Category Archives: Historical Archives

Historical Archives

Civilization and Cancer

Compiled by Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: One of the absurdly ignored facts of nutrition history is that preindustrialized tribal societies—eating their traditional, whole-food diets and no processed foods—experienced practically no cancer whatsoever. Here Dr. Royal Lee presents excerpts of communications by field doctors of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries reporting a virtual lack of cancer in various nonindustrialized populations, including the famed Hunza of western Asia, natives of Brazil and Ecuador, and myriad Native American tribes. Also included is a clip reflecting a telling, dirty secret of modern nutrition research: test animals to be induced with cancer are fed processed-food diets because it’s so much harder to bring the disease about in animals that are eating whole foods. While there are surely other factors involved in the development of cancer, one of the best defenses against the disease, as this article affirms, is a diet of whole, unprocessed, “uncivilized” foods. From Natural Food and Farming, 1960 and 1962. (Excerpts originally compiled by Dr. Royal Lee, 1959.) Reprinted by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Letter on Corpulence, Addressed to the Public

By William Banting

Summary: William Banting was an overweight British undertaker who by the mid-1800s had tried all the popular prescriptions for weight loss of his day, without success. Then his physician recommended he try abstaining from starches and sweets (i.e., processed carbohydrates). When Banting promptly dropped thirty-five pounds in a few months, he was inspired to inform the public of his success in the form of this pamphlet. Banting’s publication sparked a rage of successful low-carb dieting across Europe and America that would span the next century. Unbeknownst to most modern nutritionists and weight loss “experts,” low-carb dieting in the Banting mode was commonly recommended in early-twentieth-century textbooks on medicine, obesity, and endocrinology. It wasn’t until the 1960s, with the emergence of the notion that eating saturated fat leads to heart disease—a hypothesis that remains unproven to this day—that low-carb diets fell out of favor. Here the author presents and comments on the fourth edition of his famous letter, by which time he had heard from countless readers confirming the effectiveness of his diet. Harrison Publishing, London, 1869.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Intervertebral Disc Lesions: A New Etiological Concept

By W.J. McCormick, MD

Summary: In this remarkable 1954 article, Canadian physician W.J. McCormick presents physiological and biochemical principles that go to the core of orthopedic medicine, chiropractic spinal care, and osteopathy. While many health experts fail to understand the ultimate cause of connective-tissue decay, McCormick is clear: “The most definitely established physiological function of vitamin C is that of assisting in the formation of collagen for the maintenance of stability and elasticity of connective tissues generally, and this would include the bones, cartilages, muscles, and vascular tissues…In deficiency of the vitamin, instability and fragility of all such tissues is believed to be caused by the breakdown of ‘the intercellular cement substance’ (collagen), resulting in easy rupture of any and all of these connective tissues, which would include the intervertebral discs.” As Dr. McCormick emphasized throughout his life, the effects of subclinical scurvy (vitamin C deficiency) cannot be understated, though they are often overlooked. From the Archives of Pediatrics, 1954. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 5D.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Dr. Royal Lee on the “X Factor” of Dr. Price

By Dr. Royal Lee with commentary by Mark R. Anderson

Summary: In the 1930s Dr. Weston Price traveled the globe to study the diets of traditional societies that had yet to start eating modern, processed foods or were in the beginning stages of incorporating them into their culture. Among the many profound nutritional discoveries he made (which he published in his seminal book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration) was the existence of a critical fat-soluble nutrient that was responsible for, among other things, moving calcium from the blood into the tissues, including the bones and teeth. Although Dr. Price was able to measure the effects of this “vitamin-like activator” (which he called Activator X), he was never able to precisely identify its chemical structure. According to nutrition educator and historian Mark R. Anderson, Dr. Royal Lee had no doubt that Price’s X factor was a component of vitamin F, a complex that includes the essential fatty acids. Dr. Lee considered Price’s X factor so important, Anderson adds, that he included it in three of his famous therapeutic food formulas—Cataplex F tablets, Cataplex F perles, and Super EFF. In these excerpts Dr. Lee discusses the relationship between the vitamin F complex and Price’s discovery. Selene River Press, 2005. 

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Chlorophyll for Healing

By Lois Mattox Miller

Summary: Reader’s Digest editor and medical writer Lois Mattox Miller details some of the amazing health-promoting properties of chlorophyll. “Distinguished medical specialists report that in 1200 recorded cases they have seen chlorophyll combat deep-lying infections, cleanse open wounds, relieve chronic sinus conditions, and banish common head colds. More remarkable, they say, is the way it accomplishes these things—speedily and effectively, with none of the harsh, irritating effects common to most antiseptics.” Miller discusses theories as to why chlorophyll is so effective, focusing on its similarity to hemoglobin in blood (the two molecules are essentially the same except iron is at the center of hemoglobin, whereas magnesium is at the center of chlorophyll) to explain its documented ability to stimulate the formation of red blood cells in animals. From Science News Letter, 1941. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 84. 

Continue reading →
Fresh from the Press, Historical Archives

Deaf Smith’s Secret: An Explanation of the Deaf Smith Country

By A.W. Erickson

Summary: With tooth decay ravaging virtually every town and city in mid-twentieth-century America, the inhabitants of one region remained famously free of cavities. The oral health of Deaf Smith County, Texas, was so legendary, in fact, that rumor had it one could grow a new set of teeth just by moving there. Of course this was just fancy, but it bespoke Deaf Smith’s reputation as a place “where the best man develops,” with residents boasting not just superior dental health but overall health as well. In this captivating booklet, crop reporter A.W. Erickson reveals Deaf Smith’s secret to be the food grown on its extraordinarily mineral-rich soil and water. Erickson, detailing how unique climatic and geographical factors result in the continual deposition of myriad minerals across Deaf Smith’s farmland, affirms one of the great discoveries in early nutrition research and the reason why organic farming is so important today: human health is only as good as the land we grow our food in. Published by Field Notes Crop Reporting Service, 1945. (For a comprehensive look at the connection between human health and soil health, see Empty Harvest by Bernard Jensen and Mark R. Anderson.)

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

The Chemical Background of the Relation Between Malnutrition and Heredity

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: It’s been said that Dr. Royal Lee’s theories were typically fifty years ahead of their time. In this astounding lecture from 1956, the great pioneer of nutrition science presents two “radical” ideas now considered revolutions in scientific thought. First, Dr. Lee challenges the principle of classic genetics theory that, barring a mutation in a person’s DNA, that individual will pass on a clean genetic slate to his or her children. Instead, Dr. Lee states, any defect caused to a person during his or her lifetime by malnutrition is likely to be inherited by the individual’s future children—a fact thoroughly substantiated by the new science of epigenetics. Dr. Lee then discusses the science behind his remarkable Theory of Protomorphology, the first known account of autoimmune disorders. According to Dr. Lee’s theory, the growth and repair of body tissues is controlled by a careful balance between, on one hand, growth-promoting antigens produced by (and unique to) each type of tissue and, on the other hand, antibodies produced by the body’s autoimmune system. If the amount of antibodies exceeds the normal balance, then those antibodies attack the tissue—or an “autoimmune reaction” occurs. Though it would take decades for conventional science to catch up with Dr. Lee, today autoimmune reactions are considered a leading cause of disease and death in America. From Natural Food and Farming, 1956. 

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

The American Medical Association and Its Criminal Activities

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: In this thunderous letter to President John F. Kennedy, Dr. Royal Lee calls the president’s attention to a grand jury investigation of corruption within the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The real problem, Dr. Lee explains, is that both the FDA and the U.S. Department of Justice had been infiltrated by the American Medical Association (AMA), an institution that was brutally—and illegally—wielding its influence to wipe out competitors and establish the medical approach as the only “legitimate” healing art in the United States. Dr. Lee reminds the president that the AMA was convicted for such monopolistic behavior twenty years earlier, when it was found guilty of violating the federal antitrust laws, and that it would continue to conduct such behavior if it were not legally thwarted. An amazing piece of history that speaks to what might have been. 1962.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Acidophilus Yeast

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: In this primer on the benefits of lactic acid to digestion, Dr. Royal Lee explains the science behind his remarkable bowel-normalizing product Acidophilus Yeast (known today as Lactic Acid Yeast), which has the special distinction of being able to convert any dietary carbohydrate into lactic acid within the colon. Not only does this action acidify the bowel, thus killing potentially dangerous microorganisms and promoting balanced gut flora, but the yeast also releases enzymes that aid digestion, and it provides bulk to stool—all of which help ensure proper bowel function. Dr. Lee backs up his comments by presenting a clinical study showing Acidophilus Yeast’s impressive results in combating constipation, the researchers stating unequivocally the chief reason for the yeast’s effectiveness: “It has been demonstrated time and time again that the stools of patients who are constipated are, in a very large majority, alkaline…The lactic acid acts as a stabilizer of the hydrogen ion concentration in the colon.” With many alternative health practitioners today promoting indiscriminate alkalization of the body, the words of these investigators are well worth remembering. Published by Vitamin Products Company, circa 1940.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Dr. Harvey W. Wiley on Chemicals in Food

By Harvey W. Wiley, MD, and Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: An illuminating peek at the early, fateful politics of food adulteration in the United States. From 1906 to 1912, Dr. Harvey Wiley was the head of the Bureau of Chemistry within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The Bureau, which would later become the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, was assigned the task of enforcing the country’s first federal food purity law, the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. However, as Dr. Wiley explains in the following excerpt from his 1930 autobiography, his agency’s authority was quickly and illegally usurped by higher-ranking officials within the USDA under the influence of industrial food manufacturers. In one famous case, the solicitor of the USDA forbade Dr. Wiley and other workers of the Bureau from testifying in a federal case in which their testimony would have supported a ban of the food additive sodium benzoate, a compound Dr. Wiley and his colleagues had determined to be injurious to health. Sadly, this poisonous compound remains one of the most common food preservatives used by industrial food manufacturers. Includes an introduction by Dr. Royal Lee. From Harvey W. Wiley—An Autobiography, 1930. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research special reprint No. 1-60.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

USDA on the Allowance of Chemical Additives in Food

By R.W. Dunlap, Assistant Secretary of the USDA

Summary: If you’re looking for a smoking gun regarding the chemical adulteration of food in America, this is it. In this 1925 letter to President Calvin Coolidge, the acting secretary of the U.S. Department of Agrculture (USDA) admits that the department cannot legally prevent the addition of chemical additives of unknown safety to America’s food supply. The reason, he says, is that certain federal courts pronounced such chemicals acceptable if no evidence of harm is shown in people who consume foods containing small amounts of them. Not only did the courts’ decisions put the onus of proving long-term ill effects of suspected poisons squarely on the government, but with such evidence nearly impossible to show conclusively and requiring years of study (the technology for which not even existing at the time), the basic policy of food adulteration in America was set: to err on the side of commerce, not public health. As the secretary points out, the opposing, “better safe than sorry” policy of Dr. Harvey Wiley—the former head of the USDA’s Bureau of Chemistry (forerunner of the FDA) who publicly criticized the federal rulings as violating the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act passed by Congress—would simply not stand up in court, where the decision to allow deleterious additives into the food supply had been finagled into law. 

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

The History of a Crime Against the Food Law

By Harvey W. Wiley, MD

Summary: Dr. Harvey Wiley was the “father” of the famous Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906—the first law passed by the U.S. government to ensure the safety of the nation’s food supply—and he was also the first head of the U.S. Bureau of Chemistry, the federal agency charged with enforcing the law (an agency that would later become the U.S. Food and Drug Administration). In this book, which Dr. Wiley courageously published himself in 1929 and was later republished by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, Dr. Wiley sets the historical record straight as to how the industrial food industry corrupted the nation’s laws and politicians in order to sell cheap, refined, adulterated, devitalized “foods.” The industry’s usurpation of federal laws and regulations regarding whole foods is an example of American politics at its worst. Originally published by H.W. Wiley, 1929; republished by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1955.

View PDF: The History of a Crime Against the Food Law

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Cancer: A Nutritional Deficiency

By J.R. Davidson, MD

Summary: A Canadian physician reports on his fascinating animal and human research that led him to conclude that nutritional deficiency is at the root of cancer development. “For some 45 years I have been interested in the study of cancer. I have come to the conclusion that cancer is due to deficient diet, and that, if steps are taken to see that everyone eats the proper food, the disease can be first controlled and finally eliminated.” Discussing his experiments in detail, Dr. Davidson makes a strong case in defense of his hypothesis. Published by the Science Department of the University of Manitoba. Reprint 18, 1943.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

How Antibody Attacks Cells

By Dr. Robert Dourmashkin

Summary: In the 1940s Dr. Royal Lee developed the Protomorphogen Theory through his pioneering recognition of the autoimmune disease process. This article, from a 1964 issue of New Scientist magazine, is among this first to photographically document the cellular destruction caused by a host’s own auto-antibodies. From New Scientist, 1964. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 141.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

How and Why Synthetic Poisons Are Being Sold as Imitations of Natural Foods and Drugs

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: It is obvious why companies would opt for selling synthetic vitamins (made in a laboratory) over natural ones (found only in food): the former have a considerably higher profit margin. But just how synthetic vitamins became equated with natural ones is downright perplexing, given that there are such obvious and important differences between the two. In this profound report, Dr. Royal Lee presents some long-ignored distinctions between vitamins as made by nature and vitamins as made by human beings. For one, he points out, a natural vitamin is never a single compound, but rather it is a conglomerate of substances—or a “complex”—that work together to deliver a nutritive effect to the body. A synthetic vitamin, on the other hand, is merely one compound in such a conglomerate that has been deemed, somewhat arbitrarily, the “active” ingredient of the complex. Moreover, such an active ingredient, when produced in the lab, is never an exact replica of its natural counterpart but instead is often a mirror opposite of it, with very different and possibly toxic biochemical functioning. That these facts continue to be ignored—that synthetic vitamins are not recognized as crude and incomplete imitations of natural ones—is truly one of the great scandals of modern nutrition. Published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1948.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Hope in Cancer Research

By U.S. Senator Charles W. Tobey

Summary: This excerpt from the 1952 Congressional Record shows just how far back alternative approaches to cancer have met opposition from the medical establishment, even when the evidence for the effectiveness of such approaches came from medical doctors themselves and was brought to public light by a U.S. senator. Senator Tobey’s remarks are a scathing indictment of the monopolistic, profit-driven motive of organized medicine. From the Congressional Record of the 82nd U.S. Congress, 1952. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 18-A.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

An Honest Loaf: Fresh, Stone-Ground Bread

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: Although the oil in wheat is extremely beneficial, it is also extremely delicate, writes Dr. Royal Lee, making whole wheat flour “as perishable as milk.” Truly nutritious bread can only be made with flour that is within hours of being ground. Because of this super quick rancidification of the oil in wheat, virtually all commercial “whole wheat” breads are of dubious nutritional value. The surest way to get the true benefits of wheat, Dr. Lee writes, is to buy a home flour mill and bake your bread with freshly ground flour. From Let’s Live magazine, 1958.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

High Blood Cholesterol and Its Control

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: While cholesterol has been demonized by modern medicine, wise health practitioners know that it is, in fact, an essential component for the proper functioning of the human body. In this 1956 article, Dr. Royal Lee describes cholesterol’s vital role as a “sealing compound” in controlling the diffusion of substances across cell and blood vessel walls. Dr. Lee condemns hydrogenated fats and refined vegetable oils in particular for disturbing the normal cholesterol balance in the body, one probable cause of their effect being the massive loss of nutrients—including the fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K and the essential-fatty-acid complex vitamin F—incurred during refining. From Natural Food and Farming, 1956.

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

Hidden Dangers in White Bread

By James Rorty

Summary: This article of “the suppressed facts” regarding flour bleaching details just why commercial bread in America is “worthless and unsafe.” In spite of its tabloid-like style, this 1956 magazine article boasts some solid reporting, recounting the early resistance to flour bleaching by America’s millers as well as by Dr. Harvey Wiley, the first head of the Food and Drug Administration. In the end Dr. Wiley was shown the door, and the FDA became abettors of the food processors’ actions—hampered, as one “honest but resigned” FDA official says in the article—by the onus on the administration to prove a substance is harmful before it can legally bar it from manufacturing. “We’ve practically got to produce a corpse before we can claim they’re poisoning your food,” the FDA agent adds. The author also discusses the history of nitrogen trichloride, which was used to bleach bread in America for 40 years until it was finally shown in studies to cause fits in animals. While the use of the old bleach was discontinued, the process of bleaching was not, and the author excoriates the FDA for allowing the use of a new bleach, chlorine dioxide, that it admits is toxic but “probably safe as normally used” (which, of course, is what it had said about nitrogen trichloride.) A great article debunking the myth of America as the “best-fed nation on Earth.” From the National Police Gazette, 1954. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 75. 

Continue reading →
Historical Archives

The Heart in Chronic Malnutrition

By J. Higginson, A.D. Gillanders, and J.F. Murray

Summary: A comprehensive review, reprinted from the April 1952 issue of the British Heart Journal, documenting heart lesions caused by malnutrition among Bantu adults in South Africa. In all twelve fatal cases studied, “the hearts were dilated and hypertrophied,” the authors note—a “distinctive pathological pattern” they attributed squarely to malnutrition. Specifically, the high-carbohydrate Bantu diet, along with B vitamin deficiencies, are implicated. From the British Heart Journal, 1952. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 74.

Continue reading →