Your Body At Its Best Ch 3

And then there was Aubrey Steen McLeod, whose life story was related in an editorial by David Lawrence in U. S. News and World Report of April 25, 1960. Mr. McLeod died of a heart attack on April 9, 1960. His life exemplified courage at its very best. Aubrey McLeod enlisted in World War I, and was wounded in an enemy air raid in the fall of 1917. They amputated both his legs near the hips in order to save his life. In a letter to his parents he told about his experience, and finished with these heroic words: "If everything progresses favorably, I shall be home about November 1. Now please don't worry about me, for I am getting along fine. I shall be given artificial legs, and will be able to get along O.K."

Aubrey McLeod got his artificial legs, graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1921 as a chemical engineer, received a Master's Degree in Economics from Harvard in 1925, became an expert forecaster of business conditions, served as an actuary of the United States Treasury Department, was on the staff of U. S. News and World Report for some twenty years, and at the time of his death he was Chief of the Economic Unit of this great magazine. During his college days Aubrey McLeod, who attended classes in a wheel chair and took part in social activities as if he were as able-bodied as his classmates, voiced this ringing challenge which is an excerpt from a fuller statement reported in The Boston Globe at that time: "There could hardly be a more used-up man than I am, and yet I want the boys to take heart and go to work and make men of themselves."

There are many, many more magnificent examples of success achieved under the severest physical handicaps; men and women whose indomitable spirits could not be defeated; men and women who did the very best they could with what they had.

In general, however, the man who makes a place for himself among successful men is a man who is in possession of all his physical faculties, is in robust health, and blessed with a goodly supply of surplus energy. For it is ruthlessly true, as Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "The world belongs to the energetic." And energy is the power that is generated by a healthy body.

Though most Americans undoubtedly consider, in theory at least, a healthy body to be their most treasured possession, yet in reality most people abuse their bodies with impunity. Most people have atrocious health habits, habitually disregard one or more of the simplest and most basic rules of good health - fresh air and sunlight, a well-balanced diet, regular exercise, and adequate rest.

That this is true was forcefully revealed by our nation's experience during World War II and the Korean conflict.

• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 1
• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 2
• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 4
• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 5
• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 6
• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 7
• Your Body At It's Best - Ch 8