When Ice Cream Was Poisonous
Adulteration, Ptomaines, and Bacteriology in the United States, 1850–1910
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 15024041 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Edward Geist (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2012 |
| Volume | 86 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 333-360 |
| Publication date | 2012-09-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Bulletin of the history of medicine (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-5140 • E-ISSN: 1086-3176 |
| Publisher | Project MUSE (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1353/bhm.2012.0053 |
| PMID | 23241909 |
| OpenAlex | W2062819923 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 9 |
With the increasing popularity of ice cream in the nineteenth century, the incidence of foodborne illness attributed to this dessert exploded. Struggling to understand the causes of the mysterious and sometimes lethal ailment called “ice cream poisoning,” Victorian doctors and scientists advanced theories including toxic vanilla, galvanism in ice cream freezers, and extreme indigestion. In the late 1880s Victor C. Vaughan’s argument that ice cream poisoning could be attributed to the ptomaine “tyrotoxicon” received widespread acceptance. To date historians have neglected the role played by the ptomaine theory of food poisoning in shaping the evolution of both scientific thinking and public health in the late nineteenth century. The case of ice cream poisoning illustrates the emergence, impact, and decline of the ptomaine idea
Ancient history · Argument (complex analysis) · Bacteriology · Biology · Criminology · Ice cream · Political science · Popularity · American History and Culture · Food Science · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · History · Law · Medical History and Innovations · Medicine · Psychology
Cholera, fever and English medicine, 1825-1865.
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Was there a Bacteriological Revolution in late nineteenth-century medicine
Food, Hygiene, and the Laboratory. A Short History of Food Poisoning in Britain, circa 1850-1950
Pure Milk Is Better Than Purified Milk”
The pioneering use of a questionnaire to investigate a food borne disease outbreak in early 20th century Britain
The “Tuberculous Cattle Trust”
An Impossible Undertaking
The Perfect Food and the Filth Disease
| Citations per year | 0.18 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2015 - 2019 (5) |
| Highly cited | No |