National School Lunch Program History

School district boards began to become overwhelmed with the amount of necessary funds for running school meal programs. The first means of financial aid for these programs came from the Reconstruction Finance Corporation when it granted loans to various towns in Missouri covering the costs of labor for preparing and serving school meals.

Early federal aid shifted to the Civil Works Administration and the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. Under these administrations, programs were able to reach 39 States.

The National Youth Administration was founded in this year. Their goal was to job train unemployed youth. This administration was responsible for training youth to make tables, chairs, and other lunchroom equipment. They were also able to employ over 16,000 youths in school lunch programs across 42 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

Fifteen states passed laws in order to authorize local school boards to create and operate lunchrooms. Most schools served the meals at cost, but four states made special provisions for children with financial needs.

During the war, the Armed Forces needed huge amounts of food supplies. This took from the supply allotted to school lunch programs. Within two years, this food supply available for school lunches dropped from 454 million pounds to 93 million pounds.

There was continuous growth in the School Lunch Program from its first permanent stance until 1968. It grew from 4.5 million children participating to 18.9 million. Federal support also grew from about $60 million to over $160 million.

Section 2 of the "National School Lunch Act" defines its purposes: "It is hereby declared to be the policy of Congress, as a measure of national security, to safeguard the health and well-being of the Nation's children and to encourage the domestic consumption of nutritious agricultural commodities and other food, by assisting the States, through grants-in aid and other means, in providing an adequate supply of food and other facilities for the establishment, maintenance, operation and expansion of nonprofit school lunch programs.”

USDA's Agricultural Research Service conducted a food consumption survey in which it was found that over 1/3 of the households with incomes of $10,000 or more did not have diets that met all recommended levels of all the nutrients to provide a good diet. The National School Lunch Program began to make attempts to remedy this national problem.

Congress stated the Declaration of Purpose in Section 2 of the Act saying, "In recognition of the demonstrated relationship between food and good nutrition and the capacity of children to develop and learn, based on the years of cumulative successful experience under the National School Lunch Program with its significant contributions in the field of applied nutrition research, it is hereby declared to be the policy of Congress that these efforts shall be extended, expanded, and strengthened under the authority of the Secretary of Agriculture as a measure to safeguard the health and well-being of the Nation's children, and to encourage the domestic consumption of agricultural and other foods, by assisting States, through grants-in-aid and other means, to meet more effectively the nutritional needs of our children.”

The principal of Green Bay Wisconsin elementary states in a letter his support of school lunch programs because of their positive affect on students' health, attendance, and school performance. This letter mimicked the support of many teachers, principals, and administrators of this time.