“Our Mutual Friend, 1885. This cartoon published on the cover of the popular magazine Puck shows that the use of dangerous additives in candy was widespread. Pictured are a doctor and a sexton (the caretaker of a church and its graveyard) greeting their ‘mutual friend,’ a stick of candy.” Notice that all the colors in the candy stick are labeled with the different chemicals used to color it.
From “What’s Cooking Uncle Sam?” the catalogue for an exhibit on at the National Archives about how the government affects what we eat.
