Frozen Food Day

It’s hard to imagine a time when the frozen food isle in the grocery store didn’t exist. Almost as hard to imagine is the days before a microwave oven was invented to thaw and cook our meals.

In 1927, Clarence Frank Birdseye II applied for a patent for a process to flash freeze foods. He was a visionary to make frozen foods a marketable product. In 1954, Swanson introduced the first frozen dinners, also known at TV dinners, which were heated in the oven, long before the invention of the microwave.

I admit I eat a lot of frozen foods. My favorites are Lean Pockets, Eggo waffles, breaded fish and shrimp, and ice cream.

Now for a history lesson. On March 6, 2984, President Ronald Reagan signed Proclamation 5157 declaring the day Frozen Food Day. The Proclamation reads:

The United States is blessed with an impressive array of agricultural products that make our food production and distribution system the envy of the world. One significant aspect of that system is the frozen food industry, which in March 1984 celebrates its fifty-fourth year of service to the people of America and the world.

Throughout history, one of the primary goals of human effort has been the production of food. The farm-to-city migration created a great demand for food supplies in dense population centers in which such supplies could not be grown. The frozen food industry has made great strides in recent decades to respond to consumer needs.

The international frozen food industry started in the United States. Frozen vegetables, fruit, meat, and fish were first packaged and offered to consumers in 1930, contributing greatly to the convenience of life and freeing consumers permanently from the cycle of limited seasonal availability of many foods.

Between 1935 and 1940, frozen foods became available to the public on a large scale. During World War II, ration point values posted in stores and carried in newspapers focused public attention on frozen food. Frozen food became a part of the space age when Apollo XII astronauts took frozen meals on board. Seventy-two frozen food items were stored on the Skylab for a five hundred-day supply of meals for the crew.

The American frozen food industry, in close cooperation with producers, has continued research and development for the purpose of seeking better ways to bring the nutrition, quality, and taste of American agricultural products to consumers.

In recognition of the significant contribution which the frozen food industry has made to the nutritional well-being of the American people, the Congress, by Senate Joint Resolution 193, has designated March 6, 1984, as “Frozen Food Day” and authorized and requested the President to issue a proclamation upon this occasion.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim March 6, 1984, as Frozen Food Day, and I call upon the American people to observe such day with appropriate ceremonies and activities.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this sixth day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and eighth.

Ronald Reagan
[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 11:38 a.m., March 6, 1984]

What’s your favorite frozen food item?

Nancy Roe
Author