Over sixty percent of all infectious human diseases, including tuberculosis, influenza, cholera, and hundreds more, are shared with other vertebrate animals. Arresting Contagion "tells the story of how early efforts to combat livestock infections turned the United States from a disease-prone nation into a world leader in controlling communicable diseases. Alan Olmstead and Paul Rhode show that many innovations devised in the fight against animal diseases, ranging from border control and food inspection to drug regulations and the creation of federal research labs, provided the foundation for modern food safety programs and remain at the heart of U.S. public health policy.

America s first concerted effort to control livestock diseases dates to the founding of the Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) in 1884. Because the BAI represented a milestone in federal regulation of commerce and industry, the agency encountered major jurisdictional and constitutional obstacles. Nevertheless, it proved effective in halting the spread of diseases, counting among its early breakthroughs the discovery of Salmonella "and advances in the understanding of vector-borne diseases.

By the 1940s, government policies had eliminated several major animal diseases, saving hundreds of thousands of lives and establishing a model for eradication that would be used around the world. Although scientific advances played a key role, government interventions did as well. Today, a dominant economic ideology frowns on government regulation of the economy, but the authors argue that in this case it was an essential force for good."

These institutions were founded ostensibly for philanthropic purposes--to encourage and reward thrift on the part of society's lower classes. For purposes of analysis, Olmstead formulates an alternative hypothesis. Men organized mutuals for the same reason that impelled their other business ventures--the hope of profit. The author focuses on the internal operations of several banks and the important role they played in financing antebellum development.
A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

This book demonstrates that American agricultural development was far more dynamic than generally portrayed. In the two centuries before World War II, a stream of biological innovations revolutionized the crop and livestock sectors, increasing both land and labor productivity. Biological innovations were essential for the movement of agriculture onto new lands with more extreme climates, for maintaining production in the face of evolving threats from pests, and for the creation of the modern livestock sector. These innovations established the foundation for the subsequent Green and Genetic Revolutions. The book challenges the misconceptions that, before the advent of hybrid corn, American farmers single-mindedly invested in labor-saving mechanical technologies and that biological technologies were static.

Long the standard source for quantitative indicators of American history, a new edition of Historical Statistics of the United States is something that reference librarians, historians, and social scientists have long awaited. Not since the Bicentennial Edition was published in 1975 has new data and material been available. Available online for the first time, this comprehensive and thoroughly revised edition reflects thirty years of information and new scholarship, providing a comprehensive compendium of statistics from over 1,000 sources, recording every aspect of the history of the United States. The electronic edition has been designed to give users a variety of means to search and navigate the vast amount of data available. Users will be able to graph individual tables or to combine data from different tables into 'custom tables' and to download tables for use in spreadsheets and other applications. Visit www.cambridge.org/historicalstats for further information and to discover more