I have been reading this book about the history of Milwaukee (my hometown) television. It features a page on Breta Griem. She was a home economist who had a cooking show on WTMJ-TV and wrote about food for the women’s pages of the Milwaukee Journal in the 1940s and 1950s. Griem’s WTMJ show was called “What’s New in the Kitchen” and was part of a block of daytime shows that were aimed at women and children beginning in 1949. Her show lasted 13 years and led to numerous awards. Here is a passage (pg 60) about Griem’s unscripted, live show:“I remember we had a kitchen program – as almost every…

I came across this interesting blog post about women’s page food editor Jeanne Voltz. The blogger wrote:“I first became aware of Jeanne Voltz when she was a food editor of the Los Angeles Times in the 1960s, when we first moved to California. The food section of the Los Angeles Times was, in my estimation, unequaled in the 1960s-1970s. (I’ve been vocal in my disappointment with the current food sections of the two local newspapers, today. They’ve gone way too high brow for my taste. I find a lot more interesting recipes to clip from the food sections that my penpals send to me from various other parts of the…

I came across this interesting blog post about women’s page food editor Jeanne Voltz. The blogger wrote:“I first became aware of Jeanne Voltz when she was a food editor of the Los Angeles Times in the 1960s, when we first moved to California. The food section of the Los Angeles Times was, in my estimation, unequaled in the 1960s-1970s. (I’ve been vocal in my disappointment with the current food sections of the two local newspapers, today. They’ve gone way too high brow for my taste. I find a lot more interesting recipes to clip from the food sections that my penpals send to me from various other parts of the…

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…