iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Absolutely loving this book by the brilliant Jeff Marlow. @bucas.bsky.social

Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

As the FDA announcement will tell you, we put powdered milk in an astonishing range of processed foods, including flavored potato chips, Ghirardelli cocoa, William-Sonoma popcorn seasoning, Fisher nuts, pork rinds, snack mixes. Croutons and the cheese bread were added later. 4/12

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 18/01/2026

Kind of getting a kick out of this North Carolina snow! It’s 36 degrees F so I am not expecting it to stick:)

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

Walking to get the mail in North Carolina is a little different than in Boston:)

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 20/12/2025

The North Carolina Tiger Rescue sanctuary in Pittsboro is really impressive.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 26/09/2025

So...this week I was inducted into the Georgia Writer's Hall of Fame. I love that my home state of Georgia honors writers in this way. And I love that this year, when coverage of everything from food safety to vaccines to climate change matters so much, they picked a science writer!

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 19/09/2025

This lamp maker is frustrating my current need to throw things in a fire.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 21/08/2025

I loved @maryroach.bsky.social's new book, Replaceable You, so much. Which you will see in this jacket quote from me. Loved doing that too!

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 23/05/2025

In case you wondered, the book event I am actually doing is with the wonderful @mariahblake.bsky.social ! In Cambridge, on Tuesday. Without music but a very good conversation indeed.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 22/05/2025

In case you are in Cambridge, MA next week, I'll be joining Mariah Carey in a conversation about her excellent and important book, They Poisoned the World.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Newspapers around the country warned citizens that they were eating poisonous food on a daily basis. Here is a cartoon about poisonous milk from the great Thomas Nast.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Things were so bad that magazines started recommending that the public safety test food before eating as the government refused to set safety standards. Here is cover from the satiric magazine, Puck.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Here's an 1890's ad for Coca-Cola, boasting about it's cocaine content. (The company removed cocaine about 1902 under pressure from the state of Georgia).

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Cocaine even went into medicines for children. www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/p...

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

I'm barely touching the surface of the problem. But I want to also note the craziness of unregulated drugs at the time. Anyone could throw an opioid narcotic into, well, anything. Vin Mariani, as an example, was cocaine-laced wine. americanhistory.si.edu/collections/...

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Charred bone in ground coffee, ground coconut shells in pepper, brick dust in cinnamon, strawberry jams made of red-dyed corn syrup and grass seeds, with never a trace of actual fruit trace of fruit. Gypsum and other fillers were mixed into flour. www.tastingtable.com/1080592/the-...

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Wiley and his chemists went on to look at coffee, tea, wine, beer, spices, canned vegetables, meats and more. In addition to toxic substances, they found an astonishing amount of fraud.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

It was legal to color food green with arsenic or red with lead. Cheddar cheese, for instance, was often deepened to a richer orange with the use of red lead. gizmodo.com/weirdest-and...

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

But the British passed their first serious food safety law in 1860. The US, influenced by industry, flatly refused to do so. Therefore, it was legal to use the poisonous compound, formaldehyde, as a dairy preservative. undark.org/2018/10/05/b...

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

His department published a series of investigations that showed just how bad unregulated food and drink were in the US. Of course, this had been known for deaces. Consider the the 1820 publication in London, A Treatise on Foods and Their Adulerations. nyamcenterforhistory.org/2013/05/22/t...

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

I'm writing this as the author of a book, The Poison Squad, on the invention of food safety in the United States. So you I'm talking about the 1906 Meat Inspection Act and the 1906 Food and Drug Law, which laid the foundation for all consumer protection laws that followed in this country.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 18/10/2024

Woods Hole, MA. Always beautiful.

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Deborah Blum @deborahb.bsky.social · 10/06/2024

Milwaukee airport. Should be in all airports.

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