V, I thought that you and your German-speaking cohorts might enjoy this...

Who knew that Germany was such a hotbed of radical thought? I certainly didn't. Like most Americans, with our limited viewpoint, I've mostly associated Germany with WWII, Hitler and the Holocaust...I picked up a book entitled "Children of the Sun" from Amazon's bargain bin... this book details alternative therapies that originated in Germany during the late 19th and early 20th century...homeopathy, vitamin therapy, hydrotherapy, helio-therapy, crushed-rock fertilizer, nature cure, mucusless diet and anthrosophy. Actually, the book doesn't "detail" the therapies, it glosses over them. It DOES provide an overview of the major players, and it's heavy on photographs:)

one of the major players, Richard Ungewitter...


http://cgd.best.vwh.net/home/naturism/wnl-0117.htm


"Most historians of naturism identify the German Richard Ungewitter, who publised a book called Die Nacktheit (Nakedness) in 1906, as the originator of the movement. There were other near contemporaries of his in Germany who shared his ideas, but we don't need to go into that now. The point is that concerns about health were central to naturism right at the beginning. It was part of a more general movement in Germany that went by the name of Lebensreform (life reform). Among other things, there was an emphasis on such (supposedly) healthy practices as sunbathing, vegetarianism, exercise, and abstention from alchohol and tobacco...."

from the Ungewitter Archives: