Jim Kershner’s this day in history

From our archives, 100 years ago

Dr. Charles E. North, who called himself a “milk missionary,” told Spokane authorities “radical action” was necessary to improve dairy sanitation in the area.

North, from New York, said the city’s smaller dairies should be compelled to pasteurize their milk and bottle it. They should not be allowed to sell it in bulk as a raw product.

“I was somewhat surprised to find that there are dairies in this city selling milk from open cans,” he said. “Let no one be ashamed of the word pasteurized on his milk bottles. It is a badge of honor.”

Raw milk was the cause of much infant mortality, he said. The death rate had been much reduced in New York after pure-milk laws went into effect.

North said small dairies in the Spokane city limits had other unsanitary effects.

“Undoubtedly, the great number of flies you have in Spokane find their breeding places in the small dairies located close in,” he said. “Many cities have already abolished cows.”

With that exception, North found sanitary conditions excellent in Spokane.

“Spokane is a banner city in the matter of death rates,” he said. “You have one of the lowest typhoid death rates and one of the lowest infant mortality death rates in the United States.”