Who Was Weston A. Price?
By Stanley A. Fishman, author of Tender Grassfed Meat
Who was Dr. Weston A. Price? He was the man who saved my life and restored my health even though he died before I was born.
Dr. Price was a dentist in Cleveland, Ohio. He was a very distinguished dentist who was also the research director of the American Dental Association. After many years of practice, Dr. Price realized that the teeth and health of his patients were getting worse from year to year. Even more disturbing was the fact that each generation of his patients had worse teeth and was sicker than their parents. Dr. Price decided to find out why.
The Question
After several years of research, Dr. Price decided that the problem was caused by the absence of some essential factors from the modern diet. But he did not know what those factors were. Dr. Price did know that many so-called primitive peoples had excellent teeth. In fact, these “primitives†had much better teeth than the “civilized†peoples who had far superior technology. Dr. Price decided to study those people who had excellent teeth.
The Search
Dr. Price decided to travel directly to where these healthy people lived, so he could study them first-hand and learn why they were healthy. Dr. Price traveled all over the world during the 1920s and early 1930s. He visited isolated, healthy people from Switzerland, the Scottish islands, Australia, Africa, Polynesia, Peru, Native Americans in Canada, and others. He also studied the close relatives of each of these peoples, who were not isolated and lived in more “civilized†circumstances.
The Answer
In every case, Dr. Price learned that the traditional people who ate the diet of their ancestors, which consisted of unprocessed foods, from hunting, gathering, herding, fishing, and natural farming had excellent teeth, without cavities, even though they had no dentists. Not only did these people have excellent teeth, they were free of the chronic diseases that were common in civilization. They did not have cancer. They did not have heart disease. They did not have diabetes. They did not have tuberculosis. They had none of the chronic diseases that plagued the so-called civilized world. They also did not have crime or mental illness. They had no need for police or psychiatrists. Their children were born healthy, without defects. Dr. Price also found that members of the same group of people, when they ate a modern diet, had terrible teeth and were plagued by every one of the chronic diseases that were common in more advanced countries. The only difference was what they ate.
The Solution
Dr. Price discovered that the key to good health is to eat a traditional diet of unprocessed food, and to eat the same kinds of foods that the healthy, isolated people ate. Dr. Price discovered that while the diets of these widely scattered peoples were quite different, they had many elements in common. Dr. Price discovered what these elements were, especially the dietary factors that were essential to good health. He recorded his findings in a book entitled Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, which was published in 1939. This book described exactly what people should and should not eat in order to be healthy.
Ignored and Rediscovered
Unfortunately, Dr. Price’s work was largely ignored. However, his work was preserved by the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation, which devoted itself to keeping his book in print, and keeping his knowledge alive. The Weston A. Price Foundation was founded in 1999. They have done a magnificent job of spreading Dr. Price’s knowledge all over the world and the Internet. Sally Fallon, the founder of the Weston A. Price Foundation, wrote Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats, a comprehensive cookbook which teaches the reader to cook traditional food that can restore their health. Nourishing Traditions also explains the teachings of Dr. Price in a way that is easy to understand.
How Weston A. Price Saved My Life
I had been chronically ill for most of my life with many illnesses, including life-threatening asthma. I was told in 1998 that I would only get worse, and that my lungs would never heal. Instead of accepting this medical death sentence, I searched desperately for a way to save my life. The website of the Weston A. Price Foundation gave me all the knowledge I needed. I adopted the Weston A. Price diet and became healthy. Once I switched to grassfed meat, I became robustly healthy. If not for Dr. Price, I do not believe I would be here today to write these words.
You can find out more about Dr. Price here.
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