The Cigarette Diet, the Wine Cleanse, and Other Bizarre Fads People Actually Tried

“I had lost upwards of `stat`|sixty pounds| of fat: I was feeling better in all ways than I had for twenty years,” Horace Fletcher raved in 1913. The miracle diet behind his transformation? One he invented himself. “Fletcherism,” a fad from the turn of the last century, captivated titans of industry like `keyword`|John D. Rockefeller| who were eager to boost their efficiency. It’s a historical echo of today's biohacking craze. From chewing food into pulp to smoking yourself skinny, here’s a look at some of the strangest, and sometimes most dangerous, diets from the past.

Hollywood's Hunger Games and 'Scientific' Solutions

Celebrities have long been trendsetters in extreme dieting. In the 1920s, after the press criticized her weight, film star Nita Naldi reportedly dropped `stat`|20 lbs| on a diet of nothing but lamb chops, pineapple, and black coffee. She later admitted to nearly fainting from hunger, saying, “One must suffer Hades to be thin.” A 1962 bestseller from a `keyword`|Cosmopolitan| editor promised a `stat`|six-pound| loss in two days on a diet of eggs, steak, and a full bottle of white wine each day.

When star power wasn't enough, 'science' stepped in. In the 1930s, an ad campaign for `keyword`|Lucky Strike| cigarettes coined the phrase, “Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet,” helping it become America’s top-selling brand. By the 1940s, doctors were prescribing amphetamines—literal speed—as diet pills, a dangerous solution marketed in an array of bright colors.

From Bizarre Habits to Tragic Fads

Some historical diets seem strangely familiar. William Banting's 1860s diet, which advised avoiding all starches and sugars, is a clear forerunner to modern low-carb trends. The cabbage soup diet, whose popularity ebbed and flowed from the '50s through the '90s, spread bizarrely through faxed chain letters with no clear origin.

Others were simply tragic. In 1976, Dr. Robert Linn's liquid protein diet became a national fad, but it led to a series of lawsuits and a Congressional hearing following a number of reported deaths. Even `keyword`|Coca-Cola| got in on the action, running ads in 1961 that claimed drinking its regular, sugary soda was a smart choice because “There’s no waistline worry with Coke,” suggesting it would keep you from eating something with more calories.