And The Biggest Loser of Season 7 on the reality show …. will have to wait to be revealed on tomorrow night’s episode. However, in 1941 the biggest loser was a 479-pound woman who lost 300 pounds in 18 months as noted in the Journal of the American Medical Association, reported the AP story in El Dorado’s Aug. 13, 1941 edition of the Daily News.
By following a diet under medical supervision, Dr. James J. Short of New York, said that the unnamed woman lost the weight without injury to health. She was just fine – if you don’t count the spell when she could barely walk. Since that was quickly remedied, the doctor concluded, that there apparently is no limit to the amount of excess weight which can be safely removed.
The past few years, contestants on “The Biggest Loser” have lost similarly fantastic amounts of weight while learning better eating habits and exercising for hours every day – all under close medical supervision.
But in 1941, weight-loss clubs, programs and gurus remained few. Only after World War II, in 1948, did the country see the formation of TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly) followed by Overeaters Anonymous in 1960 and Weight Watchers in 1963. Those with weight problems before W.W.II suffered the onslaught of what would be politically incorrect today.
For instance on Aug. 7, 1941 the Daily News carried an AP story quoting author Nina Wilcox Putnam. She said that women who allowed themselves to grow unattractively obese should be punished by law. “They should be spanked in public and made to apologize to themselves and their husbands. And everybody who looks at them,” she said underscoring her point.
Putnam qualified her startling declaration by excluding women suffering glandular or other ailments conducive to obesity. “But, women who make a minor ailment an alibi for not reducing should be penalized,” she said, speaking from the arrogance of the recent weight loss victor.
Putnam had just completed two months of a rejuvenating program “And before I am through I’ll look like 18 instead of 59, which I am,” she boldly declared.
Putnam initially weighed 187.75 pounds. She dropped to 152 and expected to weigh only 140 when finished. The loss had all been done under a purely scientific treatment program. She refused medicines or diets, according to the story.
“Now women will wonder why I ever got so fat in the first place. Well, I was injured in a hurricane in New England in 1938 and was laid up and inactive for two years. But the minute I was well, I went to work on myself.”
Of course, even then, in an era with different parameters for political correctness, her words created a furor.
Some women approved what she said. Others took exception to her views as an infringement on personal matters. Putnam re-asserted that she meant all she said about punishment for women who grow fat – she never said anything about fat men.
But then Putnam – who wrote for Hollywood movies – was sure every woman could be glamorous and charming. To that end she promised to campaign for free beauty clinics.
“I’m tired of only the rich having advantages,” she said. “I want them available to every woman. As we have medical clinics, we can have beauty clinics. Beauty culture is no longer the prerogative of the rich, any more than medical attention.”
Incidentally, Putnam also advocated for exercise, proper diet and cleanliness.
Unfortunately, the free beauty clinics never materialized, but her free advice remains the standard for losing weight: exercise and maintain a proper diet.
Cleanliness won’t shed any pounds, but it sure helps appearances.
(A foot-dragging, weight watcher, Joan Hershberger is a reporter at the News-Times.)