How long did the Watchtower Society's campaign against aluminium last?

by slimboyfat 31 Replies latest jw friends

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  slimboyfat

  I came across a discussion of The Golden Age magazine's anti-aluminum stance in a book on the history of reaction to government policy on fluoride:

  http://www.amazon.co.uk/Fluoride-Wars-Americas-Political-Melodrama/dp/0470448334/ref=sr_1_64?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1276764067&sr=1-64

  Use the "search inside" feature to find the discussion of The Golden Age on pages 131 and 132.

  Among other things it says: "Unbelievably, The Golden Age published over 130 articles railing against aluminium cookware between 1925 and 1969".

  Did the Society continue to publish articles against aluminum as late as 1969? Apart from anything else the magazine had changed name twice by 1969. Maybe the author meant to say between 1925 and 1937.
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  changeling

  I don't know, but in the early 90's a CO went through our circuit who made sure we did not cook his meals in aluminium pots and pans...
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  fokyc

  In the late 50's we had a CO from Canada with family for a convention at Twickenham,

  They were horrified that we used some Aluminium cooking pans and would only use Stainless streel cookware.
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  JWoods

  I thought that this was kind of like the 7,000 year creative days - they never really renounced it, they just kind of quietly quit publishing articles against aluminum pans somewhere along the way.

  I kind of had the idea that it died out in the 1950s or so...
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  Gregor

  One of my Grandmothers was obsessed with the aluminum cookware subject for her whole life. She looked upon witnesses who used it as quasi-apostates.
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  fokyc

  This seems to be the last mention of Aluminium:

  *** g87 7/22 p. 29 Watching the World ***

  Aluminum Alert

  "A leading group of British scientists is warning against using aluminium saucepans and aluminium-rich foods," says The Sunday Times of London. ‘Scientists from the Medical Research Council’s neuroendocrinology unit in Newcastle upon Tyne believe aluminium contamination of food and water is a possible cause of Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of senile dementia.’ Although it was previously thought that the amount of aluminum absorbed from cooking pots was negligible, recent research showed a dramatic increase in aluminum release due to a chemical reaction when fluoride was present in cooking water or when cooking acidic foods such as tomatoes or cabbage.
• 

  hotspur

  I think 2 generations of cookware (Aluminium and Stainless Steel) overlapped at one point so it should end soon!

  Ooops - reckon I've got muddled again
• 

  Room 215

  I believe the advice to favor stainless steel over aluminum cookware is sound, whatever the source
• 

  undercover

  in the early 90's a CO went through our circuit who made sure we did not cook his meals in aluminium pots and pans...

  In the late 50's we had a CO from Canada ... They were horrified that we used some Aluminium cooking pans and would only use Stainless streel cookware.

  I guess these guys never ate in a restaurant...

  I wonder... do the Bethel kitchens use S/S pots and pans exclusively? I can't imagine that they do. Even though S/S is available, aluminum is cheaper and conducts heat better. Even if a kitchen uses S/S pots for certain things, like tomato based products, they still use aluminum saute pans and other aluminum products.
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  blondie

  You can still find individual jws that ascribe to this and not all necessarily alive in that era; parents and grandparents pass this foolishness onto their children and grandchildren jws. But it is only fair to add that non-jws ascribe to these beliefs about aluminum.

  Do you mean officially in their publications? Perhaps in the 6/22/62 Awake below although an 1982 Awake! article (June 8 p. 30) quoted a pharmacologist who claimed aluminum may contribute to health disorders including senility.

  Awake! 1962 Je 22 pp.8-10 What About Aluminum Cooking Utensils?

  What about the aluminum cooking utensils?...At present the great majority of authorities in medical and scientific fields gave aluminum a rather clean bill of health. Perhaps the most learned and extensive by the Kettering Laboratories [in a report that] consists of ninety pages and was made by a group of scientists who consulted 1,500 books, articles and reports on the subject. It concludes with this statement: "There is no reason for concern about the hazards to human health derived from well-established and extensive current uses of such products. Nor need there be concern over the more extended uses which would seem to be in the offing."...For Christian ministers, especially, it is well to note that, apart from eating what they have found to be good for them, there are other things of far greater importance than material food. Rom. 14:17.