The "Worrying About The 'Umbrella Girl'" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Reading about the iconic "Umbrella Girl" who was dressed all in yellow and walking in the rain.  Oh yeah!  She was holding a container of Morton's salt as the salt poured freely from it.  There aren't too many people

who remember that since it was back in 1914 when that ad first appeared in magazines.  Above the young girl was the phrase, "When It Rains, It Pours."  Oh! Now you remember it, right?  I actually did!  So why am I telling you this today?  Well, my story today happens to deal with kids who developed goiters years ago.  So, exactly what is a goiter?  A goiter is the swelling of the thyroid gland in the neck due to lack of iodine in the diet.  People who lived in the Great Lakes region and the Pacific Northwest area of the United States were prone to goiters, since they had too little iodine in the ecosystem and thus developed enlarged thyroids or goiters.  So, how do we prevent that from happening?  You make sure people have iodine in their system.  And, to do that, you can use Morton's iodized salt.  Using Morton's iodized salt was said to raise a person's IQ by 15 points!  

An advertisement in an old magazine. Click to enlarge.

So that's why my mom made sure she used iodized salt when she cooked.  Iodine is a critical element used by your thyroid to make it able to synthesize certain gland secretions which, among other things, influences your heart, metabolism, nerve responses, etc.  Iodine deficiency has also been linked to increased difficulty with information processing, diminished fine motor skills, extreme fatigue, depression, weight gain, and low basal body temperatures.  So how much iodine did they put in the salt when they made it?  The Council on Foods and Nutrition of the American Medical Association adopted a general decision saying that using 1 part of sodium iodide compound to 5,000 parts of salt would be suitable.  Now, the United States didn't think of this all by themselves since the Swiss had already been adding iodine to salt years for years.  And, since iodine wasn't real expensive, it didn't add any cost to the salt.  I assume you know that "saltiness" is one of the five primary basic tastes that the human tongue can detect; those five being salt, bitter, sweet, sour and umami or savory taste.  And, did you know that if you boil eggs in saltwater, it makes them easier to peel.  I found that out a few years ago!  So, why not dump salt on everything?  Well, it has a direct effect on your blood pressure, makes you body hold on to water, puts a greater strain on your heart arteries, kidneys and brain.  This can all lead to heart attacks, strokes, dementia and kidney disease.  So...maybe you should cut out salt!  But then you wouldn't get the iodine your body needs so you don't develop a goiter.  Jeez!  Life's tough enough.  Now I have to worry about the "Umbrella Girl!"  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.