Mr. MOORE. Have you any suggestions to make as to any possible compromise by which corn flour might go on as a food product and work out its own destiny separate and apart from wheat flour? Mr. SPARKS. I have not, Mr. Congressman; but along that line exactly I would like to read an advertisement that I cut from the Washington Post of February 4this morning-and offer it in evidence. It is rather a conspicuous advertisement, and reads as follows: We are proud of the quality of Swift's oleomargarine.

Then comes a picture of the package, which I will not attempt to read.

That is why we put it up in plainly printed cartons. Buy it for what it is, a wholesome, economical food product, made by Swift & Co., Chicago, U. S. A. And here they are advertising oleomargarine.

Mr. MOORE. As oleomargarine?

Mr. SPARKS. As oleomargarine. They are not advertising it as butterine.

Mr. MOORE. It has been pointed out a number of times that the comparison is not apt, because oleomargarine is necessarily sold as such. If it is sold as butter it would be a clear masquerade for which the seller would be liable to arrest.

Mr. FORDNEY. It was sold as butter before the tax was put on it. Mr. MOORE. It is occasionally sold as butter now in all of the large cities. In consequence of such abuses arrests have been made and are frequently made. The courts have plenty of business of that kind, but the law apparently is effective as distinguishing between oleomargarine and butter.

Your contention here is that so long as the words "mixed flour " are used there is likely to be a deception of the public if the practice of the mingling of the two kinds of flour-corn and wheat flourcontinues?

Mr. SPARKS. I believe a part of the public would buy one thing when they thought they were getting something else.

Mr. MOORE. The public is not sufficiently discriminating. The housewife who sometimes has trouble enough to get the money to buy a 5-cent loaf does not always distinguish between the loaf made from wheat bread and a loaf made from ingredients that are not wholly wheat?

Mr. SPARKS. I think she would find out eventually what she got. Mr. MOORE. You say that prior to the act of 1898 much of this kind of mixture was sold in the Southern States?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. MOORE. Where the people were not as careful, maybe, in tracing out the law on the subject as in other sections. Is that the fact? Mr. SPARKS. That is a fact; yes.

Mr. MOORE. When mineraline and these other foreign substances were used the sale was quite extensive down that way, was it not?

Mr. SPARKS. I understand that some mixtures were made of mineraline about that time, but I have no definite knowledge on that point.

Mr. MOORE. You make the point that the average purchaser would have no information as to the contents of the bread, although the man who mixed the flour would necessarily know?

Mr. SPARKS. I understand that, according to the law, the mark would not follow the bread.

Mr. MOORE. And you see no twilight zone, as it were, between the corn man and the wheat man on this proposition?

Mr. SPARKS. They get along all right by themselves. Why not? They ought to. We try to..

Mr. MOORE. Of course, the answer to that is that the corn flour will not make bread of itself and the wheat flour does.

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir. They are trying to get in under us, as some of our witnesses have testified, in my opinion.

Mr. CASEY. You stated that you are opposed to this mixed flour because it would be sailing under a false name, because corn flour would be mixed with wheat flour? Is that what I understand?

Mr. SPARKS. I did not so mean it. I mean it will open up the way for deception.

Mr. CASEY. You have no objection, then, to the words "mixed flour" being put on the container if corn and wheat are mixed together?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes; I object to that.

Mr. CASEY. For what reason?

Mr. SPARKS. Well, I don't think it is fair to wheat flour.

Mr. CASEY. You don't?

Mr. SPARKS. No.

Mr. CASEY. Is it fair for you to sell wheat flour with chemical mixtures in it under the name of flour-rising flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. CASEY. Will you kindly explain to us why it is?

Mr. SPARKS. We specify that it is self-rising. The pure food and drugs act-I mean the department, I understand, have ruled that a flour designated "self-rising" may have those ingredients in it that make it self-rising without any other specification.

Mr. CASEY. Does your container give the information to the public that it contains wheat flour and chemicals?

Mr. SPARKS. It says that it is self-rising flour.

Mr. CASEY. But is it not flour masquerading under a false name when it is masquerading as flour, when it is wheat flour and chemicals together?

Mr. SPARKS. We do not think so, sir.

Mr. CASEY. Then would you say that corn flour mixed with wheat flour would be masquerading under a false name?

Mr. SPARKS. I stated my objection to it in just a little bit different idea. I said that it would open the way for deception and fraud, and I believe it would.

Mr. CASEY. If I have understood this testimony at all, I have understood the millers to be protesting against the word "flour" being used in connection with a mixture of any kind other than wheat flour. Now, you tell us that you make a rising flour composed of wheat flour and chemicals and you sell that as a flour. Mr. SPARKS. Self-rising flour.

Mr. CASEY. Self-rising flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes.

Mr. CASEY. But you do not give the public, on the container, the information that it is composed of wheat and chemicals.

Mr. SPARKS. Excepting that the words "self-rising" so indicate. It is all sold as self-rising flour.

Mr. CASEY. How many people in this world know what is put into flour to make it self-rising?

Mr. SPARKS. All of those who use it.

Mr. CASEY. The ordinary housewife knows it has chemicals in it? Mr. SPARKS. Yes. Otherwise it would not rise.

Mr. SLOAN. Do they know what those chemicals are?

Mr. SPARKS. I believe not.

Mr. SLOAN. It is a secret, is it not?

Mr. SPARKS. No, sir.

Mr. SLOAN. Do you publish it? What are the chemicals that enter into it?

Mr. SPARKS. I have mentioned them.

Mr. SLOAN. Oh, phosphate, soda, and salt?

Mr. SPARKS. The salt is added. It is a combination of phosphate and soda that does the rising under chemical reaction when the water is added.

Mr. FORDNEY. Do you mix with wheat flour, what you call selfrising flour, anything except the material that takes the place of yeast or baking powder?

Mr. SPARKS. We do not. The percentage of those added ingredients, in our case, is about 6 per cent.

Mr. SLOAN. Six per cent?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir; about 94 per cent flour and 6 per cent total of those chemicals.

Mr. FORDNEY. It is an article purchased by the housewife for quick use, where she can use it to bake a pan of biscuits or a batch of bread without preparing yeast, or baking powder, or sour milk, and saleratus?

Mr. SPARKS. We claim they can work it up quicker, and they evidently think so, because they buy it.

Mr. FORDNEY. All they have got to do is to mix it up with water or milk and put it in the oven, and it will raise itself?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. FORDNEY. The rising qualities are in that; you put water in and nothing else?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes.

Mr. MOORE. How is it sold at retail? In packages?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir; in packages that we put up.

Mr. MOORE. Are there any directions for using it on the package? Mr. SPARKS. Usually.

Mr. MOORE. The housewife knows, then, how to use it?

Mr. SPARKS. I believe all of our brands have the directions on the reverse side of the sack.

Mr. MOORE. They are such instructions to the user as we find on starch or pancake flour, and the housewife knows substantially what it is?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes.

Mr. ROGERS. Those chemicals referred to are the constituents of ordinary baking powder, are they not?

Mr. SPARKS. I would not like to testify to that. I do not know what ordinary baking powder is.

Mr. CONRY. You say that that proportion is 94 per cent of flour and 6 per cent of chemicals. Do those chemicals contain gluten? Mr. SPARKS. I do not know, sir.

Mr. CONRY. Do they contain any of those ingredients that are necessary to build up the tissues of the body?

Mr. SPARKS. I have no idea.

Mr. CONRY. Do you know anything about the gluten composition of corn?

Mr. SPARKS. No, sir.

Mr. CONRY. Or the quantity it contains as compared with wheat flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Of corn or corn products?

Mr. CONRY. Corn flour.

Mr. SPARKS. I understand the gluten is very limited.

Mr. CONRY. In corn?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. CONRY. How much gluten is there in a barrel of flour, wheat flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Dry gluten runs about 10 per cent or a little less. Mr. CONRY. What is that?

Mr. SPARKS. Ten per cent of dry gluten in flour; may be a little less or a little more.

Mr. CONRY. In wheat flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. CONRY. How much gluten in corn flour?

Mr. SPARKS. I do not know.

Mr. CONRY. Is there any?

Mr. SPARKS. I presume so.

Mr. CONRY. Well, do you think, then, that the amount of chemical that you insert in the self-rising flour decreases the amount of gluten in the combination so as to make it equal to the combination produced by mixing wheat flour with corn flour?

Mr. SPARKS. No, sir.

Mr. CONRY. You think there is more gluten in yours than in mixed. flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. FORDNEY. If you did not mix the material with your selfrising flour to make it rise, the housewife would have to mix it in order to get it to rise, wouldn't she?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. FORDNEY. Mix something with it to make it rise?

Mr. SPARKS. Yes, sir.

Mr. FORDNEY. Do the materials which you mix reduce the tissuebuilding qualities any more than baking powder?

Mr. SPARKS. No, sir.

Mr. LIND. Might that flour, self-rising flour, be used with yeast? Mr. SPARKS. No, sir; it could not.

Mr. LIND. It could not be used for bread making either, could it? Mr. SPARKS. No, sir.

Mr. FORDNEY. Is it not chiefly used for griddle cakes or biscuits? Mr. SPARKS. For biscuits in the South, sir.

Mr. RAINEY. You make patent flour?

Mr. SPARKS. We make what is called patent flour: yes.

Mr. RAINEY. What is it?

Mr. SPARKS. It is the better part of the flour-the better part of the total.

Mr. RAINEY. What is the process of making it? How do you distinguish it from other flours?

Mr. SPARKS. In a flour mill the product comes from a great many various machines 10, 15, or 20-I dare say, and the practical miller selects those that he thinks are the best, and we find that those can be sold at a little bit higher price than some of the other flour. We consider that they are better, if we can get a little more money for them.

Mr. SLOAN. Then your mixture is really an advanced stage of food production, instead of being flour?

Mr. SPARKS. Our mixture of self-rising flour?

Mr. SLOAN. Yes.

Mr. SPARKS. We merely add something there. That is not what I had in mind, but it really is advanced.

Mr. SLOAN. Is not that what it amounts to, it is really an advanced stage of food making?

Mr. SPARKS. I had not thought of that, but I agree that it is correct. We carry the process a little further.

Mr. RAINEY. How many grades do you make besides the patent? Mr. SPARKS. I think my brothers recently remarked that we sold 27 or 28 different grades of flour.

Mr. RAINEY. How do you indicate the grades so that the purchaser knows whether he is getting the first or twenty-seventh grade? Mr. SPARKS. We have brands for them all.

Mr. RAINEY. Do they run from 1 to 27?

Mr. SPARKS. I think he told me we had 27 grades.

Mr. RAINEY. Do you indicate on your lowest grade of flour that it is your twenty-seventh grade?

Mr. SPARKS. We do not look at that that way. We make three different varieties. We make spring-wheat flour, hard-wheat flour, and soft-wheat flour. I do not say that one of those is worth more than the other.

Mr. RAINEY. With reference to the prices that you charge for your flours, how many grades do you have?

Mr. SPARKS. We have innumerable prices. I do not say that we have any more or less grades than I mentioned before. We have a great many, and a great many different prices.

Mr. RAINEY. What is the name of your best grade?

Mr. SPARKS. Is is soft-wheat flour that we sell under the brand of "Ring Leader."

Mr. RAINEY. Is that your patent flour?

Mr. SPARKS. We call it a patent.

Mr. RAINEY. What is your next best grade?

Mr. SPARKS. We have a soft-wheat flour, a little lower than that, that we call "The Traveling Salesman."

Mr. RAINEY. Is that a patent flour?

Mr. SPARKS. We do not so call it.

Mr. RAINEY. What is the difference between that flour and the flour you call patent flour?

Mr. SPARKS. "Traveling Salesman" is the full mill run; it is all of the flour.