Why and How to Use Skim-Milk was written by Helen Gertrude Campbell in collaboration with the federal Department of Agriculture. Campbell was born in 1889 in Campbell Cross, Ontario and died in Chinguacousy Township, Ontario in 1970. She attended the Macdonald Institute at the University of Guelph, completing the Domestic Science program in 1910 and earned a Domestic Science Teacher Certificate in 1913. She was employed by the Department of Agriculture for nine years and then served as director of the Chatelaine Institute beginning in 1930. Campbell wrote several cooking pamphlets for the Department of Agriculture throughout the 1920s and 1930s. She also wrote pieces for the London Life Insurance Company and Chatelaine magazine.