(For further detail, see the book Awakening Our Self-Healing Body by Arthur Michael Baker MA, NHE)

1822: Isaac Jennings, M.D. of Fairfield, Connecticut, having practiced medicine for 20 years and being thoroughly discouraged with the results, begins to administer placebos of bread pills, starch powders, and colored water tonics to patients, while instructing them in healthful living.

1822 - 1832: Dr. Jennings, and physiologist/minister Sylvester Graham start a healing system called "Orthopathy". During the following few decades, a group of health-conscious doctors and citizens boldly claim that Nature knows better than the most learned physicians. Citizens of this country are fed-up with failures and contra-dictions of current medical practice and theory. The truths proclaimed by Jennings and Graham find immediate and widespread acceptance. After becoming fully convinced of the correctness of his "Let-Alone Plan," "Do-Nothing Cure," and the "No-Medicine Plan," Jennings announces his discovery to the world, but he is misunderstood. Because of his pioneering impact Jennings is credited with being "The Father of Natural Hygiene."

1830 - 1832: For several years Graham lectures nationwide on the relationship of physiology to Hygiene and gains a large following, especially among the common working people. In just a few years, he publishes "The Graham Journal of Health and Longevity"; establishes the Library of the American Physiologic Society; opens the nation's first health food stores, health book stores and health food restaurants; and founds numerous "Grahamit" health retreats and boarding houses.

1833: Dr. Russell Thacker Trall emerges as a great mastermind of Hygienic "Hygieo Therapy", which combines the use of all Hygienic agents into one wholistic system. A brilliant thinker and articulate debater, Dr. Trall publicly challenges the medical establishment on their theory and practice and always comes out the victor.

1844: Dr. Joel Shew introduces the European system of "Hydrotherapy" to the United States, a "curing treatment" which uses little or no drugs while employing water as the main therapeutic agent. Hydropathists adopt the Hygieo-Therapy (Natural Hygiene) dietary and exercise plan, as well as its emphasis on fresh air and sunlight. American physicians who had lost faith in drugging but lacked belief in Hygiene adopt Hydrotherapy wholesale as both become intertwined and indistinguishable for several years.

1830 - 1860: Scores of Hygienic homes, schools and sanitariums open throughout the country. Dr. Harriet Austin and James Jackson found the largest Natural Hygiene institution in the world, "Our Home on the Hillside", with 250 beds. Seventy-five hydrotherapy (water-cure) institutions are founded. During this time, over 80 "health papers" effectively reach the masses which coincide with an improvement in the hygienic habits of Americans.

1852: Natural Hygiene is so enthusiastically received and popularized that its practitioners outnumber those of allopathic, homeopathic and chiropractic medicine.

1853: Dr. Russell Trall founds the New York College of Hygieo-Therapy to educate competent health practitioners. This inaugurates a new era in medical science, theory, philosophy and practice that is in variance with prevailing allopathic doctrines of the time.

1861: Trall, who had once been a practicing Hydropathist, announces a formal declaration separating Hydrotherapy from Hygieo-Therapeutics (Natural Hygiene) by stating "water possesses no power whatsoever to cure any disease. Nature is the remedial principle".

1862: Trall delivers a landmark lecture at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. before the most distinguished medical minds in this country entitled "The True Healing Art, or Hygiene vs. Medication". The lecture is widely published and circulated among the populace, and the health reform movement in this country reaches its height. Ironically, in 1861, with the onset of the Civil War, national attention focuses on survival, and health reform ends.

1861 - 1865: The Civil War causes Hygienic institutions everywhere to close. The health reform movement is halted as the war impoverishes the nation. Schools and sanitariums are wrecked and the common citizen can no longer afford Hygienic educational literature.

1864: French chemist Louis Pasteur fathers "The Science of Bacteriology" and "The Germ Theory of Disease" by demonstrating the existence of microorganisms. It is concluded that "germs" cause pathogenic change in living cultures within laboratory experiments. With Pasteur, a new era in modem medicine is inaugurated, including sterilization, pasteurization, vaccination, and fear of raw foods. The prevailing "germ era" helps usher in the decline of 19th century health reform. Not only did people develop germ-phobia, but they also found complacency in blaming their ill health on malevolent invading bacteria, rather than taking responsibility for their own poor lifestyle choices.

1881: Clara Barton, student of Hygiene founds the American Red Cross and becomes its first president.

1900 - 1940: Dr. J. H. Tilden, after thoroughly reading 19th century Hygienic literature, becomes convinced that disease need not be experienced. Tilden conducts a private practice to teach patients how to eliminate body toxicity; he lectures widely; writes 25 books; and widely circulates a monthly magazine both in this country and abroad.

1909 - 1910: The infamous Flexner Report ends health-care reform in this country, as alternative schools of healing are shutdown nationwide under the influence of the Rockefeller and Carnegie Foundations.

1924-1940: Tilden opens and operates a Hygienic school and sanitarium in Denver, Colorado. In 1926, he publishes the famous book "Toxemia Explained", which identifies the primary cause of all disease as toxemia (a state of internal pollution) brought on by enervating, unhealthful living. In the meantime, medical authorities strongly oppose and condemn Tilden.

1920: Dr. Herbert M. Shelton writes the first of 40 books in his effort to revive Natural Hygiene. Over the next 50 years, many of Dr. Shelton's books are translated into eight languages.

1928 - 1981: Dr. Shelton's Health School operates in San Antonio, Texas and includes a clinic, laboratory, and educational program. Well over 40,000 fasts are professionally supervised. According to Shelton, "the sick get well, the well get better, and all gain the priceless knowledge needed to stay well". Throughout his career, Shelton is considered a threat to medicine. He is repeatedly threatened, and jailed over 30 times.

1948: The American Natural Hygiene Society is founded. Several chiropractors and laymen elect Shelton as its first president. Annual conventions are held, and 30 chapters worldwide are established some of which are still active today. Current membership in the U.S., however, is below 10,000.

1939 - 1980: Shelton publishes the monthly magazine Hygienic Review popularizing and reviving Natural Hygiene worldwide for 20th century thinkers. From 1934 - 1941, Shelton also wrote and published the seven volume series entitled The Hygienic System, which becomes the basis for Hygienic study.

1970: At age 44, Terrance C. Fry reads Shelton's book "Superior Nutrition" and becomes a hygienist overnight. Within a few years, he writes and self-publishes several easy-to-read booklets and books popularizing Natural Hygiene, that are in contrast to Shelton's formidable text-books and manuals.

1982: T.C. Fry founds the Life Science Institute and publishes
Healthful Living magazine with a circulation of 30,000. Fry also develops a Natural Hygiene teacher training course, a 2200 page, 111 lesson home study curriculum. The Life Science Institute also produces audio and video cassettes on Natural Hygiene and offers retreats and seminars to students and to the general public.

1986-1988: Harvey and Marilyn Diamond, after years of counseling, teaching and study with Life Science Institute, write Fit For Life, the best-selling health and diet book in history. A second book Living Health follows. Warner Brothers publishes and provides extensive national coverage through media and conferences, which popularizes Natural Hygiene for millions of Americans.

1990's: Many Hygienic organizations and practitioners continue operating educational programs, retreats, sanitariums, and private practices, although relatively few are directed by those with "recognized" credentials.

1995 - 1997: Art Baker serving as Dean of Students of Life Science Institute, enrolls nearly 1,000 students into the Natural Hygiene correspondence program before the
company veers from its Natural Hygiene roots and focuses on digestive enzyme supplements, as it is sold off to a group in Canada.

1996: Inspired by T. C. Fry's Healthful Living, David Klein publishes the first issue of Living Nutrition Magazine, "The True Voice of Hygiene."

1999: Healthful Living International (HLI) is founded by a dynamic group of pure Natural Hygiene educators and practitioners (Healthful Living Consultants) whose mission is to incorporate knowledge of total wellness of body, mind and spirit into teaching pure true Natural Hygiene. The Healthful Living Consultants are the first international professional association of Natural Hygiene practitioners that includes licensed doctors and professional health educators and counselors.

2000:

• HLI accepts its first members and launches its web site, www.healthfullivingintl.org.
• Dr. Douglas Graham serves as HLI's first President.
• Dr. V. Virginia Vetrano, who worked almost fifty years along side Dr. Herbert Shelton, serves as the senior advisor and fountainhead for HLI. Drs. Douglas Graham, Robert Sniadach, Timothy Trader, and other Healthful Living Consultants Rozalind Gruben, Dana Clare, David Klein, and Arthur Baker serve as HLI's Governors, and pledge to spearhead its progress.
• Dr. Robert Sniadach releases the Natural Hygiene Courses, with a teacher/practitioner training program.
• Construction of huge Natural Hygiene web sites begin: www.HealthCreation.net and www.HealthEnlightenment.com.
• Living Nutrition, with 1600 subscribers worldwide, becomes the official mouthpiece of Healthful Living International.
• HLI's first symposium on Healthful Living is planned for 2001.

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