The Great Masticator

dr.bob · 268660. Thu Jan 31, 2008 9:41 am

At the risk of dredging up one of Flash's long lost relatives, surely there's some mileage to be gotten out of the Great Masticator: Horace Fletcher (1849-1919).

Fletcher is described as "a well known and influential food and health faddist" in the USA at the start of the 20th century. He espoused the theory that excessive chewing of food was a good way to improve health. At the time, there was already a movement suggesting that each mouthful should be chewed 32 times (one mastication for every tooth, for some reason). However, Fletcher would take this philosophy to a new extreme.

The self-titled "Fletcherism" held that a mouthful of food should be chewed until it turned to liquid and "swallowed itself." This behaviour was supposed to prevent overeating, reduce food intake, and therefore save money, by allowing a person to eat "less food for the same amount of appetite" (though they may just have got bored of all this bloody chewing). He also claimed that the food's flavours would be "more pleasing" and "an increased secretion of digestive fluids enhanced utilization of meals."

Fletcher was inspired to begin his crusade when he had an application for life insurance rejected on the grounds of obesity. He himself lost over 60 pounds with his regime, though this might have something to do with his philosophy that any food that cannot be reduced to liquid (like fibre) should not be chewed in the first place. Existing on a fibre-free diet lead to constipation

personal speculation {and doubtless greatly affected the body's ability to process the food, thereby leading to weight loss.}

According to his obituary in the NY Times, during the first world war he worked as a food economist for the Commission for Relief in Belgium where he taught his mastication technique to "the 8,000,000 starving Belgians to get the full nourishment from their food." The obit also mentions that, early in 1912, he had "subsisted on a diet of potatoes for fifty-eight days." Sadly it neglects to mention why :)

s:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9693596
http://tinyurl.com/ywsekc
http://www.thehistoryof.net/the-history-of-dieting.html
http://tinyurl.com/yqcsy7

Flash · 268693. Thu Jan 31, 2008 10:42 am

We did him, under D for Diets, but he didn't make the cut. post 57767 has details and a great photo which I was sorry we weren't able to use: a device for Fletcherists to count their chews.

The guy in the photo was very excited at the prospect of being on TV, and I was sorry we didn't deliver for him because he's obviously a genius.