More on the history of food journalism
I am currently reading the book, Appetite City which is a culinary history of New York City. Included in the book is the story of Craig Claiborne – the longtime food editor and critic at the New York Times beginning in the 1950s. (He took over from Jane Nickerson who wrote about food news in rationing and then post-World War II era.) This is the author’s take:
“From scratch, Claiborne created serious newspaper food journalism and elevated food to the status of news. This innovation coincided with big changes in consumer journalism. Editors gradually woke up to the fact that readers cared just as much about soft subjects like home design, fashion and gardening – the whole gamut of lifestyle topics – as they did about international affairs and congressional legislation.” (pg 306)
This certainly doesn’t fit into the traditional histories of journalism and co-opts the role of women’s pages where that soft news was placed. I would also argue that the food sections had news value prior to Claiborne’s time at the NYT – particularly during World War II when rationing was a real problem for feeding families.
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