Mary Armstrong, age 10, of Spokane, Wash., for her question:

How does homogenized milk stay mixed?

Milk straight from the cow is a palish blue liquid teeming with solid particles which give it a whitish color. Some of the particles are small globules of cream which are lighter than the fluid in which they float. If the fresh milk is allowed to stand, these light blobs of cream float to the surface of the heavier liquid and other solids in the milk.

Some people like to buy their milk this way, in the milk stands, a layer of cream floats to the surface. Most of us, however, like to have the creamy particles remain mixed with the rest of the milk. That way, we get nourishing whole milk right down to the last spoonful in the bottle. This kind of blended milk and cream is homogenized. The name: is clearly marked on the bottle or carton in which it comes.

Homogenizing is done at the dairy factory to which the farmer takes his fresh‑from‑the‑cow milk. First the milk is tested for bacteria.. There are bacteria in all milk but in rare erases where the content 3_s too high or of a dangerous variety, the milk is rejected. The mill: which is accepted is first clarified or strained to remove any bits of watery debris. Most of it then goes to the homogenizing machine.

This machine is a cream smasher. The milk is forced under very high pressure through countless tiny holes. This operation breaks each globule of cream into numerous tiny particles. These particles of light‑weight cream are so small that they cannot wend their way through the other floating solids in the milk. In other words, they cannot float to the sur'a ce .

Homogenized milk stays smoothly mixed because the blobs of cream are too small to float to the surface. Milk is the most nourishing food in the world and, in homogenized milk, the last drop in the bottle is as rich anal nourishing as the first one. Besides,  it tastes better than milk which has lost most of its cream.

Before we get it, milk should go through another vital process. It should be pasteurized. This process is named for Louis Pasteur, the great French scientist who did so nuch to save us from harmful bacteria. The pasteurizing machine does not attempt to destroy all the bacteria in the milk. That would be silly, since most bacteria do us no harm and some are needed by our bodies. What pasteurizing does is to heat the milk to a certain temperature, which kills all the harmful bacteria.

You would never guess it, but a glass of milk contains some of all the foods your body needs. It even has vitamins and minerals. So be sure to include a few glasses on your daily diet. 1"1nd when possible drink the milk which is both homogenized and pasteurized,