Diets 50 years ago no secret: Eat less

Fifty years ago, a low-calorie diet was at the top of recommendations doctors would give patients who needed to shed pounds, a retired Chattanooga internal medicine physician said.

Fad diets were never suggested, diet pills were used only on rare occasions and weight-loss surgery was decades in the future, said Dr. Robert W. Myers, who practiced medicine in Chattanooga from the 1950s through the 1990s and later volunteered his services for the local Volunteers in Medicine clinic.

"We'd send them to a dietitian," he said, "or we'd give them copies of a diet, they'd go on 1,200 to 1,500 calories a day and we'd guide them."

Dr. David McCallie, an internal medicine physician who practiced in Chattanooga from the 1950s through the 1990s, said the hard lesson to get across to someone who wanted to lose weight then and now is that you have to eat less.

"We've learned a lot about biology and physiology in that time," he said, "but it's hard to get away from (that lesson), and you have to do it consistently over a long period of time."

Dr. Myers said people in general were more active 50 years ago.

"People were exercising more then," he said. "They were more active. They walked more, got out more."

Metrecal, a meal-replacement powder by manufacturer Mead Johnson, was first marketed in 1959, but Dr. Myers said he didn't recall recommending the product.

Diet pills such as Phentermine, approved in 1959 by the Food and Drug Administration, were around, he said, but similar pills were prescribed "only occasionally and with precaution.

"You had to be careful," he said.

Dr. McCallie, 88, said you also couldn't take them forever.

"And once you got off the crutch, the weight came right back on," he said.

Dr. Clif Cleaveland, who practiced internal medicine in Chattanooga for more than 35 years, said an uncle with a family practice in the 1950s told him "diet pills which were essentially amphetamines were widely available.

"He considered them dangerous," he said, "and would not prescribe them."

Dr. Myers said he never believed obesity would become the problem it is today.

"I did not see that (coming)," he said. "People burned more calories. Fast food was available but not the way it is today."

ONE MORE SOLUTION

Prayer, according to Glamour magazine, also was a 1950s diet solution. Books of the era included 1957's "Pray Your Weight Away," written by the Rev. Charlie Shedd after he lost 100 pounds and 1960's "I Prayed Myself Slim" by University of Tennessee student Deborah Pierce.