In performing research for previous blog posts, I kept coming across brief blurbs about meat conferences and agricultural shows. Naturally, such mentions piqued my interest, especially with the Annual Meat Conference on the horizon in Nashville, Tenn., next week from March 18 to March 20. So, when did Americans start meeting about meat? And when did national associations form and evolve into what we know today?

Americans have been meeting about everything, well, since before American Revolution. But formal associations or groups did not fully develop until the early nineteenth century. So-called associationalism, imported into America by European political theorists such as Alexis de Tocqueville, preached that associations and their committed volunteers provided a bulwark against individualism and unnecessary government growth. Associations, with the combined power of their members, could resolve social, political, and economic ills hopefully before government intervention.

It was not until after the American Civil War, however, that associations blossomed, which was fueled by the massive transformation of American life wrought by industrialization. The late-nineteenth century, in the words of sociologist Jason Kaufman, “was the Golden Age of American associationalism, a period when the number of groups, clubs, and fraternities of all kinds grew enormously.” Some of the first associational activity in the industry occurred when breed associations formed, including the American Berkshire Association (1875), the American Hereford Association (1881), the American Aberdeen-Angus Breeders’ Association (1883, today the American Angus Association), and the Holstein-Friesian Association of America (1885).

The meat industry was not immune to this social and political pressure in the late-nineteenth century. Local or regional meat trade associations existed in the late nineteenth century, but it wasn’t until the early twentieth century that trade associations formed in direct response to government legislation. The first national meat trade association, the American Meat Packers Association (AMPA), was founded in October 1906, just four months after the passage of the Federal Meat Inspection Act (FMIA). At the Grand Pacific hotel in Chicago, the epicenter of meat production in the late-nineteenth century, “some fifty or more representative packers from different parts of the country met” to discuss “the new meat inspection law.” The primary purpose was to “secure co-operation among the meat packers of the United States…in protecting their interests, general welfare and prosperity.” Most importantly, AMPA aimed to “promote social intercourse among its members, cultivate friendship and good will and to maintain good fellowship among them.”

What started as a two-day meeting in October of 1906 became an annual affair, and with every convention marked a growing membership and interest, especially among smaller packers, “county butchers,” and those seeking assistance in becoming federally inspected and navigating the new federal regulations. The membership roster quickly swelled from 1906 to 1909, and there was a general feeling of optimism among the membership about the future of and impact of meat packing and distribution. As the National Provisioner reported in 1909 about the Fourth Annual Convention in Chicago, “there are a whole lot of packers who would ‘pass up’ a train load of 4-cent hogs rather than miss that annual banquet.” The Provisioner continued, “The packer has found that he can save a lot of money and kill several birds with one stone by combining convention attendance with trades and purchases and sales.”

While AMPA changed its name along the way, merged with other associations, and is currently known as the Meat Institute, it laid the groundwork for other associations and organizations to meet about meat. The “Eat More Meat” Conference met in 1920 to encourage more consumption of meat during an economic downturn for the industry. In 1939, the National Frozen Food Locker Association (today the American Association of Meat Processors [AAMP]) held its first annual meeting in 1939 and has been holding an annual conference ever since. In 1948, a group of meat and food scientists met for the first time in Chicago at the Reciprocal Meat Conference, and they eventually formalized their gathering into American Meat Science Association in 1964.

In this way, associationalism has played a crucial role in the development of the meat industry. Conferences offered a forum for small to large-sized packers to share ideas, network, listen to industry experts, and make friends along the way. Conferences provided the ability for scientists to share research and ideas about food safety. And when representatives from regulatory agencies attended or even contributed on a panel, it allowed conference attendees and association members to interact with regulators on neutral ground outside of the plant’s walls.

If you are attending the Annual Meat Conference next week, please know that you have been participating in a long-standing tradition in American history and the industry. I hope to see you in Nashville!

Meating Up: A Brief History of Associationalism and Trade Conferences in the Meat Industry

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