When America Had a Different View of Weight

[By Ed Nizalowski, Historian]

If one were to compile a list of national characteristics for this country that have evolved in recent years, weight consciousness would probably surface quite early. The number of products containing the words fat-free, cholesterol-free, low calorie, lean, etc., have proliferated like mushrooms after a warm rain. Searching for “real” butter seems more like a quest for contraband. One’s appearance and the need to stay in fashion always seem to favor the lean over the plump. Any extra weight needs to be gotten rid of by means of a dozen different diets or regimens, and so many extra pounds are so many extra nails in your coffin.

This aversion to largeness has not always been the case. In fact, a group of heavyweights in Newark Valley were so proud that providence had blessed them with large bodies that they sponsored a “Fat Men’s Clam Bake” at the Newark Valley Trout Ponds on a Thursday, September 24, 1874. Assuming that Newark Valley had not become some kind of mecca for people of amplitude seeking some kind of haven from the scorn of society, the event can be studied as a way of judging America’s attitude toward the size of one’s body.

There was no hint of offense taken by the plump prose with which the Owego Gazette reported the entire affair, and the reporter seemed to feel that many in the country viewed these anatomical leviathans with a bit of jealousy.

The morning began with the group from Owego gathering at the South Central Depot with Capt. Isaiah Flamer, “a handsome colored tonsorial operator of North Avenue,” being mentioned by name with a group of other “distinguished and adipose gentlemen.” When this “crush of human obesity” rolled out of the cars at Newark Valley, the smiling and corpulent weighmaster general of the day, Frank B. Winship, was ready at the scales. 

As each gentleman stepped on, his name, residence, and weight were registered, and a red badge was pinned upon his coat by Mrs. Waring, “very much in the same manner as prize pigs are decorated with entry cards at a county fair.” [Mrs. Waring was wife of the owner of the Trout Ponds.] Capt. Flamer himself tipped the scales at 241 as envious persons of the “clothes pin order” watched each entry receive the coveted badge.

There were 100 men altogether who reached the desired weight of 200 lbs. or more, the necessary qualification to gain admittance. Since the men and their weights were published in the paper, it was public knowledge that many entrants had acquired their badges “by the skin of their teeth”. It would have been a sad affair if certain borderline cases had spent several weeks “fattening up” only to lose a pound or two through some illness. It would have meant filling their boots with shot or wandering about “disconsolate with the outsiders”.

The clams were baked in beds that were in the shape of a pill box revenue stamp. The beds had handles with the woodwork covered with sod to protect them from the fire. When the clams were cooked, these beds were taken up by the handles and distributed among the tables. As the cooking was being done, the men, accompanied by their wives and children, walked the grounds, admiring the plumpness of the trout or perspiring over the croquet grounds, “knocking about the balls in a manner to remind one forcibly of an elephant manipulating a peck of apples with his trunk.”

Although the day had been cloudy, the sun began to shine around 1:00 and the hungry one hundred began a general waddle up the steps to the dining hall. The Rev. J. K. Peck, formerly the pastor of the M. E. Church at Flemingville and being blessed with his 201 lbs. “invoked the Throne of Grace afterwhich an assault was commenced upon the viands.” As the clams were brought to the dining hall, a solemn procession would follow the savory smell of those who were unable to participate because of “insufficient plumpness.”

When nearly 5,000 clams had been consumed, the Rev. J. K. Peck addressed the crowd and received considerable laughter and applause. The group also heard from Gen. Stewart L. Woodford, who had been passing through Newark Valley, but who had been induced by Judge Clark to participate in the festivities. 

The Gazette remarked that the clambake had been one of the “pleasantest” it had ever attended. There were thirty couples that stayed into the evening and danced to the music of Paris and Smith. The dance lasted until 12:30 with the grounds illuminated by 41 lamps and 30 Japanese lanterns. The Gazette’s account ended with the men’s names listed, their residence and their weight duly recorded. 

In a spirit of fair play, the other end of the weight bell curve was given a chance to gain notoriety in the following year. A lean men’s clam bake was scheduled for July 3, 1875, anticipating every “sugar-tong and animated clothes-pin” to be present. Instead of being urged to pack in some extra pounds, would-be competitors were exhorted to “Bantamize at once.”

(This article first appeared in the Press & Sun-Bulletin on October 21, 1994.)