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Professor of Nutrition Emeritus, Harvard School of Public Health, Westwood, MA 02090
Fredrick John Stare, one of the best known nutritionists in the country, died in Wellesley, Massachusetts, on April 4, 2002. He founded the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health in 1942 and served as Chairman until he retired in 1976. He was the founding editor of Nutrition Reviews, wrote a nationally syndicated column for many years entitled "Food and Your Health," and published several popular books on nutrition; thus, he was well-known within the academic community and by the general public as well. He is survived by his wife, Irene M. Kinsey Stare, two sons, Fredrick A. of Chicago, IL and David S. of Healdsburg, CA, and a daughter, Mary Susan Wilkinson of Durham, CT, a brother Robert of Madison, WI, a sister, Susan of Columbus, WI, 7 grandchildren, and 2 great-grandchildren.
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Fred’s father was president of the Columbus Canning Company, which canned primarily peas, corn, tomatoes, and pumpkin. Fred worked there in the summers while he was growing up. After graduating from high school in Columbus, he entered the University of Wisconsin, majoring in Chemistry. During his 3rd year he also took a course in Agricultural Chemistry and attended Professor E. B. Hart’s journal club on Saturday mornings. When he graduated in 1931 during the depression, jobs were scarce and he was offered a teaching assistantship in Agricultural Chemistry with Dr. Conrad A. Elvehjem. He was Dr. Elvehjem’s first graduate student and received his Ph.D. in 1934. Professor Elvehjem became well known later when his group isolated nicotinic acid, the antipellagra vitamin, and he went on to become Head of the Department of Biochemistry and President of the University of Wisconsin. Dr. Elvehjem had just returned from a year at Cambridge University, England and brought back a Warburg apparatus. This instrument allowed the measurement of the respiration of slices or minces of tissues and sparked the development of enzymology in biochemistry. Fred’s Ph.D. thesis in 1934 was entitled "Studies on the Respiration of Animal Tissues" (1).
He received a Rockefeller Foundation fellowship to study with Dr. Philip Schafer in St. Louis. The fellowship was extended and in 1935 Fred married Joyce Love Allen, the daughter of the Governor of Louisiana, and they left for Europe. In Europe, Fred studied with a number of the well-known chemists and biochemists including David Keilin in Cambridge, Paul Karrer in Zurich, and Albert Szent-Gyorgi in Szeged, Hungary. While in Cambridge, Fred worked with Carl Bauman, also on fellowship from Madison, and they published several papers on what was later named the Krebs cycle. Dr. Krebs also was in Cambridge at that time. Fred and Carl also published a well-received review paper on the coenzymes (2).
Fred worked in the Bowman Cancer Institute in Madison for 2 years, but then went to the University of Chicago Medical School. Later, he accepted an internship at Barnes Hospital in St. Louis. In the spring of 1942, while still an intern, he was recruited by Dr. Baird Hastings and Dean Cecil Drinker to become the head of a new Department of Nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health and the Division of Nutrition in the Biochemistry Department of the Harvard Medical School.
The budget for this new effort was $26,000/y, $20,000 from the Rockefeller Foundation, $5,000 from the School of Public Health, and $1,000 from Biochemistry. The Department of Biochemistry also provided space in Building C2. Fred then recruited John (Jack) M. McKibbin and me, both former students of Conrad Elvehjem.
Fred said that when some of his friends heard that he was going to Harvard, they congratulated him and said that he should have no need to raise funds because Harvard was the richest university in the world. The reality was soon apparent and, as is well known, Fred became a very successful money-raiser and the department grew to be the largest in the School of Public Health. Of course, we were also fortunate to develop during the early years of NIH when it really had more money than could be used profitably and so often paid 80–90% of applications. By the 1970s, the nutrition department had 
180 people including staff, technicians, graduate students, and postdoctoral students.
We established a course on nutrition in the School of Public Health and were allotted 20% of the lectures in the medical school biochemistry course. After the war, however, when it became apparent that deficiency diseases had almost disappeared in the United States and many other places, interest in nutrition in the medical school fell and after a few years, our association with the Biochemistry Department practically ceased. By that time, we had moved from Building C-2 in the medical school into the old Huntington Hospital, which had been taken over by the School of Public Health. With additional space available, Fred recruited Jean Mayer, Martha Trulson, and Stanley Gershoff to enlarge the faculty.
In 1960, Fred obtained a grant of $1,026,000 from General Foods for the "expansion of the School’s Nutrition Research Laboratories." With support from a variety of other sources we moved into our new quarters in 1962. Fred’s ability to raise funds was remarkable. In the chapter entitled "Fund Raising" in his autobiography, Adventures in Nutrition (3), he states that in the 44-y period he raised $29,630,347. During the same period, members of the department received grants, mainly from the NIH, of $28,946,858 in direct costs, which brought the university $14,473,436 in indirect costs.
After Fred retired, he organized the Harvard Human Nutrition Program, which he envisaged "as a clearing house, stimulator, helper, and possible coordinator of activities related to human nutrition in any part of Harvard University or any of its teaching hospitals, including teaching, research and service." In later years, Fred also turned his money-raising ability to assist the Boston Opera and the New England Conservatory of Music. Those who are interested may find Fred’s advice on fund raising and the trials and tribulations associated with it in the above-mentioned chapter (3).
By the late 1950s the department had a substantial research program on nutrition and atherosclerosis. We had developed a colony of monkeys, mainly cebus monkeys, for this work. We participated in the Cooperative Study of Lipoproteins and Atherosclerosis in which 2045 subjects were evaluated. There were 1968 active, healthy adult men who were compared with 273 who had experienced a myocardial infarction, 141 with angina pectoris, and 27 women with myocardial infarctions. These early studies showed some of the now well-recognized trends, including the gradual increase in cholesterol levels with age, which differs between men and women, and the higher serum lipoprotein and cholesterol levels in those who had had an infarction (4). In the early 1960s, we were also involved in evaluating the effects of the various fatty acids on serum cholesterol levels in humans (5). Fred decided we needed a "real" cardiologist on the staff. This led to the appointment of Dr. Bernard Lown as Assistant Professor of Cardiology in Public Health in the Department of Nutrition. Dr. Loan developed a prolific training and research program and, with a colleague in Moscow, Dr. Evgueni Chazov, founded the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. The IPPNW was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985, which was accepted by Drs. Lown and Chazov.
From 1943 to 1986, 87 students received Doctoral degrees and 129 received Masters degrees from the department. During the same period, there were 167 postdoctoral fellows who were not candidates for degrees. Of these, 89 were "Lown Fellows," i.e., MDs who received special training in cardiology with Dr. Lown.
Fred was an early, persistent, and vocal advocate of the fluoridation of water supplies for the prevention of dental caries. He wrote numerous popular articles and frequently testified in support of this important public health issue. He was also active in combating what he called "nutrition nonsense" and food faddism, especially in his popular writings. Experiences related to Fred’s dealing with these issues, including litigation in which he became involved, are discussed in Fred’s autobiography, pp. 112–125 (3).
Dr. Stare’s interest in international nutrition began very early. In 1944, he spent 2 months in Mexico working on a public health study sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation in 3 villages outside Mexico City. In the spring of 1945, the allied high command knew that food supplies in Holland would be very limited when the Germans retreated, and food distribution would be required to avoid starvation. Civilians, rather than military personnel, were selected to represent their governments in evaluating the situation and in the food distribution. These were Dr. Hugh Sinclair of Oxford for the British, Dr. J. M. McCreary for Canada, and Dr. John Youmans from Vanderbilt and Fred Stare represented the Americans. Three teams were formed, which included army personnel and a few Dutch nutritionists and physicians. They visited various towns where they met with physicians and health workers to determine the degree of starvation, sources and supplies of food available, and what was needed (6).
In 1949 the Department of Nutrition was asked by the Institute of Inter-American Affairs, later the Agency of International Affairs, to help establish an Institute of Nutrition in the Ministry of Health in Lima, Peru. Over the next 10 years, there were 20 publications from these activities. Some years later, joint studies were developed with the University in Cali, Colombia, and with the National Nutrition Institute in Bogota in which the effects of food supplementation on the outcome of pregnancy and child development were investigated.
During the 1970s, the department was involved in rather extensive studies evaluating the effects of lysine fortification of wheat flour on children in oases in southern Tunisia (7) and of lysine-threonine fortification of rice in Thailand (8) on child development. Over 125 papers dealing with the many international activities were published by various faculty members, usually in collaboration with former students.
It is difficult to decide which research studies conducted by the department should be selected for mention in a biographical sketch of Fred Stare. As head of the department he was involved to varying degrees in most of the research activities, often as the primary source of financial support. On the other hand, as noted above, the departmental members were usually able to obtain NIH and other sources of financial support for their research. Hence, I have selected a few projects that were primarily Fred’s idea and with which he was most directly involved.
While Fred was an intern in St. Louis, he developed an interest in the difficulties associated with feeding patients who could not be fed orally. Studies were started by Jack McKibbin on the use of fat emulsions for intravenous alimentation. When Jack left for the University of Syracuse, Fred recruited Robert Geyer, another student of Conrad Elvehjem, to carry on the work. These studies were continued until 1974 and resulted in 40 published papers.
The Boston-Ireland Brother’s Study was primarily Fred’s idea. With the collaboration of a group at Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, >500 Irish American men in Boston were identified who had a brother living in Ireland. Food intake, physical exams, and so on were completed and repeated 12 y later. The brothers in Ireland appeared to be less susceptible to heart disease, even though their diet appeared less satisfactory, probably because they were much more active (9).
A study was undertaken in l960 to modify the diet of adolescent boys in a boarding school in Concord, MA. Acceptable diets were developed that lowered the serum cholesterol level of boys whose original levels were >200 mg/dL by 15%. Those with levels <200 mg/dL were lowered by 8% (10).
Personal notes
In the late 1940s, Fred and Joyce purchased a 36-acre farm on the outskirts of Wellesley; the land was about one third woods, one third wetlands, and one third pasture. Fred eventually increased his property to 50 acres. An expanse of lawn kept him on the mower after work or on weekends when he was home. He tried raising, hogs, chickens, and turkeys without much success and finally settled on three Sicilian donkeys, which are still there. In 1989, 38 acres were sold to the Needham Conservation Commission for the tax-assessed value. The land is to be used "solely for those who like to walk, ski and enjoy nature" and can never be developed. The house was remodeled several times, once after a fire. The Stares were excellent hosts and many, many friends, visitors, and students will fondly recall the many dinners they enjoyed on the farm.
Frederick Stare received the Conrad A. Elvehjem Award in 1969 and was elected an ASNS (AIN) Fellow in 1981. His many contributions to nutritional sciences, and to his many colleagues and students, inspired us all and deserve our remembrance and celebration.
Manuscript received 4 February 2004.
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LITERATURE CITED |
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 TOP LITERATURE CITED |
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1. Stare, F. J. & Elvehjem, C. A. (1933) Studies on the respiration of animal tissues. Am. J. Physiol. 105:665-660.
2. Bauman, C. A. & Stare, F. J. (1940) Coenzymes. Physiol. Rev. 19:353-360.
3. Stare, F. J. (1991) Adventures in Nutrition 1991 The Christopher Publishing House Hanover, MA.
4. Lawry, E. Y., Mann, C. V., Peterson, A., Wysocki, A. P., O’Connell, R. & Stare, F. J. (1957) Cholesterol and beta lipoproteins in the serum of Americans. Well persons and those with coronary disease. Am. J. Med. 22:685-693.
5. Hegsted, D. M., McGandy, R. B., Myers, M. L. & Stare, F. J. (1965) Quantitative effects of dietary fat on serum cholesterol in man. Am. J. Clin. Nutr. 17:281-295.[Medline]
6. French, C. E. & Stare, F. J. (1947) Nutritional surveys in Western Holland, Rotterdam 1945. J. Nutr. 33:649-660.
7. El Lozy, M. & Kerr, G. R. (1976) Results of lysine fortification of wheat products in southern Tunisia. Wilkie, H. eds. Improving the Nutrient Quality of Cereals II 1976 Agency for International Development Washington, DC. .
8. Gershoff, S. N. (1976) Rice fortification in Thailand. Wilkie, H. eds. Improving the Nutrient Quality of Cereals II 1976 Agency for International Development Washington, DC. .
9. Brown, J., Bourke, G. J., Gearty, G. F., Finnegan, A., Hill, M., Heffernan-Fox, F. C., Fitzgerald, D. E., Kennedy, J., Childers, R. W., Jessop, W.J.E., Trulson, M. F., Latham, M. C., Cronin, S., McCann, M. B., Clancy, R. E., Gore, I., Stroudt, H. W., Hegsted, D. M. & Stare, F. J. (1970) Nutritional and epidemiologic factors related to heart disease. World Rev. Nutr. Diet. 12:1-42.[Medline]
10. McGandy, R. B., Hall, B. & Stare, F. J. (1972) Dietary regulation of blood cholesterol in adolescent males: a pilot study. Am. J. Clin. Nutr. 25:61-66.[Abstract]
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