History List
The importance of sturgeon on the Columbia Was comparable to that of buffalo on the prairies, or whitefish in the forest belt. It was the staple food of the traders:
"Our party, when all together, numbers 60 men, who consume 13 sturgeons per day, weighing from 25 to 250 pounds each."
The Savage Country
January 2, 1802
The full importance of pemmican is understood as a vital survival food that could last "through a winter's scarcity of game and fish. It was his staff of life in a way that bread never was in more civilized parts of the world." Two pounds of pemmican was worth eight pounds of buffalo meat.
The Savage Country
January 5, 1802
"As in the case of fish, enormous quantities of meat were required to sustain a man who ate only flesh. The daily allowance of buffalo meat at Fort George was eight pounds a man. The Canadian voyageur's appetite for fat meat is insatiable." Meat, fat, and pemmican were hunted and stored for long winters at fur trading camps, but some of them were supplemented with summer harvests or traded wild rice. Some even got fat by eating maple syrup.
The Savage Country
January 3, 1803
"The posts in the forest belt subsisted largely on fish. Often, indeed, the traders in the northern departments had no other food at all. Yet, eating nothing but fish the year around, without vegetables or even salt, they were healthier, Mackenzie avers, than the venison eaters of the west." The best fish was the whitefish.
The Savage Country - Rum, Women and Rations
January 2, 1802
The fur traders of the Nor West Company often faced starvation and hunger and would have to boil animal skins for nourishment. However, when even this was unavailable, they could eat herbs or a rock lichen called tripe de roche. When eaten in excess, it weakened the body and led to violent vomiting and acute spasms of the bowels.
The Savage Country - Rum, Women, and Rations
January 2, 1801
I have been eating the natural human dietary regime for over 47 years now. I do not eat anything whatsoever from vegetable sources. The only things veggie I use are spices. My diet is usually 60% fat and 40% protein by calories. I used to eat 80/20 when younger and about twice as much quantity of meat also, but that seems too much energy at my age, which is 71- even though I am very active
Owsley Stanley The Bear Forum Posts
January 5, 1958
"Long ago, when I was young, said Albert Iyahuk, "people were never sick." Now cancer and heart disease were common; one of the causes may be a partial change to Western food. Recent studies by scientists have shown "that the incidence of cancer [among Inuit] has increased significantly following westernization."
Arctic Memories - Return to Diomede
April 15, 1990
Ten walruses were dead. The men pulled the umiak onto the floe, patched the hole, and with amazing speed and precision cut up the 2-ton carcasses. Blood flowed everywhere; piles of steaming guts lay on the ice; men with axes cut heavy-boned skulls to remove the precious ivory tusks. Ivory and a sea of blood; it seemed the essence of the hunt. We loaded the boat to the gunwales with meat, fat, and ivory, and headed for Diomede.
Arctic Memories - Island Between Two Worlds
June 2, 1975
"What is the most important thing in life?" He reflected for a while, then smiled and said: "Seals, for without them we could not live." Seal meat and fat, raw or cooked, was the main food of most Inuit and their sled dogs. The high-calorie blubber gave strength, warmth, and endurance to the people; it heated them from within.
Arctic Memories
March 2, 1578
We lacked fat. The spring caribou were thin after their long migration and our main food, mipku, dried caribou meat, was leathery and lean. We ate pounds of it each day, yet were forever hungry. Living on an exclusive protein, fatless diet took its toll. We tired easily, and after a month developed the first signs of protein poisoning: diarrhea and swollen feet. As soon as we could supplement our lean-meat diet with fat fish, we felt fine again.
Arctic Memories
May 15, 1969
Bruemmer explains the importance of the caribou to the Inuit and reminisces about a hunting trip he took with them. "Caribou meat was eaten fresh, or cut into strips and air-dried for future use. Fat fall caribou, often killed far from camp, were cut up and cached, food for the coming winter."
Arctic Memories - The All-Purpose Caribou
April 15, 1967
"The general conclusion is that cancer patients, particularly those with a high level of blood sugar, should be put on a low carbohydrate diet which should contain little or no sugar."
Find Sugar is Fuel for Cancer - Develops Fastest Where Blood Has High Sugar Content - ADVISE DIET LOW IN CARBOHYDRATES
September 3, 1931
"Sugar was offered to many of the grown people, who disliked it very much, and, to our surprise, the young children were equally averse to it. The fatigued and hungry Eskimaux returned to their boats to take their supper, which consisted of lumps of raw flesh and blubber of seals, birds, entrails, &c.; licking their fingers with great zest"
The Private Journal of Captain G.F. Lyon, of H.M.S. Hecla
July 22, 1824
According to Caption Lyon, the Sadlermiut Inuit board the HMS Hecla and devour some beef, but refuse biscuits. "Some slices were cut off and thrown down to them , and these they instantly devoured with great satisfaction ; but they refused to eat the biscuit which was offered at the same time."
The Private Journal of Captain G.F. Lyon, of H.M.S. Hecla
July 21, 1824
The Sadlermiut were "discovered" in the summer of 1824 by the explorer Captain G.F. Lyon of the Royal Navy. 150 years later, a visit to this island found "Ashore were ancient stone houses, man-high cairns, box-like graves built of large flat stones, and everywhere masses of bleached bones of caribou, walrus, bowhead whale, and seal." The Sadlermiut were killed off by infectious diseases by 1902.
Arctic Memories
July 8, 1824
Settle says about the Inuit "Those beastes, flesh, fishes, and fowles, which they kil, they are meate, drinke, apparel, houses....[they] are contented by their hun∣ting, fishing, and fowling, with rawe flesh and warme bloud, to satisfie their gréedie panches, whiche is their onely glorie."
A true reporte of the laste voyage into the west and northwest regions, &c. 1577. worthily atchieued by Capteine Frobisher of the sayde voyage the first finder and generall With a description of the people there inhabiting, and other circumstances notable. Written by Dionyse Settle, one of the companie in the sayde voyage, and seruant to the Right Honourable the Earle of Cumberland.
March 2, 1577
Superb sea-mammal hunters, Thule-culture Inuit pursued and killed everything, from the small ringed seal to the giant bowhead whale, and, according to archaeologist Robert McGhee of the Canadian Museum of Civilization, they had evolved "a technology more complex than that of any other preindustrial society, which allowed not only an economically efficient but also comfortable way of life throughout arctic North America."
Arctic Memories
June 1, 800
When I first went to stay with Inuit, for weeks and often for months, I had misgivings about living on meat alone. It was not what my culture considered a "balanced diet." Yet common sense told me that since the Inuit were healthy I, too, would be healthy if I ate the meat in their fashion, some cooked, some raw. This turned out to be true, and hunger quickly took care of my ingrained cultural aversion to eating raw meat.
Arctic Memories - The Northernmost People - Arctic Meat
June 1, 1975
Increased consumption of sugar is given as a probable explanation of the increased death rate from diabetes during the last thirty years, in a bulletin issued by the New York City Health Department yesterday.
Diabetes Deaths Rise as Sugar Sales Grow: City Health Department Reports Fatalities Up 50% for Men and 150% for Women in 30 Years.
September 2, 1928
"Sugar is a great source of heat and energy; it is quickly utilized. That is generally known and conceded. Some people think that it is fattening, but candy is like everything else; it isn't the use of a thing that harms, it is the abuse."
Candy Needed in Daily Diet Says Chicago Health Director
November 18, 1928
It almost feels like the #HAES movement was launched in 1930 by The Sugar Institute when you read the following disturbing passages. "Children are led to believe certain essential foods, necessary to build up strong, healthy bodies, are harmful because rats, fed on pre-arranged diets containing the food in question[sugar], fail to thrive." "Treat candy and other forms of sweets as food" "Medical professionals sanction a reasonable place of carbohydrate in the normal diet"
Good News...! Public interest aroused by the Sugar Institute's Advertising campaign is reflected in the news and editorial columns of the nation's newspapers and magazines.
June 13, 1930
"Quacks and pseudo-scientists charged sugar as the cause of many serious ills.... And so today, instead of having merely subdued a hostile force, The Sugar Institute has enlightened the public and converted many opponents to the proper use of sugar."
Removing Prejudice by Telling the Truth
June 10, 1930
Margaret Albrink, Yale: Elevated Triglycerides (TG) - not cholesterol - were associated with increased risk of heart disease. Low-fat, high-carb diets raised TG. Albrink: Ancel Keys' supporters attacked me, "They were so angry!"
LIPOPROTEIN PATTERN AS A FUNCTION OF TOTAL TRIGLYCERIDE CONCENTRATION OF SERUM
March 1, 1961
The Sugar Institute uses a famous doctor to push fears about losing weight. "The craze for thinness is an attempt to modify the process of nature." It's almost amazing to hear the same arguments today. "In reducing, decrease the quantity of all foods, but enjoy variety."
Reducing may ruin good looks - Extreme dieting is also dangerous to health
January 6, 1930
The Sugar Institute pushes a lie that "The "dead tired" feeling can be avoided by eating or drinking a wholesome sweet food such as a soda fountain beverage, ice cream, candy, or sweet cakes. These are quickly digested and the energy in the sugar is quickly available to renew vigor."
It's very easy to catch cold when you are tired out - Before going home from work eat or drink something sweet and see how this nourishment "picks you up"
January 2, 1930
The Sugar Institute makes sugar sound like the best thing since sliced bread. "The only safe rule for a healthful diet is to eat as large a variety of foods as possbile, including healthful cereals, fruits and vegetables made appetizing to the taste by the judicious use of sugar."
Sugar Makes Eating a Joy - Why eat unflavored, unappetizing foods?
March 26, 1929
The Sugar Institute recommends adding sugar to lamb chops or vegetables with the justification that "Doctors approve the use of sugar as a flavor on these essential foods because it arouses the appetite to eat more of them. Good food promotes good health."
New Way to Prepare Lamb Chops - Addition of Novel Seasoning Improves their Flavor
April 8, 1930
