Food Studies Presentation: Ohio Food Editor History
I was happy to get an acceptance for presentation about Ohio food editors for the 2020 Food Studies Conference.
The Golden Era of Newspaper Food Journalism
Questions about cooking? Lost a cherished recipe? Planning a holiday menu? For decades, it was the newspaper food editor who answered these questions from readers. The newspaper food editors were important to their communities as they wrote about food trends, popular recipes, and local restaurants. The readers responded with calls and letters to the food section. Prior to the early 1970, these popular editors were almost always female and typically had a background in journalism and home economics. Food sections began in the women’s pages of newspapers. Newspapers had a direct connection to the community that a national magazine or cooking show does not have. Food editors will largely write about local stores, local restaurants, and local cooks. The story of the newspaper food sections and the women who edited the sections is important to understanding the history of American food and home cooks in the post-World War II years. The impact of the high cost of food and the dangers of contaminated food were documented in the food section. The sections also included the stories of home cooks—several newspapers had weekly columns that profiled local women, often in their kitchens. This article tells the story of three Ohio food editors from the women’s page era: Janet Beighle French, Polly Paffilas, and Phyllis Tamor. It is based on reviews of their food sections and interviews they gave.
