Over Spilt Milk: The Fight for Fair Price & Fair Profit in Depression Era New York
The First Art Newspaper on the Net    Established in 1996 Saturday, December 21, 2024


Over Spilt Milk: The Fight for Fair Price & Fair Profit in Depression Era New York



NEW YORK.- The history of the Consumer-Farmer Milk Cooperative officially started on a damp November Sunday in Foley Square, Manhattan with a Holstein cow, a farmer, and 150 resolute women. It was chilly that day in 1937 – 35 degrees to be exact – and the forecast for freezing rain threatened plans to protest recent milk price increases. The group stood in eyeshot of City Hall, where, had the sun been shining, 4,000 strong would have continued onward to present the petition of the League of Mothers Clubs of the United Neighborhood Houses to New York City’s Mayor Fiorello La Guardia. Mr. E. Claude Jones officiated the gathering of shivering, diminished numbers from the back of his truck under a sign that read: “I have signed up with Dairy Farmer’s Union – “Bossy”. I am a union cow, my milk is for babies, not for the milk trust.”

The NY Food Museum’s newest exhibition Over Spilt Milk: The Fight For Fair Price and Fair Profit in Depression-Era New York will open at The City Reliquary Museum and Civic Organization, 370 Metropolitan Ave., Brooklyn, on January 30, 2009. The exhibition tells the story of New York’s Consumer-Farmer Milk Cooperative, a tale of the power of solidarity and consumer activism.

The show will feature documents and artifacts from the 1930s, when immigrant Meyer Parodneck and a handful of anti-poverty activists founded the Consumer-Farmer Milk Cooperative to ensure farmers received a fair price, and consumers paid a fair price, for milk. The Co-op played a pivotal role opening the market controlled by milk distribution giants. With their own processing plants and distribution stations, the Consumer-Farmer Co-op sold milk to consumers at the lowest possible price, and paid farmers the highest possible return, for nearly fifty years.

Overcoming a mountain of obstacles, this organization made a difference to hundreds of struggling farmers and to the children of low-income New Yorkers. The exhibition includes period Co-op newsletters and advertising campaigns, vintage paper milk containers, and cooperative movement propaganda. Pivotal moments in the Co-op’s story are represented in miniature dioramas.

The City Reliquary is a new partner for the NY Food Museum, and Director Nancy Ralph relates “We’re excited to work with the Reliquary, whose work is so innovative and appealing.” Parodneck was himself a far-sighted innovator (a precursor of community supported agriculture and food cooperatives) and inventor (the paper milk carton), as well as a compassionate, open-minded and tireless advocate. The exhibition gives an overview to the national and state-wide economic struggles of tenants and farmers in the 1930s and their efforts to organize and gain control over their lives. Curator Hi’ilei Dye comments, “As contemporary issues concerning affordable food sources becomes increasingly visible, this story provides a compelling model for self-help.”

Hi’ilei Dye, a Master’s Degree candidate at Bard Graduate Center is researching and curating the show under the supervision of NY Food Museum Board Member and Director of the CUNY Gotham Center for New York City History, Suzanne Wasserman. To see all online exhibitions, find out times and dates for the launch party, and for more information, visit www.nyfoodmuseum.org. Open Hours for The City Reliquary are 12-6pm, Saturday and Sunday. For more information about The City Reliquary, visit http://www.cityreliquary.org.










Today's News

January 16, 2009

Sotheby's To Sell Rediscovered Masterwork By Lucio Fontana - Concetto spaziale, 1961

Experience Christo and Jeanne-Claude: Projects at the Asheville Art Museum

Artists Making Photographs Opens Today at the Whitney Museum of American Art

Czech-Born Architect Jan Kaplicky, Dies Just Hours After Daughter Is Born

Bookmarks - Worlds of Knowledge from Cuneiform to YouTube

Monumental New Work From James Turrell Unveiled at Phoenix Art Museum

Portland Museum of Art Announces New Director - Mark Bessire

Antonio Riello - B.SQUARE! Opens at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art

Kunstmuseum Basel Presents Today David - How Do You Love Dzzzzt by Mammy?

Cyprien Gaillard - Pruitt-Igoe Falls Opens at Kunsthalle Fridericianum in Kassel

Goshka Macuga - I Am Become Death Opens at Kunsthalle Basel

Paper Exhibition Opens at Artists Space in New York

From Kabul to Kandahar: 1833-1933 at The Royal Geographic Society

The World of Madelon Vriesendorp - Paintings, Postcards, Objects, Games, 1967 - today Opens

Ephemerality Opens at The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education

Rosalyn Engelmann - Dry Tears at National Arts Club

Over Spilt Milk: The Fight for Fair Price & Fair Profit in Depression Era New York

Safle Graduate Award 2009 Announced in Cardiff




Museums, Exhibits, Artists, Milestones, Digital Art, Architecture, Photography,
Photographers, Special Photos, Special Reports, Featured Stories, Auctions, Art Fairs,
Anecdotes, Art Quiz, Education, Mythology, 3D Images, Last Week, .

 



Founder:
Ignacio Villarreal
(1941 - 2019)
Editor & Publisher: Jose Villarreal
(52 8110667640)

Art Director: Juan José Sepúlveda Ramírez
Writer: Ofelia Zurbia Betancourt

Royalville Communications, Inc
produces:

ignaciovillarreal.org juncodelavega.com facundocabral-elfinal.org
Founder's Site. Hommage
to a Mexican poet.
Hommage
       

The First Art Newspaper on the Net. The Best Versions Of Ave Maria Song Junco de la Vega Site Ignacio Villarreal Site
Tell a Friend
Dear User, please complete the form below in order to recommend the Artdaily newsletter to someone you know.
Please complete all fields marked *.
Sending Mail
Sending Successful