Dr. John Harvey Kellogg and the Religion of Biologic Living

Purveyors of spiritualized medicine have been legion in American religious history, but few have achieved the superstar status of Dr. John Harvey Kellogg and his Battle Creek Sanitarium. In its heyday, the San was a combination spa and Mayo Clinic. Founded in 1866 under the auspices of the Seventh-day Adventist Church and presided over by the charismatic Dr. Kellogg, it catered to many well-heeled health seekers including Henry Ford, John D. Rockefeller, and Presidents Taft and Harding. It also supported a hospital, research facilities, a medical school, a nursing school, several health food companies, and a publishing house dedicated to producing materials on health and wellness. Rather than focusing on Kellogg as the eccentric creator of corn flakes or a megalomaniacal quack, Brian C. Wilson takes his role as a physician and a theological innovator seriously and places his religion of Biologic Living in an on-going tradition of sacred health and wellness. With the fascinating and unlikely story of the San as a backdrop, Wilson traces the development of this theology of physiology from its roots in antebellum health reform and Seventh-day Adventism to its ultimate accommodation of genetics and eugenics in the Progressive Era.

Author: Brian C. Wilson
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 09/18/2014
Pages: 265
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.15lbs
Size: 9.10h x 6.30w x 1.10d
ISBN: 9780253014474
Award: Independent Publisher Book Awards - Silver Medal Winner

Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 07/15/2014
Library Journal 09/01/2014 pg. 112
Choice 04/01/2015 pg. 1334
Foreword 08/27/2014

About the Author

Brian C. Wilson is Professor in the Department of Comparative Religion at Western Michigan University. His publications include Yankees in Michigan and What Is Religion?