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Wickard and his aides, Milo Perkins, short, tweedy, slit-eyed ex-gunny-sack manufacturer from Texas, and handsome, iron-grey Rudolph M. ("Spike") Evans, AAAdministrator, want to transform the useless miles of wheat and cotton into the things the world desperately needs. By tying the U.S. farmer tightly into the international war economy, they expect to succeed—and succeed not too gradually, either.
The world needs vitamins and fats. The world can take all the pork and beef, milk, eggs, cheese, butter, beans, tomatoes the U.S. can grow. Wickard and Perkins and Evans long ago saw the need coming; in many a speech they have boasted that the tragedy of underestimation (aluminum, transportation, critical materials), which has dealt the defense program almost mortal blows, has not happened and will not happen in U.S. agriculture. Last autumn Wickard urged U.S. farmers not to kill sows, this spring took the lid off hogs. Now the sky is the limit. Hog production may be up as high as 5% this autumn; 1942's pig crop will be the biggest ever. Said Spike Evans: "One boar can spread himself a lot."
Britain wants now and from now on: pork (and lard), eggs, milk, cheese, canned tomatoes and dried beans, dried fruits and concentrates of any kind. The Department began buying food for Britain even before the Lend-Lease Bill was signed, spent $75,000,000 through the Sur plus Marketing Administration by June 30. The rate of expenditure is climbing like a morning-glory in a hot dawn. Unofficial purchase figures for Britain since March 15: 153,019.615 lb. of lard; 49,727,118 lb. of canned pork; 88,318,500 lb. of cured and frozen pork; 70,004,500 yd. of sausage; 37,704,674 lb. of cheese; 2,766,300 cases of evaporated milk; 12,000,000 lb. of dry skim milk; 1,609,050 lb. of dried eggs; 21,766.690 lb. of frozen eggs; 1.354,661 cases of canned tomatoes; 172,368,400 lb. of dry beans. Secret food dumps have been established along the Atlantic seaboard; out of the caches food is being shipped steadily to British ports. In the next twelve months, rough estimates show the British will want from four to five times as much—$500.000,000 is not a bad guess at the total British purchases of U.S. food by July 1942.
Forclble Feedings. At first, Wickard and his aides almost had to shove U.S. food down the throats of the unimaginative Britons in charge of food buying. Asked for requests, the Britons (usually called "those pigheaded Britishers" in Washington) politely asked for cotton and wheat, which they did not need. Impatient, the President and Wickard dispatched U.S. experts to England. Then things began to straighten out. But for many weeks cooperation was poor to the point of stupidity. Typical conversation —U.S. official: "How would you like a couple of boatloads of beans?" British official: "We would like them very much, thank you."
But by last week two cooperative Britons, alert and intelligent, lanky Robert H. Brand, shrewd international troubleshooter, and chinless, affable Maurice Hutton, were in the saddle and riding the U.S. kitchen range. With Wickard, Perkins, Evans, and dark, silent, shrewd, young Leslie A. Wheeler (Harry Hopkins' man), they make up the Anglo-American Food Committee, which meets daily in Wickard's office.