SOSLAND PUBLISHING years " Pullquote - ATTRIBUTION PLAYIN' IT SAFE Legislation, science and culture have all been variables in the evolution of food and worker safety BY BOB SIMS | bsims@sosland.com IN The evolution of food safety in the United States has moved forward as the result of significant events in the processing industry. 1905, an event outside the meat processing industry forever changed its trajectory. That year marked the first publication of Upton Sinclair's now classic novel, " The Jungle. " The work of fiction depicted the unsavory conditions of the meat packing industry in the United States. Sinclair spent seven weeks working in the packing houses of Chicago to gather experiences for the book. Those experiences gave the author the details necessary to write a book that brought change to an entire industry through legislation, specifically the passing of the Meat Inspection Act of 1906. 16 MEAT+POULTRY | 07.21 | www.meatpoultry.com This event and others marked monumental shifts throughout the evolution of food safety in the meat packing industry. They set successive changes in motion and pushed food safety and consumer well-being to the top of the priority list for meat processors in the United States. EARLY ACTS President Theodore Roosevelt read " The Jungle " and sent labor commissioner Charles P. Neill and social worker James Bronson Reynolds to Chicago, and through their NeillReynolds Report, the two confirmed the details Library of Congress Public Domainhttp://www.meatpoultry.com