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Show I WHAT to EAT and WHY i -aUdta1 (fOUcll55 Noted Food - Authority Relates the Miracle of VITAMINS and Explains Why YOU MUST EAT THEM or DIE O o By C. HOUSTON GOUDISS 6 East 39th St., New York. WE LIVE in the most inspiring age the world has ever known. Chemists grow plants without soil. Doctors snatch men from death with insulin. Surgeons perform incredibly in-credibly delicate brain operations. And thanks to the amazing amaz-ing discoveries of nutritional scientists, children enter the world with far better chances for long and happy lives, while men and women of seventy are more active and useful than their grand- Much of the hard - won knowledge of how to eat so as to increase efficiency, curb disease, and improve the chances for longevity is due to the discovery of vitamins. VITAMINS DISCOVERED Twenty-six years ago, a now-famous now-famous scientist walked nervously around his labora-tory, labora-tory, back and fx " S forth back a n d 1 1 forth. He was con- ' t ducting a nutrition f" Yjf experiment of vast I i importance. H e I ' f didn't quite know k v l what he was going kfe to find, but he be- ! I lieved that he was n ' on the verge of a toaaJkfi! iai revolutionary food discovery. The scientist was my friend, Casimir Funk, a brilliant Polish bio-chemist. He had been working work-ing on the problem for many years. At last, in the year 1912, his experiments were positive and conclusive. Then he announced to the scientific world that he had discovered a vital force. "This force," said Funk, "I have called vitamine, because it is necessary to life." Thus, the word "vitamin" came into being, along with the first knowledge of these minute but powerful factors which exert such a tremendous influence on human health and happiness. SPARK PLUGS OF NUTRITION Other bio-chemists throughout the world including Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins in England, and Hart, Humphrey, Babcock, Steen-bock Steen-bock and McCollum in the United States had been working on the same problem that Funk had partially par-tially solved. They knew that the first step was to find out how vitamins vita-mins affected the human body, and that the second step was to discover what foods contained these vital substances. And so there began a long series se-ries of experiments in the laboratories labora-tories of great universities all over the world, which demonstrated demonstrat-ed what happens when a diet is deficient in any of the vitamins, and proved that if laboratory animals ani-mals are wholly deprived of vitamins vita-mins for a short time they will die. These experiments are of the utmost ut-most significance to every home-maker, home-maker, because the same thing happens to human beings as to experimental animals. Today our knowledge of vitamins has progressed pro-gressed to such a degree that it is possible to state the exact requirement re-quirement for most of the vitamins vita-mins and to designate the foods from which adequate quantities can be obtained. RESISTANCE AND VITAMIN A To date, six vitamins have been identified. Vitamin A promotes growth and builds resistance to disease. It is necessary for the health of the mucous membranes of the body and helps to guard against infections of the respiratory respira-tory and alimentary tracts. It influences in-fluences the health of the hair and skin, is necessary to prevent a serious eye disorder known as night blindness, and is essential for the formation of healthy teeth. Vitamin A is found in milk, butter, but-ter, margarine that has been reinforced re-inforced with vitamin A concentrate, concen-trate, egg yolk, cod-liver oil, thin green leaves and yellow fruits and vegetables such as carrots, sweet potatoes, apricots and bananas. APPETITE AND VITAMIN B Vitamin B promotes appetite, aids digestion, prevents a serious nerve disorder. It is essential to the maintenance of a good digestion, diges-tion, which is vitally important if the body is to obtain full benefit from the food consumed. This vitamin is closely related to the energy metabolism, and the requirement re-quirement increases with the rate of growth and with Increased energy en-ergy expenditure, so that growing children and working men and women should receive very generous gen-erous amounts. Vitamin B is found in yeast, whole wheat cereals, oatmeal, milk, fresh and dried peas and beans, spinach, cabbage and other greens, egg yolk and liver. VITAMIN C FOR TEETH, GUMS Vitamin C plays an important part in regulating body processes, and prevents the dread disease of scurvy. A lack of this essential vitamin vi-tamin results in profound changes in the structure of the teeth and gums, may be responsible for hemorrhages occurring anywhere in the body, and for the degeneration degenera-tion of muscle fibers generally. Vitamin C is most abundant in succulent fresh green leaves, such as green cabbage. It is also found in onions, potatoes,, oranges, tomatoes, to-matoes, green peppers, bananas and strawberries. . In most foods, it is easily destroyed by heat that is why it is so important to include some fresh raw foods in the diet daily. VITAMIN D AND RICKETS Vitamin D is sometimes called the sunshine vitamin because it can be manufactured in the body through the action of direct sunlight sun-light on the skin. This is the vitamin vita-min that is necessary for the proper utilization of calcium and phosphorus in building bones and teeth. When it is lacking in the diet of infants, there develops that horrible disease known as rickets, in which the bones become soft and twisted, resulting in pitiful deformities knock knees, bow legs, pigeon breast. In foods, vitamin D is only found in appreciable amounts in fish-liver oils and egg yolk. That is why every homemaker should be so grateful to the scientists who labored to discover how to concentrate con-centrate this precious vitamin from fish-liver oils and add it to foods, or to increase the vitamin D content of foods through irradiation. irradi-ation. ANTI-STERILITY VITAMIN E Vitamin E comes in for less discussion dis-cussion than the others, because its significance to nutrition has not been fully determined. It does, however, appear to be necessary for successful reproduction and is found especially in wheat germ and lettuce. VITAMIN G PROLONGS YOUTH Vitamin G is necessary for growth and for the maintenance of health and vigor at all ages. It helps to ward off old age by prolonging the vigorous middle years. It is essential to the health of the skin, and recent experiments experi-ments demonstrate that cataracts in the eyes may be due to a deficiency de-ficiency of this vitamin, which Is found in yeast, and in liver, kidneys, kid-neys, egg yolk, milk, cheese and green leafy vegetables. One authority claims that chronic disorders of the throat, stomach, lungs, colon, heart and kidneys may be traced to vitamin and mineral deficiencies. Certainly enough has been learned of vitamin chemistry to make clear that the homemaker fails in her duty who does not provide pro-vide vitamins in abundance for every member of her family. Both Building, Maintaining 1 Family Health TN THE C. Houston Goudiss articles that have appeared weekly in this newspaper previous pre-vious to this one, the nationally known food authority has described de-scribed FOOD, as it provides the key to mental and physical power; PROTEINS, the foods you cannot live without; CARBOHYDRATES CAR-BOHYDRATES and FATS, foods that provide motive power pow-er for the body machinery; and MINERAL SALTS, that you must have in order to build strong bones, healthy nerves and rich, red blood. These subjects have been treated in an interesting and understandable manner, free of scientific terms, principally offering of-fering advice to the housewife that will aid her in the problem of feeding the members of her family such foods as will build and maintain their health. Every one of these articles has a definite place in your scrapbook for future reference. If you have missed any of these discussions, the publisher of this newspaper will supply them upon your request. If you have not already done so, start a department of these informative informa-tive articles in your scrapbook at once! children and adults depend upon you for their food supply. It lies within your power to help them to health and happiness or condemn them to weakness, illness and sorrow. sor-row. Do not fail them. See to it that every member of your household house-hold your children, the wags earners, the middle aged and the elderly get enough vitamins to afford them the health that science sci-ence has placed within their grasp. WNU C. Houston Goudiss 1938. |