Norwalk Books

This book is the journal of Rosemary Langheldt who left her job and home in San Francisco to serve with the Red Cross in London and then Germany. The story is told through letters home and journal entries, and both are highly informative and well written missives. Mrs. Norwalk recreates what it was like to live in England during the last year of the war. She is an empathetic observer of the many tens of thousands of men (boys) who stop briefly at her Clubmobile for a donut and a cup of coffee after disembarking in England and re-embarking for the fight on the Continent. Once Rosemary is transferred to Germany, she sees firsthand the near destruction of many German cities. Her writings are true to the time: these people were our enemies a short time ago and they tried to kill the boys who I helped serve. It also offers an honest appraisal of the Occupation where the black market made many Americans rich. This book will be of interest to anyone who wants to know about life in England after the Allied landings in June 1944 and the early days of the occupation in Germany.

Rosemary Norwalk left ardent swains and professional position to become a "doughnut dolly" with the American Red Cross. This University of California graduate and San Francisco native brings a disciplined eye to the social climate and
the broad spectrum of Americans thrown together by World War II. Following training in Washington, D.C. where she had to be restrained from sitting in the back of the bus, to commentary on the bravery of the ordinary Londoner under the buzz bombs, to experiences managing the large operation at a major port, she is insightful and forthright. Her many letters home are tied together with good historical notes on military operations and progress of the war. Mistitled a love story, it is instead a story of women who dared to step up and take on great responsibility for providing troop support both departing and returning through Britain. An example: A new"girl" arrives and one of the current Red Cross "girls" rushes to Rosemary with misgivings over her attitude and different looks. " The new girl announces: I'm Lil...I'm a Jew and I'm from Brooklyn and I don't like to take orders.' It was a challenge, not a greeting. I took a deep breath in the silence, then stuck out my hand and smiled. I hoped cordially. 'Welcome, Lil. I'm a gentile, I'm from San Francisco, and,' I groped for the right words, 'I don't like to give orders, so we ought to get along fine.' "

This is a wonderful book that I enjoyed the entire time I was reading it. It is one of those treasures of American history that should be read by anyone interested in WWII history. It is valuable look at the war from the perspective of an American Red Cross volunteer stationed in England. Not a nurse, as the author points out as the usual assumption, but one of those moral boosting "doughnut dollies" that sometimes were the last friendly female face a soldier would see before embarking for the battlefields of Europe.
Mrs. Norwalk was a wonderfully skilled writer at the time she wrote the letters and journal entries that make up the book. And the book is equally well crafted and edited, giving a detailed look at the work of the Red Cross workers on the docks of Southampton, England, their everyday lives and yes romances as the subtitle implies. It also includes personal photographs taken at the time.
An interesting item on page 99 is a list that explains the code used by the Red Cross to communicate the number of ships arriving or leaving, their sailing dates, and the number of soldiers to expect so they would be prepared and have enough volunteers, coffee, and doughnuts for them.
My sincerest thanks to Mrs. Norwalk (now deceased)for sharing this personal history with us, it reminds me very much of the letters my father wrote my mother during WWII that I have published into a book entitled: All My Love, Forever: Letters Home From A WWII Citizen Soldier. - Dale Lane

I picked up "Dearest Ones" in a discount store and didn't expect much. There's a certain sameness to the World War II diaries of young women: young woman from small town bucks convention, kisses parents good-bye, and runs off to get liberated. She has some very mild adventures, makes a lot of friends, says "gee golly whiz" a lot, and swans on home at the end of the book. A postscript informs us that she settled down with a man named Bob or Hank or Earl, of whom we heard absolutely nothing in the course of the book except for a few mentions of "letters from So-and-So in the South Pacific," and is living somewhere in the midwest near her three grown children.

Boy, was I surprised, and pleasantly so. Perhaps it helps that Rosemary Langheldt was older, in her mid-twenties, and already a career woman when she applied to join the Red Cross overseas. It also helps that she seems to have been a very curious and thoughtful person. As other reviews have mentioned, she takes notice not only of the glitz and fun of work abroad, but of Britain's sometimes stifling class distinctions, American racial prejudice, and the difficult moral compromises involved in the occupation of Germany. There is also plenty of romance, fun, and gee-golly-whiz adventure, but one never gets the sense that Rosemary lost track of her primary reasons for being in the Red Cross or saw her job as a mere means of adventure. Rather, she was there to work and the adventure happened along the way.

She was keenly interested in other people, making this book a pleasure to read-- it can be incredibly frustrating to read a diary when the only "character" the diarist is able to make three-dimensional is the diarist herself. She had a skill for interacting with people (I get the sense that I would never in a million years have been able to handle her job) and trying to understand them, and that curiosity and interest in humanity permeates the whole book. (I also feel compelled to mention, as a reader, that I really appreciated the narrative cohesiveness of this book. If someone is introduced, then they will be around until a reason for their departure is given. A lot of diaries suffer from people and events appearing, disappearing, reappearing, necessitating either a lot of head-scratching or awkward footnotes. This book doesn't have that problem. Rosemary was a really excellent correspondent.) This is really a stellar example of the genre, probably one of the best I've read.

I came across this book at a local bookstore and thought it was a very touching and well-written account of love during wartime. As the author lived in my area, I was able to meet her and have her sign my copy. I'm so glad I did as she passed away August 22, 2002. What a great keepsake for her family and a wonderful book for the rest of us. So if you've been meaning to write your memoirs, don't put it off! It may not ever be listed on Amazon but it would probably mean a lot to your loved ones.

Every person who cares enough about health and longevity needs to read and heed. Take charge of what goes into your body and gain better health and longer, more energetic life. This is especially true for parents who have an opportunity AND a responsibility to provide the best teaching and good health for their children.

For as old as this book is, it is incredible how the information is pertinent to today's drinking water issues. This book is easily read and packed with information in layman's terms. Information I have never read or heard of before. I highly recommend this book as well as others written by Norman Walker. He was a man ahead of his time!

Every person who cares enough about health and longevity needs to read and heed. Take charge of what goes into your body and gain better health and longer, more energetic life. This is especially true for parents who have an opportunity AND a responsibility to provide the best teaching and good health for their children.

Rumor has it Dr Walker lived to be 120 years old!!! If anyone can confirm this for me please do. You must read Dr Walker's complete set of 8 books - they could change your life - they did for me. Now I want to live to be 120 as well....

I understand that Norman W Walker died in 1984 at the ripe old age of 118. He was a Brit, and became a "raw foodist" early on in his life in response to his own medical ailments.

If anyone wishes to take their health seriously they need to read every book that this man has ever written. The medicine and pill popping society of today would be far better off, if people exerted the self-control explained necessary to promote better health.

The Heritage Edition of 1974 is a large format hardback with bold type and ample margins. Black slipcase.

Bound in a glossy red-orange, it is illustrated with 8 gravures by Mara McAfee and has an introduction by Ashley Montagu.

Sewn binding; 237 pp.

I love this book - large paperback, beautiful pictures, loads of different ocean life to see and discuss. Interesting facts. Both of my children (now 6 - 9) have loved this book, reading it over and over together with us. We bought this at the beach, and it helps us remember what is special about the oceans when we are inland. We have since ordered many other books in this same series (Smithsonian - Soundprints), and have been pleased by them all - but this remains our favorite. We prefer the large paperback to the small hardcover edition, which is too small to appreciate the beautiful pictures adequately. This paperback is the same size as the regular hardcover.

All of Walker's books are excellent resources. Here is THE man who invented 'juicing carrots'. Along with that, he showed that eating natural, mostly raw healthly diet was the key to vibrant healt. He also had a major emphasis on colon cleansing. If you read any of his books you will be quickly overcome with a desire to have your insides washed out. believe me! and believe Dr. Walker, who afterall lived 'vibrantly' to an age well over 100. He has quite a few great little books and it seems like the rest of the world is just now catching on to what he had taught for decades.

The author blends his own family legacy into larger themes that apply to us all. He addresses the legacy of his own family in a way that is applicable to all of us. Very tender, but also practical and a little bit shocking, like most family histories at least should be.

Frazier's gifts as a writer shine in this climb through his family tree. Deadpan, folksy, soulful, urbane, Frazier captures the complexities of his family's unique history within the context of our country's history. Lots of real people and their small eccentricities. The negative editorial reviews reflect a collective missing of the boat. "On the Rez" is another great Frazier book.

I think it's Frazier's style that is the most attractive thing about this book. He writes in simple declarative sentences with little embellishment - exactly the way someone would tell you a story orally. No histrionics, no deep reflections - just straight facts, boom, boom. It works magnificently here.

He tells a history of his family (it's not really a memoir, at least not until the end, which is the weakest part), going back to his ancestors who first came to America. The best part I think is the first half; Frazier is very interested in the Civil War and spends a lot of time tracing relatives as they fought with the 55th Ohio Volunteer Infantry and the 11th Corps. (He goes way off on a tangent writing about Stonewall Jackson; it's interesting but probably could have been edited out.)

Commendable is his willingness to reveal some not very pleasant things about his relatives at times: prejudices, job failings, embarrassments - things that other writers would have kept secret. Unfortunately, as his family history becomes more contemporary he comes across as more self-serving: I felt suddenly that he was writing more for himself than for his audience. An excellent first half, though - and that style is terrific.

Ian Frazier is a good writer--let's get that straight. The downfall of this book is not how he writes but what he writes about. I wasn't bored out of my mind reading this book, but it just didn't do anything for me. I like to read books that move me and this book had a cruising speed of 0-1 mph. This book is a generational playback/story about his family. I often thought how amazing it was that the author could write in a way to sound like he was speaking to the reader and to keep me (just barely) reading on to the next page. This was sllooowwww reading and I thought, "with all the books out there, I am just wasting my time reading about something I really couldn't care less about. There was nothing too fascinating about his family story. (At least to the point where I finally quit---about 1/2 way) I would never ever recommend this book. I would recommend sitting comatose in front of the tv watching really bad sitcoms over reading this book.

Many of the books I love, such as Carolyn See's "Making a Literary Life" and Barbara Grizzuti Harrison's "Italian Days," are as much about their authors as their stated subjects. Ian Frazier's "Family" also is highly personal, yet remarkable in how Frazier presents his memoirs of growing up in Ohio, adds a meticulously researched history of his ancestors, and conflates it all into a profoundly moving meditation on a country, a society and the human condition. "Family" is a book that you'll read from cover to cover without being able to put it down, then pick up often to dip into, savoring favorite parts and the rich, supple excellence of Frazier's prose. Always poignant but never sentimental, "Family" takes us through two hundred years of the lives of various Fraziers, Wickhams, Hurshes, Bachmans and Chapmans--the genealogy that culminated in David and Kate Frazier of Hudson, Ohio, their son Ian, and his four brothers and sisters. Frazier leads us off into far-ranging but fascinating and germane tangents: Discussing a Civil War skirmish in which his great-great-grandfather Charlie Wickham fought, Frazier goes off into the life story of the leader of the opposing forces in that skirmish--Stonewall Jackson. Throughout the book, Frazier shows an unerring eye for the telling detail that throws situations and personalities into dazzling focus. He also makes us love each and every one of the family members, past and present, that he writes about, and moves us to tears with his descriptions of the deaths of his father, his mother, and his young brother Fritz. Here is how Frazier describes his thoughts at his mother's deathbed: "(S)oon all the people who had accompanied me through life would be gone, too, and then even the people who had known us, and no one would remain on earth who had ever seen us, and those descended from us perhaps would know stories about us, perhaps once in a while they would pass by buildings where we had lived and they would mention that we had lived there. And then the stories would fade, and the graves would go untended, and no one would guess what it had been like to wake before dawn in our breath-warmed bedrooms as the radiators clanked and our wives and husbands and children slept." To read "Family" is to gain a fonder, fuller appreciation of our own families, and of all the blessed ties that bind.

The guy uses his blender to break molecules and free the juice! See? One's tempted to quote forever from this laughable treatise, so funny it is, but... verbum sat sapienti. Idiots will buy anything, but you've been warned.
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PS. OK, I can't resist -- a few quotes (capitalization preserved; in no particular order, just read the bits -- this must be enough):

"It has only been within the past two Centuries that people generally awakened to the realization ... the manner in which the body utilises the minerals and Vitamins comprising such food. ... The results ... have been almost phenomenal the World over, particularly in the area of Juice Therapy. ... Even though such fibers reach the Colon in microscopic ... take the best of what IS available and Praise the Lord for what you CAN get. ... be sure to pick the freshest ... buying your vegetables for Salads or making your Juices."

"Life as LIFE cannot be explained, so we describe enzymes as a Cosmic Energy Principle or vibration which promotes a chemical action ... cooked foods ... [do not] have the power to regenerate the atoms which furnish the life force to our body. ... surprisingly large percentage of the atoms making up the nourishment ... triturate the vegetables ... thereby splitting open the interstices of the cells of the fibers, liberating the atoms and molecules."

"I have found that the toxic sprays are retianed in the fibers ... and are not present in the fiber-free juices. ... Our Creator gave food both as nourishment and as medicine. ... just consider how much more concetnrated than the juices are the following items used as food: soy bean and soy bean flour are 870% more concentrated that carrot juice and 940% more than celery juice. Popcorn is 2100% more concentrated than carrot juice and 2300% more than celery juice. White sugar in 4200% more concentrated that carrot juice and 4600% more than celery juice. "

"When the juice is incompletely extracted from the vegetable or fruit, they are in the form of vital organic water ... their effective power is ... diminished due to the absence of the vitamins and enzymes which are left behind in the fiber and the pulp. ... pesticides and sprays ... it is FIBERS that collect these toxins. The enzymes, atoms and molecules are allergic to them. ... our Blessings have been multiplied beyond what we think we deserve, besides having the vibrations of our food raised to their highest nutritional point. It is the Hand of the Almighty God that guides us in our discoveries. We pass them on to you."
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I could simply retype the whole book here, but the small portions above should suffice to show you what goes one in this book. It was originally published in 1938 -- a while ago, but still, 1938 isn't 1638. The author signs his name as D. Sc., which I take to mean "doctor of science". What efin science was this half-literate impostor a doctor of? Nothing comes to mind. Anyway, it's 2007 now. There are mountains of real scientifically based health and nutrition books; written by real scientists; in standard English; based on real, verifiable, current scientific research. In other words, there is no reason whatsoever to pollute your mind with Mr Walker's rubbish. And there's never been, come to think of it.

Otoh, collectors of pseudo-scientific garbage may want to get this book for its historic and curio values. I have never seen anything quite like it; it reads like a 16-century alchemy manual.

It was suggest to me to buy this book when I purchased my first juicer. I love this book. I have read it over and over and enjoy the carrots with 1 stalk of celery juiced daily. I wish I could enjoy fresh juice during the day, but you can't juice at work! My skin, hair and overall health has improved since I started juicing. I took this one step further and bought his other book, Pure & Simple Natural Weight Control, which talks about juicing and raw foods. It give such insight of how the body digests food, and make you want to eat for nurishment. I recently read a article on raw food diet that names Mr. Walker and said he died at 118 from a accident. You won't be dissapointed with anything Mr. Walker has written.

Juicing is definetely a great way of being healthy. Dr Norman Walker lived to be over 110 yrs old and juiced every day. This book is a simple read and gives easy and practical advice into why, how & what to juice.
Highly recommended if you want to live a long, healthy & happy life!

This book has turned into my health bible. I have given this as a gift to many friends and family members. Use this as your guide to curing and fighting desease. You can feed your body the nutrients it needs to heal itself. I teach juicing and raw food preparation classes, this is one of the books that inspired me and I recomend it to all that attend my classes.

The title says fruit juices, but he hardly mentions them in this book! Well, i guess he preferred to eat them since they digest easier than veggies. He says enzymes can be preserved at any desired low temperature without loss, which i didn't know. He also says that the sprays and pesticides are retained in the fiber, not the juice! He says a lot of good things about raw goats milk, and apple cider vinegar. Also says that the sea & ocean are full of minerals, so you should take sea-salt, kelp, and dulse. And if you wanna eat flesh, choose fish! And take a look in the ailments list, he lists nymphomania! Great book.

Great inspiration fromthis book and a very simple approach to health:

1.Become a vegan
2. Eat mostly raw food
3. Drink lots of fresh organic vegetable & fruit juices
4. Eat less
5. Exercise regularly
6. Keep Colon clean

Another great book by Dr Norman Walker!

this book was instrumental in turning my health around. Dr Walker was very practical, very educated in how the body functions and what the body needs. I wish I would have had a chance to meet him when he was alive. I think he lived to 113.

WA

If you are ill, please buy this book along with all of Dr. Walker's other books and become a new person. There are no guarantees in life but Dr. Walker's research is in my opinion rock-solid. If you are not willing to change, save yourself the money.

Forget all the modern diet approaches to health. This is the best information available about how to improve and maintain your health and live to infinity! The research is rock solid and there are examples of the diet Dr. Walker followed throughout his life.

Every topic this author touches in this book receives the same advice: consume raw fruit and vegetable juices and have a few colonics. The author ignores totally standard approaches that help digestion such as drinking plenty of water and taking in fiber. The reader looses out on a thorough and comprehensive approach to health as the author is so taken by the raw food religion. Additionally, living on juiced raw food may not be the best long-term approach, although the book seems somewhat of a retort of the processed food diet that was gaining popularity in the late 1940s when this book was originally written.