Category Archives: Historical Archives

Historical Archives

Dr. Royal Lee—A Thumbnail Sketch

By L. Jewell

Summary:  In today’s world of super specialization, it is almost impossible to fathom the breadth of Dr. Royal Lee’s accomplishments. While he is widely hailed as one of the most knowledgeable nutritionists of his day, Dr. Lee was also a wildly successful engineer, inventor, and manufacturer. From 1927 to 1962, he earned nearly seventy patents for his inventions, which included everything from electric motors to the low-temperature manufacturing equipment needed to make his revolutionary raw-food supplements. In 1944, as Dr. Lee neared his fiftieth birthday, author Lee Jewell wrote the following biographical overview detailing some of those inventions, including the famous Lee Motor Governor, which allowed silent movies to become “talkies” and was a critical piece of the famous Norden bombsight, credited with tipping the scales in World War II. Dr. Lee’s ability to not just comprehend ideas but transform them into effective application is what made him truly unique in the field of nutrition. While mainstream scientists and medical authorities argued over the value of hypothetical nutritional therapies, Dr. Lee was busy creating products that actually helped people regain their health. Reprinted by the The Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1944.

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Historical Archives

Dr. Lee Wins Price Ruling

By the Vitamins Product Company

Summary: During World War II, government-enforced price controls dictated what various items and commodities could be sold for. When federal agents prosecuted Dr. Royal Lee for selling the famously nutritious whole-wheat flour from Deaf Smith County, Texas, at a cost beyond the control price for ordinary flour, Dr. Lee fought back in federal court and won, as described in the newspaper account preserved here. Also included is a commentary on the incident by Dr. Lee, attributed to his business The Vitamin Products Company. From The Milwaukee Journal, 1946.

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Historical Archives

Dr. Brady’s Health Talk

By William Brady, MD

Summary: Dr. William Brady was a medical doctor with a popular syndicated newspaper column in the 1940s and ’50s. Here he discusses the link between physical degeneration and nutritional deficiencies resulting from the consumption of refined and processed foods. While we tend to think of the poor as most prone to malnutrition, Brady points out, in his characteristically biting manner, that it is actually the wealthy in America who are most susceptible. “Most Americans, particularly the well-to-do class, suffer from poor nutritional condition and are too dumb to realize what ails them,” he writes. For “anyone who purports to be informed,” Brady recommends as required reading the books Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, by Dr. Weston Price, Studies in Deficiency Disease, by Sir Robert McCarrison, MD, and The National Malnutrition, by Dr. D.T. Quigley. Sound advice still. From the Lincoln Sunday Journal and Star, 1950. Reprinted by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research.

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Historical Archives

Do You Want to Lose the Hair on Your Chest?

By Dr. Royal Lee and unknown author

Summary: Two articles featuring quotes and commentary by Dr. Royal Lee that contrast the incredible nutritional value of butter with the equally incredible lack of nutritional value of “oleomargarine” (what we call simply margarine today). In particular, the relationship between vitamin E and pubescent development is discussed, with Dr. Lee reminding readers that “sex development demands vitamin E, and butter is our main source in the American diet.” Dr. Lee presents photos of boys and girls demonstrating the failure of sexual differentiation to occur as a result of nutrient starvation. He also discusses the vital roles of the vitamin F and D complexes—both found naturally and in their entirety in butter but not in margarine—in assimilating and distributing calcium in the body. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 59, 1948. Multiple original sources. 

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Historical Archives

Diseases as Deficiencies via the Soil

By Dr. William A. Albrecht

Summary: In this article world-renowned soil scientist William Albrecht, former Chairman of the Department of Soils at the University of Missouri, connects the dots between unhealthy soil created by unsustainable farming practices and deficiency-related disease. “The degenerative diseases of the modern world,” Albrecht says, “need to be traced not only to the supplies in the food and feed market where the family budget may provoke them but a bit farther and closer to their origin, namely the fertility of the soil, the point at which all agricultural production takes off.” From the Iowa State University Veterinarian, 1950. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 37A.

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Historical Archives

A Discussion of the Forms of Blood Calcium

By Dr. Royal Lee and William A. Hanson

Summary: This booklet is an authoritative presentation on the metabolism of calcium in the blood. It outlines the specific influence of various vitamins, such as vitamins F and D, on the movement and activity of calcium. There is more calcium in the body than all the other minerals added together; this is an important overview on the biochemical flow of our most abundant mineral. Includes a large chart of the flow of calcium throughout the body. Published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1942.

View PDF: A Discussion of the Forms of Blood Calcium

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Historical Archives

Discovery of the Anticancerous Properties of the “F” Vitamine (Reptiline)

By Professor Humberto Aviles

Summary: A sweeping report on the special properties of vitamin F, a complex of essential fatty acids (linolenic acid, linoleic acid, arachidonic adic) that was first identified in 1929 by Drs. Burr and Burr. Though medical and government authorities never recognized the F complex as a vitamin, the author of this paper, along with many other clinicians and particularly Dr. Royal Lee, conducted significant experiments over many decades to prove its presence and effect in the human body. (Today linolenic and linoleic acids are acknowledged by conventional science as the “essential fatty acids.”) Here Professor Aviles, in discussing his own clinical application of vitamin F in relieving pain in cancer patients, presents an extensive review of peer-reviewed literature on vitamin F from around the world, including research in Germany, England, Russia, and the United States. In addition to numerous references, Aviles includes a fascinating time line of the research on fatty acids and cancer from 1924 to 1953. From the Center of Investigations of Medicinal Plants and Animals (Mexico), 1953. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research special reprint 12-53.

View PDF: Discovery of the Anticancerous Properties of the “F” Vitamine (Reptiline)

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Historical Archives

The Dietary Regimen in the Treatment of Renal Calculi

By Charles C. Higgins, MD

Summary: Excerpts from a review of studies investigating the connection between vitamin A deficiency and renal calculi, or kidney stones. This is one of the earliest tracts showing the critical role of vitamin A in the health of the kidneys. Although pH is discussed, the main thrust of the report concerns studies—conducted in the U.S., Africa, China, and other parts of Asia—all reaching the conclusion that vitamin A deficiency leads to renal calculi and lesions. From The Journal-Lancet, 1938. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 5. 

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Historical Archives

Low Blood Sugar and Susceptibility to Polio

By Benjamin P. Sandler, MD

Summary: In this excerpt from his book Diet Prevents Polio, physician, nutritionist, and polio expert Dr. Benjamin Sandler explains how he came to believe, based on years of clinical observation, that susceptibility to infection by the polio virus (and other disease) is determined by quality of diet. “Specifically,” he writes, “I suspected that children and adults contracted polio because of low blood sugar brought on by a diet containing sugar and starch.” To read about the science behind Dr. Sandler’s theory—and how high-carbohydrate diets set humans up for infection and disease in general—see Diet Prevents Polio in its entirety within these archives. From Diet Prevents Polio, published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1951. 

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Historical Archives

The Low-Carb Diet That Prevented Polio

Summary: In the summer of 1948, the polio epidemic was raging across the United States, and it was hitting the city of Asheville, North Carolina, particularly hard. Parents had been ordered to keep their children quarantined in their homes, and residents were even advised to leave the state if possible. Among the town’s citizens was Dr. Benjamin Sandler, one of the few medical doctors of the time who recognized the profound connection between malnutrition and disease. Dr. Sandler’s research had convinced him that a diet high in refined sugar and starch was setting the stage for the polio infections (as well as many other illnesses). With his belief far too “radical” for public-health officials to even consider, Dr. Sandler took his case to the local newspapers and radio stations, who were convinced enough to report his theory and his proposed polio-prevention diet to the public. The story quickly went national, and rates of the disease proceeded to drop as people across the country started following the diet. (See chapter 7 of Diet Prevents Polio for a detailed discussion of the results.) Sadly and predictably, the medical field refused to acknowledge the efficacy of Dr. Sandler’s diet, leaving the sampling of newspaper clips here to document the “diet that prevented polio.” Reprinted by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research. Multiple original sources. 

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Historical Archives

Diet Frights—Sign of the Times

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: “How long will it be before we realize the simple truth that the health of every individual depends upon his nutritional status?” So writes Dr. Royal Lee in making the obvious—yet still criminally ignored—correlation between the emergence of heart disease, cancer, and other “modern” diseases and the introduction of industrial food processing and refining, which turned white sugar, white flour, and hydrogenated fats into the foundation of our food supply. “Is any satellite, atomic bomb or guided missile so likely to jeopardize our health as the certainty that insidious food tampering assuredly sucks away, like greedy quicksand, at the very foundation of our health?” Dr. Lee asks ominously. From Let’s Live magazine, 1958.

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Historical Archives

Cost of Malnutrition

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: In this creative and forward-thinking commentary on preventive healthcare, Dr. Royal Lee discusses the ways in which proper nutrition saves businesses money by fostering employee health. Getting enough vitamin A complex, for instance, helps maintain the integrity of mucous membranes and thus prevents infection and lost man hours. Sufficient vitamin B complex keeps the nerves and heart functioning properly, while adequate vitamin C complex promotes stamina by optimizing the oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood. A proper amount of vitamin D complex prevents cramps, irritability, and bone-calcium loss, and so on. From Let’s Live magazine, 1958.

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Historical Archives

Carbohydrate Not Essential

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: “What is refined sugar?” Dr. Royal Lee asks in this provocative excerpt and then answers, “It is pure carbohydrate. [And] is carbohydrate an essential food, a food component without which we could not live? It certainly is not.” Today people are picking up on the fact that while there are essential fats and there are essential amino acids (the building blocks of proteins), there is no such thing as an essential carbohydrate. The content here is excerpted from the 1952 article “This Molasses War—Who Is Prevaricating,” in which Dr. Lee expounds on the critical difference between whole-food sweeteners and refined ones. From Let’s Live magazine, 1952. Reprinted by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research.

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Historical Archives

Developmental Malformation in Man and Other Animals: A Bibliography with Introduction

By Howard H. Hillemann, PhD

Summary: In the introduction to this bibliography of over 200 references, Dr. Howard Hillemann speaks of the evolution of humankind’s beliefs about disease and bodily defects, from early notions attributing such abnormalities to “divine visitation” to the idea, as of 1957, that such disorders are the result of a combination of genes and environment. Regarding the latter, Hilleman points out, “Proper nutrition is the most important single factor in the prevention of disease or in the recovery therefrom” and presents a list of references supporting this claim. While much of the content cited is no longer in print, merely perusing the categories and titles of the papers of the bibliography is “impressively educational in itself,” Hillemann writes. Published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, reprint 66C, circa 1957.

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Historical Archives

The Despotic Misuse of Our Federal Pure Food Law

By Dr. Royal Lee

Summary: Publishing this piece was a tremendous act of courage by Dr. Royal Lee. In it, he exposes the methods used by government agencies to suppress the natural-nutrition movement and subordinate nutritional science to medical consensus in spite of the fact that medical authorities have never trained in nor respected the field of nutrition. In fact, these authorities have historically acted as apologists for food adulterators and persecutors of whole-food advocates. Lee also debunks FDA attack statements on “food faddists” and organic-farming advocates. Published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1957.

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Historical Archives

Correctable Systemic Disorders Indicated by Presence of Salivary Calculus

By John E. Waters, DDS

Summary: An excellent nutritional piece positing dental plaque as a precursor to cancer. “Both the medical and dental professions in general consider pyorrhea alveolaris [gum inflammation and loosening of teeth] as a disease per se and treat it primarily from the local disease angle. That is wrong. Pyorrhea is but a single symptom of a systemic disease caused by glandular abnormalities. Local treatment but reduces the obvious symptoms; it does not affect the basic systemic disease. That which follows is based on observations during over forty years of general dental practice, and on over thirty years of special attention paid to certain aspects rarely if ever commented on in connection with dental calculus [tartar].” Published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1964.

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Historical Archives

The Composition and Nutritive Value of Flour

By H.M. Sinclair

Summary: With the invention of the steel roller mill in the late nineteenth century came the widespread availability of “70-percent extracted” flour—or refined flour, as we know it today. The 30 percent of the wheat grain left behind in refined flour’s production comprises mostly the bran and germ, which happen to contain almost all the food’s vitamins and minerals. In countries that historically relied on bread for their health, such as Great Britain, this was a major problem, and for years a debate raged over what to do about it. On one side there were the “chemical” nutritionists, who proposed doctoring 70-percent flour with synthetic versions of the “token nutrients”—that is, the handful of vitamins and minerals deemed most depleted during refining. Opposing them, as reflected in this 1957 lecture to the Royal Society of Health by Dr. Hugh Sinclair, were the more “naturalist” nutritionists. Since not all the nutrients provided by wheat were known nor the way they function truly understood, Dr. Sinclair says, a wiser course would be to mandate a minimum, higher extraction rate of wheat—as the British government had done during World War II—so that the nutrient-dense germ at least was included. “There have been very many tests on the lower animals of the two types of flour,” he adds, “and it is acknowledged that rats grow better on flour of high extraction than on [chemically] ‘fortified’ white flour.” Unfortunately, facts such as these—like the old-school-nutrition researchers who presented them—were simply ignored as the age of chemical nutrition prevailed. From The Journal of the Royal Society for the Promotion of Health, 1957. Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research reprint 38.

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Historical Archives

The Commoner Forms of Pruritus Ani Considered Eutrophically

By N. Philip Norman, MD

Summary: Pruritus ani is a condition marked by intense and chronic itching in the anal area. Here, Dr. Philip Norman, celebrated New York City physician and author of Chronic Idiopathic Ulcerative Colitis, explores the various nutritional causes and treatments of this difficult condition. This is a splendid example of how far back some medical doctors embraced a holistic approach to difficult health problems and applied nutritional solutions to great success. Published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, 1965.

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