Customer Reviews

The Great Starvation Experiment: The Heroic Men Who Starved so That Millions Could Live

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In the final months of World War II, thirty-six Americans were held in a bunker hidden away from the public. They were systematically starved until they had lost a quarter of their weight. The men suffered a range of symptoms (aside from extreme weight loss) including incapacitating weakness and constant headaches. One man chopped off three of his fingers to escape the agony. The Americans were starved under the supervision of a doctor who was conducting an experiment.

Sounds like a tale of Nazi atrocities, but Todd Tucker's Great Starvation Experiment is about a group of conscientious objectors who volunteered for this experiment in order to learn how best to aid the recovery of starvation victims. The doctor in charge, Ancel Keys, later became famous for discovering the relationship between fatty diets and heart disease.

In addition to covering the experiment itself, Tucker gives us a biography of Dr. Keys, a short history of the conscientious objector in America, and brings up the question of ethics in medicine. After the Nuremberg Trials, the Nuremberg Code was written, an international document detailing standards governing medical experimentation on humans. U.S. doctors refused to accept the code, claiming they were already bound by their own extremely high standards. Tucker presents evidence that not all American doctors felt bound by personal and professional ethics and conducted some rather alarming and harmful experiments on people, usually without their knowledge.

The Great Starvation Experiment is readable and entertaining. It was so readable, with snippets of conversation and anecdotes, that I began to doubt its reliability. But the extensive bibliography, detailed notes, and many interviews convinced me that this is a complete and factual story of a little-known episode of the World War II homefront.

"The Great Starvation Experiment" is a fascinating telling of a little-known piece of American history. While a previous reviewer lambasted the author for giving histories of Dr. Ancel Keys, conscientious objectors, historic peace churches, the Civilian Public Service, and the Experiment volunteers, I found that background information absolutely essential to understand how and why the experiment occurred. Without a basic knowledge of the aforementioned, the Starvation Experiment would seem hardly distinguishable from the sadistic medical experimentations that took place in Nazi concentration camps. As it was, 36 idealistic young men volunteered without pay for an entire year to be systematically starved in order to provide the data that would enable relief workers to rehabilitate famine victims most effectively. Truly, it's a page-turning story of peaceable heroes,

For more information, listen to the author, Todd Tucker's interview on the Diane Rehm show. I believe that you can listen to previously recorded programs online.

As the veterans of World War II begin their inevitiable departure folks realize that if they're going to honor them it'd better be soon. The same goes for a different kind of war hero, the conscientious objectors who were willing not only to stand up for their beliefs in the face of overwhelming disdain, but were just as willing to risk their lives to serve humanity through Civilian Public Service.

Over the years I've met some of the Brethren, Mennonites, Friends, and others who refused to serve because of their religious beliefs. They were anything but cowards. Some pioneered the science of Smoke Jumping, others exposed the abuses of nuring homes and asylums, while many served as medical guinea pigs.

I met one of the latter about fifteen years ago, a man named Carlysle Frederick, who once admitted under questioning that he'd taken part in the starvation experiment. I wrote a few articles about him, but I always felt the story needed to be widely known.

Thank heavens for this book. The author has done his homework, and carefully examines the ethical questions that undergird what was a daring and almost brutal experiment which has, as the subtitle suggests, saved millions of lives over the year.

One cannot read this book without admiring both the calm and measured religious convictions of the three historic peace churches, the Brethren, the Mennonites, and the Friends, as well as the many others from other traditions.

The heroism of the participants, the extreme privations they endured, and their good humor, all deriving from their desire to serve humanity during their service through CPS, is worth honoring as another way to be patriotic.

For those who want to know more about CPS and related forms of service for peace, I also recommend the book A Cup of Cold Water, by J. Kenneth Kreider.

Frank Ramirez

Interesting book on a little-known study conducted on 36 men who offered themselves as volunteers to study the effects of starvation and the best way to rehabilitate starvation victims.

Unfortunately, it was a bit of a disappointment, given that only 2-3 chapters really deal with the experiment itself, its ethical implications, etc. The others deal with historical context (which is very interesting, but I could've read a history book if that was what I was looking for), history of starvation, history of the Peace Churches (again: interesting, but not what I was looking for in a book with this title), Ancel Key's life & accomplishments, etc.

I also missed more excerpts from the subjects' journals as firsthand account of what was going on, instead of the oftentimes-novelesque narration.

Nope it's not about anorexia, but it is fascinating! All manner of details about hunger, calorie restrictions, who loses weight, who doesn't, and why! This study, run by Dr. Alan Keys (who also invented the K ration) is the seminal (and only) work on human starvation. This book is its story and the story of the men who participated to make the study possible. As someone who is firmly opposed to the taking of any life I can relate to the characters motivations and be inspired by their perserverence.

Mr. Tucker does a wonderful job of bringing all the characters to life. One stylistic trick I really enjoyed was his blending of characters' colorful descriptions right into the authors narrative so that for a moment the narrative becomes an illustration of the attitude of the person being discussed.

Highly Recomended

-Ian

History writers often fail at the task of presenting great stories in an interesting, organized and readable form. Todd Tucker has not failed in this account of a little-known chapter in the great story of World War II. He presents the work of Dr. Ancel Keys, a University of Minnesota scientist who used the unique combination of circumstances presented by the availability of volunteer conscientious objectors, military funding and the looming famine in Europe to study the multiple effects of starvation.

The success of the book is the easy flow of the story of the men who starved for science and the background of the times. The reader is informed of the history of pacifism, the politics of promoting democracy in Europe, the state of research ethics, and the backdrop of the war while following the personal stories of the men in the study. This a case of great editing.

It becomes clear that a similar study of starvation could not be done today. Perhaps the biggest reason is that it would be difficult to find a group that possessed the motivation, dedication, and altruism that these men displayed.

Whenever my son Ron comes for a visit as he did this past July 4th, we have an official exchange of the books routine within about the first 5 minutes he is here. Of the 4 books he brought me this time, I started reading with this one.

The Great Starvation Experiment was intended to see what is the best way to help war-torn starving refugees or any large group of people that have had their food sources stopped for so long due to natural disasters, etc. that they are literally starving. The experiment itself was started during World War II but didn't finish in time for the end of the war, obviously you don't keep a war going just for the sake of experimentation. During the draft of World War II the powers that be tried to keep Conscientious Objectors out of sight and busy on conservation projects or helping out places like mental hospitals. But for some pacifists, it was not enough that they could do for the cause of peace. Then Dr. Keys, the inventor of the K rations, came up with the plan for the starvations experiment. He found close to 40 conscientious objectors who were willing, at great personal sacrifice, to become part of an experiment on starvation and how to restore starving people to health.

After finding his initial young, physically fit men, Dr. Keys spent the first three months of the experiment, gathering health data on their general fitness and how many calories it took for them to maintain their normal weight. The men on average were 5' 10" tall and weight on average 165 pounds. The had to walk 22 miles a week on top of the walking involved to get to the dining room and the exercises on the fitness machines that measured them. At this point the men were consuming around 3000 calories a day depending on the man as each diet was structured individually to the man's size.

The next six months was the starvation part of the experiment. From the very first day of the this part of the experiment the men were cut down to around 1500 calories a day plus all the water and coffee they wanted to drink. They had to maintain their physical exercise including the 22 miles of walking a week. The exercise to simulate the activities of people having to rebuild their lives following war or natural disasters. The men dropped on average 25% of their body weight during the six months. As the men got hungrier and hungrier, a buddy system had to be instituted to be sure that no one was cheating on the diet. If they dropped a pea while eating, they grabbed it up off the floor and ate it. Any food given to them was not wasted and the men literally licked their plates clean. As the weeks and months moved along, they began to care less and less about world events and the only things they could focus on was food and looking forward to the end of the 6 month starvation phase and getting to recovery phase.

However the recovery phase wasn't what they were expecting. This was actually the most important part of the experiment as Dr. Keys needed to see how many calories it took for a starving person to regain their strength and interest in life so the men were divided into groups and only got intermittent increases in their diets of a set amount of calories. Although the men slowly began to gain strength back, they were still focused on food, especially those who were only getting an extra 400 calories a day. The war was winding down and so was the experiment time when Dr. Keys realized that what the men needed to recover fully was food and as much as they wanted. When given back their full diets, the men quickly recovered their strength and interest in usual activities.

Space does not allow me to tell more about the book. It is fascinating reading and I urge you to read it. This was an experiment that due to the special circumstances of it, can never be repeated again. The data and book published from this study is still the authoritative guide to starvation and eating. These were immensely brave men who went through this experiment. In its way it does answer many things about diets for me. No wonder when someone tries to go on a 1000-1500 calorie diet that have trouble succeeding, as they are literally trying to starve their body to death and the body will refuse to cooperate. All the person will do is think about food and will do whatever it takes to eat food.

While this book deals with medical problems and issues, it is discussed in layman's words and is very understandable. You will find the individual stories of the men fascinating and enjoy hearing the updates on them as most lived to old age.

This book is really three-books-in-one: information on conscientious objectors and how they played a part in the war effort doing alternate duties; biographical background on the primary researcher, Dr. Ancel Keys; and details about the Starvation experiment.

I first read about conscientious objectors participating in experiments earlier this year in Andrew Sean Greer's The Story of a Marriage; however, I learned much more from The Great Starvation Experiment, which covers the topic in much greater detail. About 36 male participants were involved at the start. Initially, they were supposed to decrease their weight by about 25%, "starve" for about six months, and then gradually increase their weight during what they called the recovery phase. One of the most interesting aspects of the study was the affect food deprivation had on test subjects' mental health, which was tracked along with a long list of physical factors. In spite of many non-participants' beliefs the experiment was too harsh, most of the men reported that, given the chance to rethink their decision, they would do it again. In an attempt to make the experiment realistic and the results applicable to the real world, one of the researchers' goals being to figure out how to increase the body weight of persons suffering from starvation, they chose the same types of foods starving persons might eat. Because the level of self-discipline required and the stakes were so high, participants were forced to remain on the Notre Dame campus so they could be closely monitored. Those that cheated were dropped from the experiment. In spite of the fact that the book's scope went beyond the limits of its title, it provides enough excellent and comprehensive information about starvation, the experiment, conscientious objectors, and Dr. Ancel Keys, to make it worth the read. Further reading: The Story of a Marriage by Andrew Sean Greer, Execution by Hunger by Miron Dolot and The Big Show in Bololand (though very long and textbookish) by Bertrand M. Patenaude.

I found this to be an enjoyable and informative read.

There were, however, two errors. The author confuses the cornea with the sclera; and neglects to correct Ancel Key's impression that cannibalism does not occur in China - reference "Hungry Ghosts" by Jasper Becker.

The Great Starvation Experiment is a great read! The doctor and the men involved were courageous. The contribution that these men and Dr. Keys made to mankind and science is amazing. It had to be very hard to do what they did; starve themselves and watch what happened.

The author delivers the story of this experiment with an intelligent writing style. He covers the scientific and ethical reasons for reasons for the experiment. The personal stories of the men (guinea pigs) makes their experience come to life for the reader. There is humor and sadness.
Starvation has always been a threat to man. It is interesting to see starvation faced head on - on purpose!

I recommend this book to anyone interested in history, medicine, nutrition, science, conscientious objectors or WWII.