Question

excerpt from \the jungle\
it narrated how he jurgis rudkus was working in the room where the men prepared the beef for canning, and the beef had lain in vats full of chemicals, and men with great forks turned it over and dumped it into trucks to be taken to the smoking room. when they had speared out all they could reach, they emptied the vat on the floor, and then with shovels scraped up the balance and dumped it into the truck. this floor was filthy, yet they set antanas with his mop slopping the \pickle\ into a hole that connected with a sink, where it was caught and sold as soup stock, and if that were not enough, there was a trap in the pipe, where all the scraps of meat and odds and ends of refuse were caught, every few days it was the old mans task to clean these out, and shovel their contents into one of the trucks with the rest of the meat!
from reading this excerpt of \the jungle\, you can infer that
a. the canned juice came from the area who cleaned the trap in the pipe
b. the meat packing industry was regulated by the usda.
c. conditions in the packing houses were contaminated.
d. canned beef was made with nutritious impurities.

Explanation:

To solve this, we analyze the text from "The Jungle" and the options:

Option Analysis:

• Option A: The text focuses on unsanitary practices in meat packing, not on the job of those cleaning traps. Eliminate.
• Option B: The text describes unregulated (or poorly regulated) unsanitary practices, not USDA regulation. Eliminate.
• Option C: The text details unsanitary conditions (e.g., chemicals, filth, mixing waste with meat) in packing houses, showing contamination. This matches.
• Option D: The text describes unsanitary meat handling (not just "canned beef" or "inorganic impurities" specifically). Eliminate.

Answer:

C. conditions in the packing houses were contaminated.