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David E. Gumpert
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The Raw Milk Revolution: Behind America's Emerging Battle over Food Rights Paperback – November 6, 2009

by David E. Gumpert (Author), Joel Salatin (Foreword)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 59 ratings
See all formats and editions

Beginning in 2006, the agriculture departments of several large states-with backing from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration-launched a major crackdown on small dairies producing raw milk. Replete with undercover agents, sting operations, surprise raids, questionable test-lab results, mysterious illnesses, propaganda blitzes, and grand jury investigations, the crackdown was designed to disrupt the supply of unpasteurized milk to growing legions of consumers demanding healthier and more flavorful food.

The Raw Milk Revolution takes readers behind the scenes of the government's tough and occasionally brutal intimidation tactics, as seen through the eyes of milk producers, government regulators, scientists, prosecutors, and consumers. It is a disturbing story involving marginally legal police tactics and investigation techniques, with young children used as political pawns in a highly charged atmosphere of fear and retribution.

Are regulators' claims that raw milk poses a public health threat legitimate? That turns out to be a matter of considerable debate. In assessing the threat, The Raw Milk Revolution reveals that the government's campaign, ostensibly designed to protect consumers from pathogens like salmonella, E. coli 0157:H7, and listeria, was based in a number of cases on suspect laboratory findings and illnesses attributed to raw milk that could well have had other causes, including, in some cases, pasteurized milk.

David Gumpert dares to ask whether regulators have the public's interest in mind or the economic interests of dairy conglomerates. He assesses how the government's anti-raw-milk campaign fits into a troublesome pattern of expanding government efforts to sanitize the food supply-even in the face of ever-increasing rates of chronic disease like asthma, diabetes, and allergies. The Raw Milk Revolution provides an unsettling view of the future, in which nutritionally dense foods may be available largely through underground channels.

Previous page
  1. Print length
    288 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Chelsea Green Publishing
  4. Publication date
    November 6, 2009
  5. Dimensions
    6.02 x 0.79 x 9.02 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    1603582193
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1603582193
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This thorough, thought-provoking account of the illicit raw milk trade comes from a veteran health and business journalist who has followed the story on his blog (thecompletepatient.com) since 2006. Elaborating his online posts, Gumpert looks at the industry in Michigan, California, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania, offering detailed accounts of dairy farmers persecuted and prosecuted for dealing in non-pasteurized milk-thought a cure-all by some, a health hazard by others (including the FDA). Dramatic anecdotes and digressions, including federal agents confiscating milk cartons, the rise of commercial feedlots and the story of pasteurization give context and weight to the book's first third. When Gumpert turns his attention to the minutiae of food contamination, however, readers' eyes may glaze over. Testimonials to raw milk's healing properties (for autism, cancer, asthma, allergies, "virility" and more) are reported but aren't vetted; stories of foodborne illness, meanwhile, are truly harrowing, despite Gumpert's assurance that they've never originated in raw milk. Those close to the debate will likely find this a helpful snapshot, but anyone with passing interest should simply check out the highlights on Gumpert's blog.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

"David Gumpert has chronicled the Raw Milk War with insight and humor. He provides an important record of systematic government bias against Nature's perfect food. Must reading for raw milk fans and government officials alike."--Sally Fallon Morell, President, The Weston A. Price Foundation



"David Gumpert has become the official chronicler of the 'raw milk movement' in the United States. The Raw Milk Revolution is a highly readable expose that successfully captures how the controversy over raw milk is at the center of a larger battle between the industrial food system and the local food movement. Gumpert explains how raw milk, more than any other food, threatens proponents of the 'germ theory,' centralized food production, and the 'nanny state.' The Raw Milk Revolution is an extremely important book because it sounds a clear warning that upholding the right to produce and consume raw milk is critical in preserving our food freedoms in general."--Peter Kennedy, President, Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund



"David Gumpert employs his expertise as a professional business writer to dig deep and wide into the exploding raw milk controversy. His compelling analysis of the science, economics, politics and history of 'nature's most perfect food' opens the door to a greater understanding of the major challenges facing our food and agriculture systems today. Anyone concerned with the health of our people, our environment and our democracy should heed his words."--Dean Florez, Majority Leader, California State Senate



"If you want to understand the vocal opposition to food safety laws, you should read Gumpert's book. That's not the only reason to read it though. Even if you have little interest in raw milk, I think this book is a key piece in the puzzle to understanding the backwards priorities in America's food safety system."--Jill Richardson, La Vida Locavore review



"In this fascinating book on raw milk, journalist David Gumpert delves into the messy politics of food safety, which pits government technocrats and prosecutors against farmers, consumers and their advocates. It's a compelling account, one that should be read by any raw milk devotee--and more importantly, by anyone concerned about the broken and arbitrary way the government regulates the food we eat."--Samuel Fromartz, author of Organic Inc: Natural Foods and How They Grew



"The raw milk underground is one of the most contentious battlefields in the revolution to reclaim our food from industrialization, over-processing, and corporate control. In this book, David Gumpert investigates in great detail the health claims of both raw milk advocates and public health officials, as well the legal tactics being employed by government agencies to stop the growing movement to obtain and supply raw milk. His comprehensive analysis effectively deconstructs and illuminates the many complex issues of health, safety, and freedom that are raised by this debate."--Sandor Ellix Katz, author of Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods and The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved: Inside America's Underground Food Movements

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Chelsea Green Publishing; 1st edition (November 6, 2009)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1603582193
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1603582193
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 15.5 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.02 x 0.79 x 9.02 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 59 ratings

About the author

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David E. Gumpert

David E. Gumpert

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David E. Gumpert grew up on the South Side of Chicago, in South Shore and Hyde Park. In the years since graduating the University of Chicago, he has attended Columbia Journalism School and worked as a reporter for The Wall Street Journal and an editor for the Harvard Business Review and Inc. magazine. He has also authored ten nonfiction books on a variety of subjects—from entrepreneurship and small business management to food politics. His most prominent titles include How to Really Create a Successful Business Plan (from Inc. Publishing); How to Really Start Your Own Business (Inc. Publishing); Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Food Rights (Chelsea Green Publishing), and The Raw Milk Answer Book (Lauson Publishing).

He spent ten years in the 1990s and early 2000s researching his family's history during the Holocaust. The result was a book co-authored with his deceased aunt Inge Belier: Inge: A Girl’s Journey Through Nazi Europe (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing).

He spent much of the last half-dozen years going back to his own roots in Chicago to research and write the historical novel, Gouster Girl. While some of it stems from his own experiences growing up in South Shore and Hyde Park, he also conducted significant additional research to complete the book in late 2019.

Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
59 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

elderberryjam
5.0 out of 5 stars A Researching Reporter's Point of View
Reviewed in the United States on October 27, 2009
Verified Purchase
This book grew out of a reporter's blog, "The Complete Patient." Because of the way the topic was born, and the somewhat objective approach the writer took, I believe that a transformation is taking place of the way many people view the issue of raw milk freedom. Many view raw milk economic (non)freedom as a moot issue. Someone - David Gumpert - became curious about why. And more curious. He was just writing about his health. I stumbled upon his blog a few years ago, just as he was becoming curious. One of our local pastured meat producers was rumored to be trying to jump through hoops regulators kept throwing at him. My childhood was riddled with underground raw milk seeking by my parents. People I grew up around looked at the food I ate as if it were some sort of poison while they consumed bologna on white bread, and Little Debbie snack cakes. So I was curious too, where his investigations might take him. I bookmarked his blog, and kept going back. When someone's farm was raided, he knew the same day, and told about it. His blog became a fascinating modern portrayal of what was really happening that nobody heard about. I work in the healthcare industry. In my 13 years as a registered nurse, the number of people I have to gown and glove for isolation for has grown exponentially. I have been acutely interested in the way superbugs develop. I've become over-aware (to put it mildly) of the knee-jerk reaction regulations health care and national food safety people come up with - regulations that make my actual direct care job, and our small private farm at home, increasingly impossible to do. On David's blog, I've been able to read a national hero food safety lawyer have at it with the biggest raw milk dairy manager in the U.S., along with the input of other small farmers, and people who feel their family members were poisoned by raw milk. Now David has put the culmination of a few years of such discussion into a whole, concise form. It is difficult to put down. I believe it is a classical production that like Michael Pollan's, "The Omnivore's Dilemma," boosts us over a barrier of consciousness that developed world humans have been attempting to breech for some time.

Gwen Elderberry
46 people found this helpful
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Stephen T. Bemis
5.0 out of 5 stars A Compact, Slender Review
Reviewed in the United States on October 30, 2009
Verified Purchase
As one of the lawyers advocating for the right to choose what to eat (isn't that a strange thing to have to say?), I appreciate Gumpert's thoroughgoing synthesis of the events of the last several years for what they were: a preview of the upcoming challenges to this fundamental right.

A pension lawyer, I have come to appreciate over the years that security in retirement is not just about monthly checks or 401(k)'s. The most important planning and investment anyone can make for happiness in later years is for good health. My own path to choosing raw milk was driven initially by health concerns. I now see the ongoing struggle in this tiny corner of America's food system as a canary in the coal mine. If we lose these battles for choice in nutrition, there is no telling where it will end.

David's book informs, in highly readable fashion, linkages and background much of which (because of my involvement), I knew. But there is much in his research and writing that I did not know until now, and his compelling telling of the story is thus a real service to the public and to all participants, both advocates, regulators, legislators, and others.

We desperately need more sensible dialogue, and it is my hope that this book will bring the pro's and con's closer together, simply by everyone being better informed. At the same time it illuminates a fundamental struggle for freedom (with responsibility) in the 21st century, for the benefit of a larger public who through this book can come to understand the complexities, as well as to appreciate the challenges of finding the "health" in "healthcare." For without improvements in health, healthcare will consume the country, and there will indeed be a harsher retirement for us all.
58 people found this helpful
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Michael P
5.0 out of 5 stars worth the read!
Reviewed in the United States on September 13, 2022
Verified Purchase
Solid book. The author takes a journalistic approach to the raw milk “issue” in the USA. The issue being political & ideological, rather than being a public health concern, as regulators would deem it as.
3 people found this helpful
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D. Burgher
4.0 out of 5 stars Most interesting
Reviewed in the United States on January 11, 2013
Verified Purchase
I am always interested in why we have lost control over our choices. The government has proven it can't take care of everything yet they keep trying. Personally I am taking a good hard look and doing all I can to be independent from the grocery store chains. I grow our food and am looking for a cow to provide our dairy. This book makes you ask a lot of questions on the whys and what to dos. I think all should take a hard look and read this book for a safer and healthier lifestyle. It was great for our ancestors and it is much better for me now.
7 people found this helpful
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sinclair
5.0 out of 5 stars and the milk was amazingly good. Judging by my good health and the fact ...
Reviewed in the United States on December 7, 2014
Verified Purchase
I've been drinking raw milk for eight years from a very tiny dairy where I helped out twice a week, not because I held some belief but because I could, and the milk was amazingly good. Judging by my good health and the fact that I drink a quart a day, I'd guess it's good for me! The book is important because it reveals the chasm between government policy and consumer experience. It is shocking that public health functionaries and gestapo enforcement tactics brutalize ordinary thoughtful citizens.
3 people found this helpful
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Indigenous
5.0 out of 5 stars Rights and Responsibilities
Reviewed in the United States on July 26, 2010
Verified Purchase
A good read. Reads a bit like a legal thriller, while giving enough information to make an informed decision. It is interesting to watch as the author goes from having little or no interest in the subject, to being curious, to actually forming his opinion without actually trying to form or change the reader's opinion. Good investigative type journalism - something I thought was almost extinct in today's atmosphere of emotional reaction and reflexive decision making.
2 people found this helpful
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Kristen Scherer
3.0 out of 5 stars Jumps Around Too Much
Reviewed in the United States on December 14, 2010
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I appreciated the topic, we are definitely supporters of raw dairy. However, this book jumped around from story to story and topic to topic with no cohesiveness. There are definitely better books out there for information and education on raw milk.
4 people found this helpful
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