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The History of Nutrition in America
"The tree of nutritional knowledge."
Date: 5/19/2017 11:18:59 AM ( 7 y ) ... viewed 1503 times May 19, 2017 -
Inspiration that included the idea of "nutritional paradigms" motivated my search that yielded 24,600 initial results for "nutritional paradigms". This gave me The "Oxford History"[2] wherein I learned of Wilbur Atwater[3] who was known as the "father of American nutrition". Atwater built the first nutritional paradigm on a foundation of calories. However the "Basic tenets of early nutrition was challenged" by the discovery of vitamins in 1910s. Now "calories alone were not enough to promote health and sustain life."
The second nutritional paradigm in America was erected by Elmer McCollum.[4]
He wrote:
“The experimental methods hitherto described can, when the necessary labor and money are expended upon them, perfect our understanding of the quantitative relations of the amino acid content of the individual proteins and mixtures of proteins which occur in natural foods of animal and vegetable origin. They can, furthermore, serve as an aid to the isolation in a state of purity of the several vitamins, although they are but poor and unwieldy substitutes for chemical tests, which, unfortunately, are still wanting. The tree of nutritional knowledge appears, however, to have grown to proportions which reveal the general outlines which it will always present, and further researches by the methods which have hitherto been so productive, can, it seems, only clothe it in attractive foliage and aid it in maturing the rich setting of fruit which has not yet ripened and fallen for the service of man, although a few windfalls which have been tasted reveal the keen enjoyment with which the human race will one day reap the full harvest.”[1]
I wonder if Elmer imagined a time-frame for the "full harvest".
In any case the initial "harvester" (on behalf of the human race) came forward and set upon a quest in the following decade to identify the actual "fruit" represented by this tree of nutritional knowledge. As of 1939 he published his very well-documented findings in: Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.[5] That man was none other than Weston A. Price!
Since the publishing of this "shocking and powerful testament to the adverse effects of modern processed diets" the "full harvest" has been positively identified (through documenting the diets of over a dozen traditional isolated societies) and yet the rest of the human race is still (for the most part as far as I ca tell) in want of actually enjoying this harvest. At least this appears to be largely the case for most Americans (based on the amount of diet related medications and the like that American consumers consume on an ongoing basis).
According to the Oxford History - a third nutritional paradigm was named by Warren Belasco[6] as "Negative Nutrition". That (IMO) underscores the state of "wanting" that much of the human race did not reap from "the tree of nutritional knowledge". Why is that? (If I had a class I believe this question could launch conversations for at least a whole school year!)
The above search was preceded by a search for "traditional nutritional wisdom" that yielded the following:
“A common theme that emerges among the greatest medical advances is the rediscovery of ancient or traditional knowledge and remedies. … examples include … the constant forgetting of traditional nutritional wisdom …”[7]
I wish to know more about this particular "theme" ( the constant forgetting of traditional nutritional wisdom) and wanted to contact the authors however the elder author crossed the threshold several years ago and I don't see a contact for the son.
Later - "The constant forgetting of traditional nutritional wisdom" obviously includes the nutritional wisdom of life-giving minerals given the fact that we have lost the vital mineral content in our soils - from where virtually all our food comes from.
Just added this comment to "Plant Your Dream" by Leslie Goldman (also at CureZone):
Dr. Carolyn Dean - (The "Goddess of Magnesium" author of "The Magnesium Miracle"[8]) developed a superior magnesium product (that doesn't risk diarrhea) and knows (probably better than most doctors) the vital necessity for minerals - especially with magnesium at the top of the list! We have lost the magnesium in our soils and that includes virtually all the organic farms! We need magnesium added back to the farm lands. Carolyn say that can be accomplished by adding rock dust to the soils.
Are any of our local (San Diego County) farmers adding rock dust to their soils? If so I'd like to know who and support them!
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March 8, 2019 - The Modern Nutrition Era as of 1912 -
Casimir Funk (1884-1967) was the first of the vitamin hunters to coin the term “vitamines” —vital amines—in 1912 for the unidentified substances present in food which could prevent the diseases scurvy, beriberi and pellagra. Dr. Funk was a Polish scientist who worked in Paris and also at the Lister Institute during the early twentieth century.
Frederick Gowland Hopkins (1861-1947), a British biochemist, was an amazingly influential researcher in whose lab many young European scientists trained. Biochemistry was not yet recognized as a discipline in the early days of his career. His best known work, published in 1912, debunked Justus von Liebig’s and others’ longstanding belief that pure proteins, carbohydrates, fats, and minerals were all that were needed for growth.14 He named those yet unidentified mysterious substances, vital in small quantities for animal growth and survival, “accessory food factors,” later renamed vitamins. It was this work that led to his receiving (together with Christiaan Eijkman) the 1929 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.15 He also discovered the amino acid tryptophan in 1901.
During the rationing and food shortages of World War I, Hopkins studied margarine and found it inferior to butter because it lacked vitamins A and D.[9]
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Notes:
[1]
“The Newer Knowledge Of Nutrition:
The Use Of Food For The Preservation Of Vitality And Health”
By: Elmer V. McCollum, Ph.D., Sc.D.
Professor of Chemical Hygiene in the School of Hygiene and Public Health, of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.
In the Preface
[2] https://www.amazon.com/Oxford-Handbook-Food-History-Handbooks/dp/0190628243/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1495201879&sr=1-1&keywords=oxford+handbook+of+food+history
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilbur_Olin_Atwater
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmer_McCollum
[5] https://www.amazon.com/Nutrition-Physical-Degeneration-Weston-Price/dp/0916764206
[6] http://amst.umbc.edu/faculty-and-staff/warren-belasco/
[7]
“Medical Marvels: The 100 Greatest Advances in Medicine” by Eugene W. Strauss, Alex Strauss; page 149-150
[8] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001ODEPY4/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
[9] https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/nutrition-greats/great-pioneers-in-nutrition-of-the-twentieth-century/
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