Herbert Hoover vaulted to what may have been the most powerful position in the world in 1914 when he traded an extremely lucrative career as a mine operator for a career in public service. World War I  brought Europe to its knees by decimating its food production and distribution infrastructure. After being invaded by Germany, Belgium was starving. Hoover took on the chairmanship of the Commission for Relief in Belgium. He managed the distribution of millions of tons of food to millions of people. It took a mammoth organization -- the CRB had its own navy, factories, mills, and railroads. Moreover, Hoover assumed a mantle of diplomacy, shuttling across the North Sea from London to convince the German government to allow food supplies through enemy lines. All this was just his first act on the stage of food history.

When the U.S. entered the war in 1917, President Woodrow Wilson acquiesced to Hoover's request to be put in charge of managing the U.S. food system during the war. Amazing that one man believed he could do this job; even more amazing that he did. The genius of Hoover's U.S. Food Administration lay not in the heavy-handed price and production controls he instituted, but in the powerful propaganda machine that made his policies seem like democratic principles. He managed to make USFA goals seem like demands that burbled up to leaders from rank-and-file patriotic citizens.

Everywhere, Americans were persuaded that "Food Will Win the War." And one of the most potent weapons in the food arsenal was avoiding Food Waste.

Women and children were the first responders marshaling and conserving food resources. They were urged to cultivate victory gardens, to prepare and eat long-keeping produce such as root vegetables. Homemakers canned a winter's worth of vegetables, showcasing their patriotic zeal with gleaming glass Mason jars stuffed with deep-colored preserved food.