100 YEARS AGO

@BY Credit_NoName:By Kevin Gilbert

Monday, Oct. 14, 1918. Drastic new wartime food conservation rules taking effect this month mean that “simplified meals and simplified service will be the rule for all who eat out during the coming season,” The Saratogian reports.

The new rules are announced today by Saratoga County food administrator L. A. Grippin. They reflect federal policy, the government having committed to shipping 17,500,000 tons of food to its European allies this year.

In what is characterized as “in many particulars a more strict program than last year,” restaurants and other public eating places are barred from serving more than one meat, more than a half-ounce of butter, or more than a half-ounce of American or cheddar cheese at any meal.

Public eating places are barred from serving bacon or toast as a garniture. They are not to serve bread until after the first course of the meal, nor are they to place sugar bowls on tables or lunch counters. They may not serve “double cream” or any cream with more than 20% butter fat.”

How food is served is also subject to regulation. “Reduction of the use of china, linen and silver in order to effect a saving of labor is advocated,” Grippin explains, “It is requested that food be served, wherever possible, on the plate or dish from which it is to be eaten, meat and vegetables being brought in on one dish and side dishes eliminated.” Menus should also be simplified, with fewer selections offered, in order to save paper for the war effort.

“We feel certain that the great army of those who eat in public eating places will respond as loyally to these new and more rigid regulations as they have to the simpler ones of the past,” Grippin adds.

Increased Pay For Employees of City

The Saratoga Springs city council votes tonight to increase the salaries of policemen, firemen and water works employees, but balks at giving the deputy public safety commissioner a raise.

Responding to a petition from public safety workers and public safety commissioner William B. Milliman, who is absent tonight, the council agrees to raise patrolmen’s salaries from $1,080 to $1,200 a year, while the base salary for full-time firemen will go up from $1,020 to $1,200 a year.

The petitioners also asked that Commissioner Milliman’s deputy, who isn’t named in The Saratogian’s story, have his salary increased from $1,400 to $1,600 a year. Finance commissioner John A. T. Schwarte objects, arguing that the deputy is a council appointee rather than a department employee. In Milliman’s absence, the council postpones action on the deputy’s raise until the commissioner can be consulted.