Nearly 2,200 women, ranging in age from 30 to more than 90 years, living in five North Central states, provided the 24-hour dietaries from which data summarized in this bulletin were obtained. The women interviewed in Iowa and South Dakota were selected by area-probability sampling methods, so that they represented all women over 29 years of age in each of these two states. Four other samples were drawn from three urban centers: one from Urbana, Illinois; two (one white, one Negro) from Lansing-East Lansing, Michigan; and one from St. Paul, Minnesota.

The mean nutritive values of 24-hour dietaries reported by the white women in the five samples were similar: Food energy values ranged from 1,665 to 1,780 Cal.; protein values from 53 to 64 gm.; calcium, from 0.44 to 0.64 gm.; iron, from 9.9 to 11.9 mg.; ascorbic acid, from 53 to 75 mg.; thiamine, from 0.9 to 1.1 mg.; riboflavin, from 1.1 to 1.4 mg.; niacin, from 9.2 to 11.0 mg.; vitamin A value, from 4,425 to 6,730 I.U. Individual intakes within each sample varied considerably.

Days' diets of Negro women in the Lansing-East Lansing sample supplied mean amounts of food energy and of all nutrients except vitamin A that were lower than those of dietaries of any group of white women studied.