Fat, Overweight, and Dieting in Old Time Radio

The Diet and Weight Loss business is worth $70 billion. An industry generating that much money should be filled with success stories, but even the most attractive "Before and After" photo layouts should be taken with a grain of salt.

Everyone from movie stars to talk show hosts to your mother will assure you that becoming slender is the secret to being attractive, healthy, and happy, and the Weight Loss Industry promises those very results. Truth be told, the Industry makes its fortune on the promise rather than the results.

Theoretically, weight loss is simple: it is just a matter of eating fewer calories than your body burns. The Weight Loss Industry has countless schemes to set up that condition, usually through a calorie-restrictive diet, although some companies focus on increased exercise regimes to change the calories-consumed/calories-burned equation. The programs which seem the healthiest combine diet and exercise routines, although their success rate is nothing to brag about.

There is mounting evidence that people who live in modern societies eat too much, and usually the wrong things. Also, because of cars and televisions, not getting a proper amount of exercise can be difficult. There is an increasing body of scientific evidence which indicates that the demands of a slenderness-obsessed society are creating as many health problems as it claims to fix.

Genetics may have as much to do with whether a person is skinny or large. This is not to say that a healthy diet and a sensible exercise routine will not make even the largest person healthier, but they may not make him or her skinny. And, in the long run, that is OK. We cannot all be skinny anymore than we can all be movie stars, but keep in mind that healthy people do not die as often.

Which is a good reason to skip that bag of potato chips, put on some headphones playing a fun OTR program, and go for a refreshing walk.

• Fibber McGee and Molly, November 4, 1947. The bathroom scales at 79 Wistful Vista must be on the fritz, there is no way a svelte guy like Fibber could weigh 177 pounds! This calls for a trip to the drug store to put a penny into their scales. However, Fibber's penny won't work so he assaults the machine because no one keeps a cool head like McGee.
• Suspense, January 10, 1948, "The Kandy Tooth". Howard Duff appears as Sam Spade in an apparent sequel to "The Maltese Falcon". The action opens with a telegram from fat man Kaspar Gutman, a baddy played by Sidney Greenstreet in Bogart's version of the movie. The script was used in a two-parter on "The Adventures of Sam Spade".
• My Favorite Husband, May 6, 1949. An evening of home movies inspires Liz and Iris to go on a diet that is harmless enough until their husbands bet $5 a pound on their weight loss.
• Bold Venture, January 14, 1952, "Four Invitations To Death". After a fat man collapses in Slade's place he and Sailor put him in Slade's bed. A few hours later, the fat man is shot to death, but it seems that Slade was the actual target because of misadventure six years ago in a liferaft.
• Dragnet, January 11, 1955, "The Big Complex". A junior high school has been broken into and vandalized several times, school supplies have been stolen but a bigger clue seems to be that the cafeteria has been ransacked. Friday catches the thief during a stakeout of the school and finds a kid who is suffering from an inferiority complex because of his weight. Further investigation shows that the complex is due to parental neglect.
• Lights Out/Arch Oboler's Plays, October 24, 1964, "The Day Sinatra Got Fat". The newlyweds discover that they don't like each other all that much, as well as the fact that they are snowed in. There is green stuff on the snow that has fallen from outer space, and the green stuff is making everyone grow as fat as pigs. Eventually (but too late), they realize that they are being fattened up for the people fatten their pigs.

See also: Nero Wolfe, The Fat Man and Big Guy.