Your Tax Dollars At Work--Mulligan Stew!!

Ready to be entertained while you learn?

Let's sing the theme song:

OK, it's not quite Schoolhouse Rock...but wait--there's more music!

Or how about...

Geez, this is fairly dire stuff, isn't it...

OK, one more...

For those too young to remember (or those lucky enough to have never been exposed), Mulligan Stew was a TV show produced by 4-H (in the US, 4-H is run by the USDA) and Michigan State University (Thanks, Spartans!). It was meant to promote good nutrition via music, and was actually syndicated on real TV (even though there were only 6 episodes...).

But most kids were exposed to this is schools, as the USDA gave them the episodes to show the little tykes, along with this tie in comic book!

Basically, it was one strange adult who hauled 5 youngsters around solving problems caused by poor diet and bad nutrition. They regularly broke into song and dance...hence all those lyrics.

But in the comic book? They regularly broke into puzzles and charts!!

See, that "4-4-3-2" they're always raving about is how many servings from each food group you're supposed to have each day:

Yes, yes, of course, our conception of what is actually good for us has changed about 28 times since this was printed. But let's not get too superior with all our hindsight, as we're only about 2 weeks from a study telling us that a diet of Captain Crunch with Crunchberries will extend our lives (only to be refuted 4 months later by a study that says the exact opposite). Plus, Mulligan Stew was quite firm against fad diets and the like, a stance that many would do well to remember 40 years later.

So rather than food pyramids or trapezoids or whatever they're pushing these days, let's just revel in song, shall we?

Yay!! And once again, thank you to:

As if we needed more reason to hate Michigan State...

Mulligan Stew was published in 1974