D8.
[>] “We’ve got a worldwide food panic”: Quoted in Norman H. Fischer and John A. Prestbo, “Cost of Eating: Soaring Grain Prices Seen Braking Output of Meat, Milk, Bread,” Wall Street Journal, June 11, 1973, p. 1.
[>] “Let’s just say”: Quoted in Mitchell C. Lynch, “Land of Plenty: For the Government, the Farm Boom Means Worry and Confusion,” Wall Street Journal, October 31, 1973, p. 21.
[>] “had become far too important”: Quoted in ibid. For the economists’ claims, see, for example, Norman H. Fischer, “Land of Plenty: Growing Enough Food for the Future May Tax U.S. Farms’ Capacity,” Wall Street Journal, November 19, 1973, p. 1.
[>] “We’re on the threshold”: Quoted in John A. Prestbo, “Land of Plenty: The Quick Turnaround in Agriculture Picture Brought Joys, Woes,” Wall Street Journal, October 9, 1973, p. 41.
[>] “farm belt”: Quoted in Joseph Winski, “Land of Plenty: For Agribusiness Firms, the Farm Boom Means a Return to Riches,” Wall Street Journal, October 15, 1973, p. 1.
[>] “foreign dignitaries”: “Pigs in the Sky,” National Provisioner 169, no. 25 (December 22, 1973): 23.
[>] “I don’t think”: Quoted in “Work Expected to Begin in March on Large Hog Plant,” Joplin (MO) Globe, February 17, 1974, p. 3D. McQuoid’s adventure was covered by trade journals and Missouri newspapers, but the most accessible accounts, and ones that ponder the implications of large-scale farming for rural America, are Calvin Trillin, “U.S. Journal: Kahoka, Missouri,” New Yorker, May 6, 1974, pp. 88, 90, 92–94, 96–97; and Gene A. Meyer, “If Proposed Corporate Hog Farm Succeeds, Future of Small Producer May Be in Doubt,” Wall Street Journal, February 19, 1974, p. 34.
[>] “glimmering row”: Quote is from a photo caption on p. 29 of Dean Houghton, “An Exclusive Look at Tyson, the Nation’s Largest Hog Farm,” Successful Farming 77 (August 1979).
[>] “It’s got all the advantages”: Quoted in ibid., 30.
[>] “ought to scare the hell”: Dick Hanson, “Across the Editor’s Desk,” Successful Farming 77 (August 1979): 3.
[>] “a very ambitious man”: Quoted in Brent E. Riffel, “The Feathered Kingdom: Tyson Foods and the Transformation of American Land, Labor, and Law” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Arkansas, 2008), 148.
[>] “gregarious, voluble fellow”: Paul Duke Jr. and Rick Christie, “Don Tyson Marshals His Flock to Fight,” Wall Street Journal, October 13, 1988; accessed online; and Kim Clark and Melanie Warner, “Tough Times for the Chicken King,” Fortune 134, no. 8 (October 28, 1996); accessed online.
[>] “If it makes money”: Quoted in Clark and Warner, “Tough Times.”
[>] “The business of politics”: Quoted in Riffel, “Feathered Kingdom,” 231.
[>] “[T]here is”: Quoted in ibid., 201.
[>] “He’s one of those”: Quoted in Clark and Warner, “Tough Times.”
[>] “Don Tyson”: Quoted in ibid.
[>] In the spring of 1962: The example is from Riffel, “Feathered Kingdom,” 121.
[>] “expand or expire”: Quoted in Marvin Schwartz, Tyson from Farm
to Market (University of Arkansas Press, 1991), 12.
[>] “We’re not committed”: Quoted in “Tyson’s Foods Looks at Future,” Broiler Industry 27, no. 3 (March 1964): 12, 14.
[>] “I’ve had two turkey plants”: Quoted in Riffel, “Feathered Kingdom,” note 20, p. 156.
[>] “easy to grow pigs”: Quoted in “Don Tyson Suggests a Better ‘Game Plan,’” Broiler Industry 37, no. 6 (June 1974): 34.
[>] “on an integrated basis”: Quoted in ibid.
[>] “It’s a question”: Quoted in Robert B. Cullen, “McLean Stakes $60 Million on Giant Farming Venture,” The (Lamberton, NC) Robesonian, November 10, 1974, p. 4C.
[>] “the same relation”: Ibid.
[>] “the food crisis”: Quoted in Nash Henderson, “N.C. Corporate Farming—I: Companies Escaping Ecology Laws Requirements,” High Point (NC) Enterprise, October 30, 1974, p. 13A. This series on the environmental and political impact of corporate farms first appeared in the Winston-Salem Sentinel and was reprinted by the Associated Press.
[>] NF was owned by: On the Bass family holdings, see Ann Crittendon, “Even for Texans, the Basses Are Rich,” New York Times, December 13, 1981, pp. F1, F17.
[>] “a God-given mission”: Quoted in Robert Dorr, “Center-Pivot Irrigation Boom Slows to Trickle,” Omaha World-Herald, December 16, 1984; accessed online.
[>] “leading edge”: Quoted in “Here Comes the Corporate Sow,” Farm Journal 108 (October 1984): 15; and “The $50 Million Hog Farm,” Farm Journal 108 (October 1984): 13. Haw did not mention another factor that surely informed his decision: thanks to a 1981 change in the federal tax code, the company’s investment in the necessary buildings would earn tax credits and qualify National for accelerated depreciation, both of which would enhance the project’s profitability.
[>] “We think the basic”: Quoted in “Conagra [sic] Positioning for Future,” New York Times, January 31, 1981, p. 31.
[>] “booming voice”: Quoted in Sue Shellenbarger, “ConAgra Grows Rapidly Despite Missteps by Shrewdly Acquiring and Reviving Firms,” Wall Street Journal, December 7, 1982, p. 35.
[>] “awful, awful disaster”: Quoted in Joseph Winski, “The Grand and Daring Strategy of ConAgra,” Chicago Tribune, October 18, 1978, p. C10.
[>] “The guy buys things”: Quoted in Bill Saporito, “ConAgra’s Performance,” Fortune 114, no. 9 (October 27, 1986): 70.
[>] “They were thinking of Skylab”: Quoted in David P. Garino, “New Owner Rejuvenates Banquet Foods,” Wall Street Journal, February 8, 1982, p. 29.
[>] “We should have moved”: Quoted in “A Meatpacker Discovers Consumer Marketing,” Business Week, May 28, 1979, p. 164.
[>] “like a bunch of piranhas”: Quoted in Betsy Morris and Roy J. Harris Jr., “ConAgra to Buy Greyhound Unit for $166 Million,” Wall Street Journal, June 30, 1983, p. 8.
[>] “Armour’s dead”: Quoted in Alexander Stuart, “Meatpackers in Stampede,” Fortune 103 (June 29, 1981): 71. The rest of this analysis is from “The Old-Line Meatpackers Struggle to Survive,” Business Week, November 13, 1978, pp. 78, 80.
[>] “Monfort wants to return”: Quoted in Barnhart, Kenny’s Shoes, 208.
[>] “the ‘big friend’”: Quoted in “How ConAgra Grew Big—and Now, Beefy,” Business Week, May 18, 1987, p. 87.
[>] “Pork has been there”: Quoted in “Iowa Beef: Moving In for a Kill by Automating Pork Processing,” Business Week, July 14, 1980, p. 100. Retailer pressure is mentioned in Judy Daubenmier, “Super Packing Plants Seen by End of Decade,” Cedar Rapids Gazette, December 11, 1980, p. 13A.
[>] “increase world food production”: Quoted in Bill Sing, “Hammer Makes Point with IBP Acquisition,” Cedar Rapids Gazette, June 7, 1981, p. 10C. Sing’s article first appeared in the Los Angeles Times.
[>] “We think food”: Quoted in “Occidental to Acquire Iowa Beef,” New York Times, June 2, 1981, p. D1. For IBP’s plans and a description of the plant, see Bill Fleming, “From Packages to Plant—IBP Set to Enter Pork Business,” National Hog Farmer 27, no. 10 (October 15, 1982): 31–32, 37.
[>] “I just don’t see”: Quoted in Francis C. Brown III, “Wilson Foods Corp. Is Facing Bleak Outlook,” Wall Street Journal, September 6, 1985, p. 6.
[>] “We are confident”: Quoted in Rick Christie, “Tyson Foods Proposes to Buy Holly Farms,” Wall Street Journal, October 12, 1988, p. A5. For the sour relations between the two men, see Duke Jr. and Christie, “Don Tyson Marshals His Flock,” B12.
[>] “battle helmet”: Ibid.
[>] “This is a very tasty morsel”: Quoted in Karen Blumenthal and Robert L. Rose, “Tyson Foods Wins Holly Farms Fight, Gains Brand, Debt,” Wall Street Journal, June 26, 1989, p. A3.
[>] “[I]nternational customers”: Quoted in Jim Stafford, “Cattle Industry in Oklahoma Faces Challenging Future,” Daily Oklahoman, April 25, 1993; accessed online.
[>] “fuzzy”: For the discussion of signals, see Alan Barkema and Michael L. Cook, “The Changing U.S. Pork Industry: A Dilemma for Public Policy,” Economic Review 78, no. 2 (Second Quarter 1993): 49–65. On quality control as a transaction cost, see V. James Rhodes, “The Industrialization of Hog Production,” Review of Agricultural Economics 17, no. 2 (May 1995): 112–13. Rhodes’s work is crucial for understanding late-twentieth-century changes in hog farming. He conducted much of his research in agricultural economics at the University of Missouri–Columbia in partnership with Glenn Grimes. For decades, they analyzed hog production, and their work provides the most complete set of statistical analyses of changes in the industry.
[>] “I can do well”: Quoted in Bill Fleming, “Opinion Page,” National Hog Farmer 38, no. 5 (May 15, 1993): 13.
[>] “product development”: Barkema and Cook, “Changing U.S. Pork Industry,” 55.
[>] “We want everything”: Quoted in Chris Mayda, “Passion on the Plains: Pigs on the Panhandle” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Southern California, 1998), 157.
[>] “entrepreneurial organization”: Quoted in ibid., 162.
[>] “technical . . . assistance”: “Clause in 1991 Bill Opened Gates for Corporate Hog Farms,” Daily Oklahoman, May 18, 1997; accessed online. For the Tyson operations, see Michael McNutt, “Swing Operation Prompts Watchdog Group—Strict Regulations Sought to Guard Environment,” Daily Oklahoman, March 2, 1994; accessed online. Also see Jim Stafford, “Cattle Industry in Oklahoma Faces Challenging Future,” Daily Oklahoman, April 25, 1993; accessed online.
[>] “Now why do the poor people”: Both quoted in Mayda, “Passion on the Plains,” 176. On the area’s economic woes, see Ann DeFrange, “Rural Revival—State Towns Taking Charge of Their Economic Future,” Daily Oklahoman, October 2, 1994; accessed online; and Michael McNutt, “Guymon’s Economy Booming,” Daily Oklahoman, December 11, 1994; accessed online.
[>] “The trouble is”: Quoted in Mayda, “Passion on the Plains,” 212.
[>] “pigs came”: Quoted in ibid.
[>] “you control”: Quoted in ibid., 195.
[>] “I’m an advocate”: Quoted in ibid., 213.
[>] “a group like the Sierra Club”: Quoted in ibid., 318.
7. The Doubters’ Crusade
[>] “innuendo, implication”: “NPPC to Answer Network Jibes,” National Hog Farmer 26, no. 5 (May 15, 1981): 25.
[>] “100%”: The Nixon quotes are from “The Administration: Looking After the Hotdog,” Time, June 27, 1969; accessed online; and “Mrs. Knauer Says Nixon Opposes Fat Hot Dogs,” New York Times, July 13, 1969, p. 22.
[>] “citizen consumers”: The phrase is from Lizabeth Cohen’s superb A Consumers’ Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America (Vintage Books, 2003). Two other essential works are Gary Cross, An All-Consuming Century: Why Commercialism Won in Modern America (Columbia University Press, 2000); and Meg Jacobs, Pocketbook Politics: Economic Citizenship in Twentieth-Century America (Princeton University Press, 2005).
[>] “private governments”: Quoted in Patrick Anders
on, “Ralph Nader, Crusader; or, The Rise of a Self-Appointed Lobbyist,” New York Times, October 29, 1967, p. SM103.
[>] “into the air”: “Environment v. Man,” Time, September 26, 1960; accessed online.
[>] “a major national problem”: Quoted in Richard D. Lyons, “Salmonella Rise Disturbs Experts,” New York Times, April 9, 1967, p. 47.
[>] “infection that [could] spread”: Quoted in ibid.
[>] “The Consumer Revolt”: See “The U.S.’s Toughest Customer,” Time, December 12, 1969; accessed online.
[>] “Evidently there’s a dearth”: Quoted in Lucia Mouat, “Will the Real Bargain Stand Up?” Christian Science Monitor, February 2, 1970, p. 9.
[>] “Other issues such as Vietnam”: Quoted in Lucia Mouat, “The Consumer Fights Back,” Christian Science Monitor, January 26, 1970, p. 9.
[>] Keys’s ideas: My take on the history of the heart disease epidemic and Keys’s role in it is informed by Gary Taubes, Good Calories, Bad Calories: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom on Diet, Weight Control, and Disease (Alfred A. Knopf, 2007); and Todd Michael Olszewski, “Cholesterol: A Scientific, Medical and Social History, 1908–1962” (Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University, 2008). During World War II, Keys helped develop the K-rations fed to troops and conducted an important study of the impact of starvation on human physiology.