Wisconsin, 1966: An elderly woman gets into her car in Sheboygan for the 100-mile trip south on Highway 41. She stops just across the Illinois border at a gas station, where she hands a wad of cash to the attendant. She puts a large brown box into the trunk. On the way home, she drives slowly and carefully, worried that she might be pulled over. She is smuggling notorious contraband: yellow oleomargarine, a butter substitute outlawed for more than 70 years in America’s Dairyland.
On this episode of Criminal, the invention, criminalization and redemption of “the demon spread.”
role: Historian outlet: Criminal publication date: June 2024 category:Food