History of Vegetarianism and Veganism Worldwide (1970-2022)
William Shurtleff, Akiko AoyagiISBN: 978-1-948436-74-8
Publication Date: 2022 March 10
Number of References in Bibliography: 4677
Earliest Reference: 1970
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Brief Chronology/Timeline of Vegetarianism and Veganism.
1970s – Vegetarianism starts to catch on and vegetarian institutions begin to develop in the USA during this decade.
1971 Jan. – East West Journal starts publication in Boston, Massachusetts. They advocate macrobiotics and vegetarianism.
1971 Sept. 3 – Stephen Gaskin and several hundred friends and disciples purchase a 1700-acre farm (which they call “The Farm”) at 156 Drakes Lane, Summertown, Lewis County, Tennessee. Vegans (complete vegetarians) and long-haired hippies, they have a huge influence on the rise of veganism in the Western world.
1971 Sept. – Diet for a Small Planet, by Frances Moore Lappé is published by Ballantine Books. Advocating a vegetarian diet, eating low on the food chain, and protein complementarity, it plays a major role in the rise of meatless diets.
1973 – Dick Gregory writes Dick Gregory's Natural Diet for Folks Who Eat: Cookin' with Mother Nature with Alvenia M. Fulton. The book inspires many African-Americans to turn to vegetarianism and veganism.
1974 March – Vegetarian Times, a monthly magazine, is started by Paul Obis, a nurse, in Chicago. By June 1997 total paid circulation is 326,349. It is probably the most important and influential vegetarian magazine ever published in America.
1975 Feb. – The Farm Vegetarian Cookbook – which is actually a vegan cookbook – is published by The Farm in Summertown, Tennessee.
1975 Aug. – 23rd World Vegetarian Congress is hosted in Orono, Maine by the newly-formed North American Vegetarian Society, run by Brian and Sharon Graff and overseen by Jay and Freya Dinshah. Historians have called the two-week-long event “the most important gathering of vegetarians in the United States of the 20th century.” Freya plans and oversees vegan meals for 1500 people. A side table with store-bought cheese and sour cream fulfills the "vegetarian" mandate.
1975 Oct. – Animal Liberation: A new Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals, by Peter Singer, an academic philosopher from Melbourne, Australia, is published in New York. He advocates a vegan (or vegetarian) lifestyle and first popularized the concepts of animal rights and speciesism.
1975 Dec. – The Book of Tofu by Wm. Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi is published by Autumn Press. It started the “tofu revolution” in America.
1976 Oct. – Laurel's Kitchen: A Handbook for Vegetarian Cookery and Nutrition, by Laurel Robertson, Carol Flinders and Bronwen Godfrey is published. It quickly becomes a classic.
1976 – Data collection begins for the Adventist Health Study-1 which includes more than 34,000 Seventh-day Adventists in the US, 29% vegetarian.
1977 Oct. – The Moosewood: Recipes from the Moosewood Restaurant, Ithaca, New York, is published by fledgling Ten Speed Press in Berkeley, California.
1978 July 28 – The Soycrafters Association of North America is founded at Ann Arbor, Michigan. Most companies in the soyfoods movement are owned and managed by vegetarians.
1980 July – The first “Position paper on the vegetarian approach to eating” is published by the American Dietetic Association.
1981 Oct. – The vegetarian movement in England 1847-1981: A study in the structure of its ideology, by Julia Twigg (456 pages), is accepted as a PhD thesis at the London School of Economics. It is widely regarded as the best history of the subject.
1982 Sept. – The nonprofit The Vegetarian Resource Group is founded in Baltimore by vegan holocaust survivor Doctor Ernie Kopstein, MD; vegan Senior Olympics swimmer Norris Fluke; vegetarian nurse Audrey Fluke; and vegan activists Charles Stahler and Debra Wasserman. Publishes Baltimore Vegetarian Newsletter, which becomes magazine Vegetarian Journal in Sept. 1985. VRG (which includes Reed Mangels, PhD, RD, Suzanne Havala RD, etc.) has a host of outreach activities including booths at American Dietetic Association (renamed Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics in Jan. 2012) conventions and other professional conferences, vegetarian scholarships, and polls of the number of vegetarians in the USA. This magazine was published without advertising. Published one of the first cookbooks with vegan in the title, Simply Vegan, in 1992, with over 100,000 sold. One of first vegan cooking demonstrations on Good Morning America September, 1994. Their Vegan in Volume for quantity cooking published in 2000 given to over 10,000 food service staff.
1983 – A Vegetarian Sourcebook, by Keith Akers published by G.P. Putnam’s Sons. This book, which has three basic parts: nutrition, ecology, and ethics, is the most useful book about vegetarianism seen to date. It is updated in 1989 and 1993.
1984 – Vegetariana by Nava Atlas makes its mark by combining vegetarian recipes with whimsical artwork and vegetarian history. It is updated in 2021 to a fully vegan version.
1987 – Diet for a New America: How Your Food Choices Affect Your Health, Happiness and the Future of Life on Earth, by John Robbins.
1990 – The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory, by Carol J. Adams is published by Continuum. It is the first book to detail the cultural overlap between masculinity and the consumption of meat.
1993 – Recruitment begins for European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition - Oxford (EPIC-Oxford) a study of more than 65,000 people in the UK; includes 29% lacto-ovo vegetarians, 4% vegan.
1995 – Seth Tibbott founds the Tofurky company, its signature product being a holiday roast that directly competes with turkey and changes the nature of Thanksgiving for many vegans and vegetarians. The funky spelling was partly for attention, and partly so that the product could be ordered at 1-800-TOFURKY. Tibbott soon expands the line to a variety of alternative meat products.
1996 May– The first Boston Vegetarian Food Fest held Boston, Massachusetts. Free to the public, it is sponsored by the Vegetarian Resource Center in cooperation with the MIT Vegetarian Support Group, and the Boston Vegetarian Society (Feb. 1996 leaflet).
1998 – The cooking show "Christina Cooks," starring macrobiotic vegan chef Christina Pirello, premieres on PBS stations. It is still running in 2022.
2000 – The newspaper VegNews is launched by Joe Conneley and Colleen Holland. In 2004 it shifted format to become a widely-read vegan magazine.
2001 – The word “carnist” is coined by Melanie Joy.
2002 – Start of Adventist Health Study-2 which includes more than 96,000 Seventh-day Adventists in the US and Canada; 28% lacto-ovo vegetarians, 8% vegan.
2003 – A new and expanded edition of The Ethics of Diet, by Howard Williams (1883, 1896), is edited by Carol J. Adams, published by University of Illinois Press.
2003 June – The American Dietetic Association releases a position paper on vegetarian diets, stating that "Appropriately planned vegetarian diets are healthful, [are] nutritionally adequate and provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases." The paper is later updated to more explicitly include vegan diets in this assessment.
2004 – Vegetarian America: A History, by Karen and Michael Iacobbo, is the best history seen to date on vegetarianism in the United States.
2005 – Tzu Chi Health study recruitment begins. Includes approximately 6000 participants; 30% lacto-ovo vegetarians.
2005 – Indian Migration Study begins. Includes more than 7000 participants in India; 33% lacto vegetarian.
2009 – Eating Animals, by Jonathan Safran Foer published. A in-depth look at the connection between vegetarianism and factory farming.
2010 Sept. 21 – President Bill Clinton discusses on CNN-TV his new plant-based vegan diet.
2012 – The Farm's Book Publishing Company releases Artisan Vegan Cheese by Miyoko Schinner, which moves vegan cheeses to a new level of parity with dairy cheese. Two years later Miyoko launches her own vegan cheese company, which becomes known as Miyoko's Creamery.
2013 Oct. – The Vegetarian Crusade: The Rise of an American Reform Movement, 1817-1921, by Adam Shprintzen is the best history seen to date on vegetarianism in the United States.
2019 July – The North American Vegetarian Society's long-running annual conference, Vegetarian Summerfest, changes its name to Vegan Summerfest.
2021 Sept. – The American Vegan Center opens in the heart of Philadelphia, the first vegan center in a major U.S. city, offering restaurant info, shirts, books and veg history tours.
2022 Jan. – The Vegetarian Journal is renamed the Vegan Journal, reflecting the rapid growth of veganism in the Western world.
2022 April – A poll conducted by Vegan Journal estimates that 6% of American adults are vegetarian including 3% vegan.