The Freckle-Faced Boy

[...]

——
The Freckle-Faced Boy
By W. H. Bates, M.D.
——
In one of the public schools of New York, some years ago, was a
boy about ten years old with a very unusual amount of freckles. He had
one of those smiles which some care-free boys carry around with them
all the time, in all places, and under all conditions. His teacher was
a very nervous person wearing glasses. Every time she spoke I was
annoyed, not so much by what she said as by the disagreeable way in
which she said it. As soon as I entered the room she began to find
fault with me for introducing my method of curing and preventing
imperfect sight in children into the school. Pointing sternly at the
freckle-faced boy she said:
"That boy is very nearsighted. He holds his book too close to his
eyes. He cannot read the writing on the blackboard. He is all the time
looking at the Snellen test card instead of studying his lessons. He
talks about it to the other children in the class, and he encourages
them to practice reading it. He tells them that he feels good when he
reads it. Makes his eyes feel better. Helps him to learn his lessons.
He is impertinent because he persists brazenly in advising me, his
teacher, to practice reading those fool letters which do not even
spell a word and have no meaning whatever. I wish you would insist
that he get glasses for his own eyes and make him stop taking glasses
off the eyes of other children. Really, Doctor, it is too absurd for
anything. That boy has actually persuaded the other children that they
cure their headaches and improve their sight by reading that card. If
it were not for the principal, I would have thrown it away long ago."
She said some other things, too, which were even more
uncomplimentary. The children became restless. When she stopped for
breath I took the freckle-faced boy into a dark room, and examined his
eyes with the ophthalmoscope. I found them perfect, with no trace of
myopia or astigmatism. I asked him:
"How is it that the teacher says you cannot read the writing on
the blackboard?"
He replied, still with his wonderful smile: "Because she is such a
bum writer that nobody can read it; she acts often as if she couldn't
read it herself."
"How is it," I continued, "that you hold the book so close to your
face?"
He answered apologetically: "Because I get tired of the scenery."
"What do you mean by that?" I asked.
"Oh," he answered, "the teacher's face; I don't like it. She is
always so cross; her face gives me a pain."
Then I took him back to the classroom and sent him to his seat. I
asked the teacher if she could read the bottom line on the Snellen
test card. She could not do so. Then I showed her an unfamiliar test
card, which she saw even worse. She explained that her glasses needed
to be changed. I asked the freckle-faced boy if he could read it.
"Yes," he said, and promptly did so.
The teacher exploded. It was impossible, she said, that he should
have read the letters; he must have found out in some other way what
they were. She pointed to the clock.
"What time is it?" she asked.
The boy answered her correctly. Then she held up a book with very
large print, which the boy also read at five feet. She was finally
convinced by these and other tests that the boy's sight was better
than her own. When she was through I pointed to some very small
letters which nobody could see at the distance at which the boy was
sitting. He smiled, and said he could not see them.
"But," I said, "you are not trying, you are making no effort to
see them."
At that the teacher unexpectedly struck the top of her desk with
her ruler, and we all jumped, with the exception of the freckle-faced
boy, who had learned how to protect himself from such influences. With
a rasping voice she cried:
"Why don't you do what the doctor tells you to do?"
In a short time my nerves returned to something like the normal,
and I turned to the boy and asked:
"Why don't you try?"
He replied, still smiling: "No use tryin'."
With this as my text I talked for a few moments, and told the
class that the boy was right and that your sight is never perfect when
you try to see. You only make yourself uncomfortable by the strain,
and it never benefits you. I then proceeded to have the pupils
demonstrate some facts. I directed them to keep their attention fixed
on the smallest letter they could see from their seats, to stare at
it, to try to see it better, to concentrate, to partly close their
eyelids—in short, to do everything they could to improve their sight.
I noted that the teacher, who had previously walked to the back of the
room, was listening to what I was saying. The children did as I
suggested, and soon found that the effort made them very uncomfortable
and lowered their vision. I now asked one pupil to tell me the
smallest letter he could see. He answered:
"A letter O on the next to the bottom line."
"When you saw it did you see it easily?"
He answered: "Yes, without any trouble."
Then I said to him: "When you tried to see it, when you made
trouble for your eyes by an effort, by a strain, what happened?"
He answered: "The letter disappeared, the whole card became
blurred, I got a headache, and I don't like it."
"Close your eyes," I said, "and rest them. Cover your eyes with
the palms of your hands and shut out all the light. Now tell me who
discovered America."
"Columbus," he replied, "in 1492."
"Can you spell Columbus?" I asked.
"Yes," he answered, "C-o-l-u-m-b-u-s."
All this time the teacher was standing with her eyes closed and
covered with her hands.
"You spelled it correctly," I said. "How is your headache?"
"Gone," he replied, "and I feel good."
I noted that the teacher still had her eyes covered, and when the
boy said his headache was relieved she nodded her head. I now directed
the boy to take his hands down, open his eyes and tell me how much he
could see.
"Gee" he exclaimed, "I see better. The letter O is all right, and
I can see some of the letters on the bottom line."
With that he put both his hands in the pockets of his trousers,
smiled at me and turned around and grinned at the class. A little girl
wearing glasses now timidly raised her hand, and when I told her to
speak, said:
"Please, sir, I have an awful headache."
Her eyes looked very much strained. I told her to take off her
glasses and put them on the desk, to look at the card and read what
she could see. At this point, the teacher at the back of the room
removed her hands from her face, took off her glasses and placed them
on the desk in front of her. I asked the little girl what she could
see:
"I can only see the largest letter at the top of the card."
She was told to close her eyes and cover them with the palms of
her hands. The teacher did the same, and all the other children
wearing glasses took them off, looked at the card, closed their eyes
and covered them with the palms of their hands. Then I said to the
little girl who had the awful headache.
"What is your name?"
"Margaret," she answered.
"Can you spell it?" I asked, and she spelled it.
"What is your last name?"
She told me, and at my request spelled it also. Then she smiled.
"How is your headache?"
"I haven't any," she answered.
"Take down your hands, open your eyes and kindly read the letters
for me on the card."
She promptly read four lines of letters, and looked very happy
when she did it. Meanwhile the teacher and other pupils who had been
wearing glasses had been doing the same, and when they looked at the
card the second time they smiled, evidently pleased with what they
saw. I was surprised to observe that even the teacher smiled, and
when, as I was about to leave the room, she came forward and threw her
glasses into the waste-basket, I was quite shocked. Turning to me, she
said:
"Doctor, need I say anything?"
"You have said it all, thank you," I replied.
As I went out of the door I heard the class call out in a chorus:
"Thank you, thank you."
After this the Board of Education condemned my method as
"unscientific and erroneous," and forbade the use of the Snellen test
card in the schools, except for the usual purpose of testing the
children's sight. Thus my pleasant visits to the classrooms came to an
end. Some years later, however, I called on the teacher of the freckle-
faced boy to ask about him. She met me smiling and without glasses,
and I noted that the Snellen test card was still on the wall. In
response to my inquiry as to why it should be there after the Board of
Education had forbidden its use, she replied:
"The Board of Education has not the power to make me take that
card down."
Then I asked about the freckle-faced boy.
"Graduated," she replied.
As he was below the age at which children usually graduate from
the public schools, I expressed some surprise.
"Rapid advancement class," she said. "Got through my class in a
hurry and took a lot of my other children with him to the rapid
advancement class. Must be half through high school now. Bright boy."
I have written a book on "The Cure of Imperfect Sight by Treatment
Without Glasses" which contains several hundred pages. The freckle-
faced boy told in three words substantially what is contained in that
book.
——
Better Eyesight
A monthly magazine devoted to the prevention and cure of imperfect
sight without glasses
Vol. V - September, 1921 - No. 3
Copyright, 1921, by the Central Fixation Publishing Company
Editor—W. H. Bates, M.D.
Publisher—Central Fixation Publishing Co.
Doctors are needed all over the world to cure people without glasses
$2.00 per year, 20 cents per copy
300 Madison Avenue, New York, N. Y.
——

[...]

The Majority-opinion OD says that the "child" can not be helped.

Here is what the second-opinion optometrist states about prevention.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7O1eku8f-Q

He is not a fraud, although the majority-opinion ODs insist that he
is.

Enjoy,



On Dec 4, 5:31*am, ThinkRight <misa...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> [...]
>
> * * * * ——
> * * * * The Freckle-Faced Boy
> * * * * By W. H. Bates, M.D.
> * * * * ——
> * * In one of the public schools of New York, some years ago, was a
> boy about ten years old with a very unusual amount of freckles. He had
> one of those smiles which some care-free boys carry around with them
> all the time, in all places, and under all conditions. His teacher was
> a very nervous person wearing glasses. Every time she spoke I was
> annoyed, not so much by what she said as by the disagreeable way in
> which she said it. As soon as I entered the room she began to find
> fault with me for introducing my method of curing and preventing
> imperfect sight in children into the school. Pointing sternly at the
> freckle-faced boy she said:
> * * "That boy is very nearsighted. He holds his book too close to his
> eyes. He cannot read the writing on the blackboard. He is all the time
> looking at the Snellen test card instead of studying his lessons. He
> talks about it to the other children in the class, and he encourages
> them to practice reading it. He tells them that he feels good when he
> reads it. Makes his eyes feel better. Helps him to learn his lessons.
> He is impertinent because he persists brazenly in advising me, his
> teacher, to practice reading those fool letters which do not even
> spell a word and have no meaning whatever. I wish you would insist
> that he get glasses for his own eyes and make him stop taking glasses
> off the eyes of other children. Really, Doctor, it is too absurd for
> anything. That boy has actually persuaded the other children that they
> cure their headaches and improve their sight by reading that card. If
> it were not for the principal, I would have thrown it away long ago."
> * * She said some other things, too, which were even more
> uncomplimentary. The children became restless. When she stopped for
> breath I took the freckle-faced boy into a dark room, and examined his
> eyes with the ophthalmoscope. I found them perfect, with no trace of
> myopia or astigmatism. I asked him:
> * * "How is it that the teacher says you cannot read the writing on
> the blackboard?"
> * * He replied, still with his wonderful smile: "Because she is such a
> bum writer that nobody can read it; she acts often as if she couldn't
> read it herself."
> * * "How is it," I continued, "that you hold the book so close to your
> face?"
> * * He answered apologetically: "Because I get tired of the scenery."
> * * "What do you mean by that?" I asked.
> * * "Oh," he answered, "the teacher's face; I don't like it. She is
> always so cross; her face gives me a pain."
> * * Then I took him back to the classroom and sent him to his seat. I
> asked the teacher if she could read the bottom line on the Snellen
> test card. She could not do so. Then I showed her an unfamiliar test
> card, which she saw even worse. She explained that her glasses needed
> to be changed. I asked the freckle-faced boy if he could read it.
> * * "Yes," he said, and promptly did so.
> * * The teacher exploded. It was impossible, she said, that he should
> have read the letters; he must have found out in some other way what
> they were. She pointed to the clock.
> * * "What time is it?" she asked.
> * * The boy answered her correctly. Then she held up a book with very
> large print, which the boy also read at five feet. She was finally
> convinced by these and other tests that the boy's sight was better
> than her own. When she was through I pointed to some very small
> letters which nobody could see at the distance at which the boy was
> sitting. He smiled, and said he could not see them.
> * * "But," I said, "you are not trying, you are making no effort to
> see them."
> * * At that the teacher unexpectedly struck the top of her desk with
> her ruler, and we all jumped, with the exception of the freckle-faced
> boy, who had learned how to protect himself from such influences. With
> a rasping voice she cried:
> * * "Why don't you do what the doctor tells you to do?"
> * * In a short time my nerves returned to something like the normal,
> and I turned to the boy and asked:
> * * "Why don't you try?"
> * * He replied, still smiling: "No use tryin'."
> * * With this as my text I talked for a few moments, and told the
> class that the boy was right and that your sight is never perfect when
> you try to see. You only make yourself uncomfortable by the strain,
> and it never benefits you. I then proceeded to have the pupils
> demonstrate some facts. I directed them to keep their attention fixed
> on the smallest letter they could see from their seats, to stare at
> it, to try to see it better, to concentrate, to partly close their
> eyelids—in short, to do everything they could to improve their sight.
> I noted that the teacher, who had previously walked to the back of the
> room, was listening to what I was saying. The children did as I
> suggested, and soon found that the effort made them very uncomfortable
> and lowered their vision. I now asked one pupil to tell me the
> smallest letter he could see. He answered:
> * * "A letter O on the next to the bottom line."
> * * "When you saw it did you see it easily?"
> * * He answered: "Yes, without any trouble."
> * * Then I said to him: "When you tried to see it, when you made
> trouble for your eyes by an effort, by a strain, what happened?"
> * * He answered: "The letter disappeared, the whole card became
> blurred, I got a headache, and I don't like it."
> * * "Close your eyes," I said, "and rest them. Cover your eyes with
> the palms of your hands and shut out all the light. Now tell me who
> discovered America."
> * * "Columbus," he replied, "in 1492."
> * * "Can you spell Columbus?" I asked.
> * * "Yes," he answered, "C-o-l-u-m-b-u-s."
> * * All this time the teacher was standing with her eyes closed and
> covered with her hands.
> * * "You spelled it correctly," I said. "How is your headache?"
> * * "Gone," he replied, "and I feel good."
> * * I noted that the teacher still had her eyes covered, and when the
> boy said his headache was relieved she nodded her head. I now directed
> the boy to take his hands down, open his eyes and tell me how much he
> could see.
> * * "Gee" he exclaimed, "I see better. The letter O is all right, and
> I can see some of the letters on the bottom line."
> * * With that he put both his hands in the pockets of his trousers,
> smiled at me and turned around and grinned at the class. A little girl
> wearing glasses now timidly raised her hand, and when I told her to
> speak, said:
> * * "Please, sir, I have an awful headache."
> * * Her eyes looked very much strained. I told her to take off her
> glasses and put them on the desk, to look at the card and read what
> she could see. At this point, the teacher at the back of the room
> removed her hands from her face, took off her glasses and placed them
> on the desk in front of *her. I asked the little girl what she could
> see:
> * * "I can only see the largest letter at the top of the card."
> * * She was told to close her eyes and cover them with the palms of
> her hands. The teacher did the same, and all the other children
> wearing glasses took them off, looked at the card, closed their eyes
> and covered them with the palms of their hands. Then I said to the
> little girl who had the awful headache.
> * * "What is your name?"
> * * "Margaret," she answered.
> * * "Can you spell it?" I asked, and she spelled it.
> * * "What is your last name?"
> * * She told me, and at my request spelled it also. Then she smiled.
> * * "How is your headache?"
> * * "I haven't any," she answered.
> * * "Take down your hands, open your eyes and kindly read the letters
> for me on the card."
> * * She promptly read four lines of letters, and looked very happy
> when she did it. Meanwhile the teacher and other pupils who had been
> wearing glasses had been doing the same, and when they looked at the
> card the second time they smiled, evidently pleased with what they
> saw. I was surprised to observe that even the teacher smiled, and
> when, as I was about to leave the room, she came forward and threw her
> glasses into the waste-basket, I was quite shocked. Turning to me, she
> said:
> * * "Doctor, need I say anything?"
> * * "You have said it all, thank you," I replied.
> * * As I went out of the door I heard the class call out in a chorus:
> * * "Thank you, thank you."
> * * After this the Board of Education condemned my method as
> "unscientific and erroneous," and forbade the use of the Snellen test
> card in the schools, except for the usual purpose of testing the
> children's sight. Thus my pleasant visits to the classrooms came to an
> end. Some years later, however, I called on the teacher of the freckle-
> faced boy to ask about him. She met me smiling and without glasses,
> and I noted that the Snellen test card was still on the wall. In
> response to my inquiry as to why it should be there after the Board of
> Education had forbidden its use, she replied:
> * * "The Board of Education has not the power to make me take that
> card down."
> * * Then I asked about the freckle-faced boy.
> * * "Graduated," she replied.
> * * As he was below the age at which children usually graduate from
> the public schools, I expressed some surprise.
> * * "Rapid advancement class," she said. "Got through my class in a
> hurry and took a lot of my other children with him to the rapid
> advancement class. Must be half through high school now. Bright boy."
> * * I have written a book on "The Cure of Imperfect Sight by Treatment
> Without Glasses" which contains several hundred pages. The freckle-
> faced boy told in three words substantially what is contained in that
> book.
> ——
> Better Eyesight
> A monthly magazine devoted to the prevention and cure of imperfect
> sight without glasses
> Vol. V - September, 1921 - No. 3
> Copyright, 1921, by the Central Fixation Publishing Company
> Editor—W. H. Bates, M.D.
> Publisher—Central Fixation Publishing Co.
> Doctors are needed all over the world to cure people without glasses
> $2.00 per year, 20 cents per copy
> 300 Madison Avenue, New York, N. Y.
> ——
>
> [...]

On Dec 4, 6:24*am, Otis <otisbr...@embarqmail.com> wrote:
> The Majority-opinion OD says that the "child" can not be helped.
>
> Here is what the second-opinion optometrist states about prevention.

I can be fairly certain there is nothing but anecdotal evidence and
proof by assertion in this video, too, right?

I watched ONE of these ridiculous things that Otis holds out as
"evidence" of something.

In essence, it was a well-meaning woman who claims to have improved
her eyesight by NVI methods, but has not had any verification that any
improvements were made.

Sell placebo somewhere else, Otis. HERE, you are widely considered a
lunatic.

Or worse.

On Dec 4, 3:31*am, ThinkRight <misa...@googlemail.com> wrote:

To "think right," you'd first have to think.

Good luck with that.

Looking at kids given stronger and stronger minus lenses, and
"wondering" why no preventive actions are even SUGGESTED.

The professor seems to be "defensive", wondering why McFarland think
he is responsible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lovok...eature=channel

At least Dr. Bates made an ATTEMPT. Everyone else sits on their ass,
and "carps" about this situation.

Engineering/Science prevention best,




On Dec 4, 5:31*am, ThinkRight <misa...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> [...]
>
> * * * * ——
> * * * * The Freckle-Faced Boy
> * * * * By W. H. Bates, M.D.
> * * * * ——
> * * In one of the public schools of New York, some years ago, was a
> boy about ten years old with a very unusual amount of freckles. He had
> one of those smiles which some care-free boys carry around with them
> all the time, in all places, and under all conditions. His teacher was
> a very nervous person wearing glasses. Every time she spoke I was
> annoyed, not so much by what she said as by the disagreeable way in
> which she said it. As soon as I entered the room she began to find
> fault with me for introducing my method of curing and preventing
> imperfect sight in children into the school. Pointing sternly at the
> freckle-faced boy she said:
> * * "That boy is very nearsighted. He holds his book too close to his
> eyes. He cannot read the writing on the blackboard. He is all the time
> looking at the Snellen test card instead of studying his lessons. He
> talks about it to the other children in the class, and he encourages
> them to practice reading it. He tells them that he feels good when he
> reads it. Makes his eyes feel better. Helps him to learn his lessons.
> He is impertinent because he persists brazenly in advising me, his
> teacher, to practice reading those fool letters which do not even
> spell a word and have no meaning whatever. I wish you would insist
> that he get glasses for his own eyes and make him stop taking glasses
> off the eyes of other children. Really, Doctor, it is too absurd for
> anything. That boy has actually persuaded the other children that they
> cure their headaches and improve their sight by reading that card. If
> it were not for the principal, I would have thrown it away long ago."
> * * She said some other things, too, which were even more
> uncomplimentary. The children became restless. When she stopped for
> breath I took the freckle-faced boy into a dark room, and examined his
> eyes with the ophthalmoscope. I found them perfect, with no trace of
> myopia or astigmatism. I asked him:
> * * "How is it that the teacher says you cannot read the writing on
> the blackboard?"
> * * He replied, still with his wonderful smile: "Because she is such a
> bum writer that nobody can read it; she acts often as if she couldn't
> read it herself."
> * * "How is it," I continued, "that you hold the book so close to your
> face?"
> * * He answered apologetically: "Because I get tired of the scenery."
> * * "What do you mean by that?" I asked.
> * * "Oh," he answered, "the teacher's face; I don't like it. She is
> always so cross; her face gives me a pain."
> * * Then I took him back to the classroom and sent him to his seat. I
> asked the teacher if she could read the bottom line on the Snellen
> test card. She could not do so. Then I showed her an unfamiliar test
> card, which she saw even worse. She explained that her glasses needed
> to be changed. I asked the freckle-faced boy if he could read it.
> * * "Yes," he said, and promptly did so.
> * * The teacher exploded. It was impossible, she said, that he should
> have read the letters; he must have found out in some other way what
> they were. She pointed to the clock.
> * * "What time is it?" she asked.
> * * The boy answered her correctly. Then she held up a book with very
> large print, which the boy also read at five feet. She was finally
> convinced by these and other tests that the boy's sight was better
> than her own. When she was through I pointed to some very small
> letters which nobody could see at the distance at which the boy was
> sitting. He smiled, and said he could not see them.
> * * "But," I said, "you are not trying, you are making no effort to
> see them."
> * * At that the teacher unexpectedly struck the top of her desk with
> her ruler, and we all jumped, with the exception of the freckle-faced
> boy, who had learned how to protect himself from such influences. With
> a rasping voice she cried:
> * * "Why don't you do what the doctor tells you to do?"
> * * In a short time my nerves returned to something like the normal,
> and I turned to the boy and asked:
> * * "Why don't you try?"
> * * He replied, still smiling: "No use tryin'."
> * * With this as my text I talked for a few moments, and told the
> class that the boy was right and that your sight is never perfect when
> you try to see. You only make yourself uncomfortable by the strain,
> and it never benefits you. I then proceeded to have the pupils
> demonstrate some facts. I directed them to keep their attention fixed
> on the smallest letter they could see from their seats, to stare at
> it, to try to see it better, to concentrate, to partly close their
> eyelids—in short, to do everything they could to improve their sight.
> I noted that the teacher, who had previously walked to the back of the
> room, was listening to what I was saying. The children did as I
> suggested, and soon found that the effort made them very uncomfortable
> and lowered their vision. I now asked one pupil to tell me the
> smallest letter he could see. He answered:
> * * "A letter O on the next to the bottom line."
> * * "When you saw it did you see it easily?"
> * * He answered: "Yes, without any trouble."
> * * Then I said to him: "When you tried to see it, when you made
> trouble for your eyes by an effort, by a strain, what happened?"
> * * He answered: "The letter disappeared, the whole card became
> blurred, I got a headache, and I don't like it."
> * * "Close your eyes," I said, "and rest them. Cover your eyes with
> the palms of your hands and shut out all the light. Now tell me who
> discovered America."
> * * "Columbus," he replied, "in 1492."
> * * "Can you spell Columbus?" I asked.
> * * "Yes," he answered, "C-o-l-u-m-b-u-s."
> * * All this time the teacher was standing with her eyes closed and
> covered with her hands.
> * * "You spelled it correctly," I said. "How is your headache?"
> * * "Gone," he replied, "and I feel good."
> * * I noted that the teacher still had her eyes covered, and when the
> boy said his headache was relieved she nodded her head. I now directed
> the boy to take his hands down, open his eyes and tell me how much he
> could see.
> * * "Gee" he exclaimed, "I see better. The letter O is all right, and
> I can see some of the letters on the bottom line."
> * * With that he put both his hands in the pockets of his trousers,
> smiled at me and turned around and grinned at the class. A little girl
> wearing glasses now timidly raised her hand, and when I told her to
> speak, said:
> * * "Please, sir, I have an awful headache."
> * * Her eyes looked very much strained. I told her to take off her
> glasses and put them on the desk, to look at the card and read what
> she could see. At this point, the teacher at the back of the room
> removed her hands from her face, took off her glasses and placed them
> on the desk in front of *her. I asked the little girl what she could
> see:
> * * "I can only see the largest letter at the top of the card."
> * * She was told to close her eyes and cover them with the palms of
> her hands. The teacher did the same, and all the other children
> wearing glasses took them off, looked at the card, closed their eyes
> and covered them with the palms of their hands. Then I said to the
> little girl who had the awful headache.
> * * "What is your name?"
> * * "Margaret," she answered.
> * * "Can you spell it?" I asked, and she spelled it.
> * * "What is your last name?"
> * * She told me, and at my request spelled it also. Then she smiled.
> * * "How is your headache?"
> * * "I haven't any," she answered.
> * * "Take down your hands, open your eyes and kindly read the letters
> for me on the card."
> * * She promptly read four lines of letters, and looked very happy
> when she did it. Meanwhile the teacher and other pupils who had been
> wearing glasses had been doing the same, and when they looked at the
> card the second time they smiled, evidently pleased with what they
> saw. I was surprised to observe that even the teacher smiled, and
> when, as I was about to leave the room, she came forward and threw her
> glasses into the waste-basket, I was quite shocked. Turning to me, she
> said:
> * * "Doctor, need I say anything?"
> * * "You have said it all, thank you," I replied.
> * * As I went out of the door I heard the class call out in a chorus:
> * * "Thank you, thank you."
> * * After this the Board of Education condemned my method as
> "unscientific and erroneous," and forbade the use of the Snellen test
> card in the schools, except for the usual purpose of testing the
> children's sight. Thus my pleasant visits to the classrooms came to an
> end. Some years later, however, I called on the teacher of the freckle-
> faced boy to ask about him. She met me smiling and without glasses,
> and I noted that the Snellen test card was still on the wall. In
> response to my inquiry as to why it should be there after the Board of
> Education had forbidden its use, she replied:
> * * "The Board of Education has not the power to make me take that
> card down."
> * * Then I asked about the freckle-faced boy.
> * * "Graduated," she replied.
> * * As he was below the age at which children usually graduate from
> the public schools, I expressed some surprise.
> * * "Rapid advancement class," she said. "Got through my class in a
> hurry and took a lot of my other children with him to the rapid
> advancement class. Must be half through high school now. Bright boy."
> * * I have written a book on "The Cure of Imperfect Sight by Treatment
> Without Glasses" which contains several hundred pages. The freckle-
> faced boy told in three words substantially what is contained in that
> book.
> ——
> Better Eyesight
> A monthly magazine devoted to the prevention and cure of imperfect
> sight without glasses
> Vol. V - September, 1921 - No. 3
> Copyright, 1921, by the Central Fixation Publishing Company
> Editor—W. H. Bates, M.D.
> Publisher—Central Fixation Publishing Co.
> Doctors are needed all over the world to cure people without glasses
> $2.00 per year, 20 cents per copy
> 300 Madison Avenue, New York, N. Y.
> ——
>
> [...]

On Dec 4, 9:04*am, Otis <otisbr...@embarqmail.com> wrote:

> Looking at kids given stronger and stronger minus lenses, and
> "wondering" why no preventive actions are even SUGGESTED.

1) I'd bet most of those kids have a history of wearing larger and
larger shoe sizes, too.

What would you suggest (, you absolute idiot)?

2) Have any evidence that anything you've conjured up works any better
than placebo (hint: ask your myopic niece, Joy Benson), and is safe?

No?

Didn't think so.