Medicine: For Uproarious Waistlines

For nearly ten years Dr. Charles St. John Butler, Navy captain, has been throwing axes into logs for a half-hour each day. Last week in the American Journal of Surgery he told why and how he does so, urged others to do likewise for the sake of their health.

Throwing axes at logs “is convenient, interesting and effective, for it brings into operation nearly all muscular groups in the body. It requires a stance and gives a twist to the torso which is most effective in subduing an uproarious waistline.”

At the Brooklyn Naval Hospital where Captain Butler is commanding officer, he keeps a stack of logs and a collection of axes. Some axes are single-bitted, some double-bitted. Others are firemen’s axes. The axes which Captain Butler uses are short-helved 3½ or 4 pounders. Longest convenient length for ax and handle is 16 in. A greater length interferes with the tumble of the ax on its way from hand to target.

In throwing an ax Captain Butler stands four to eight yards from the butt end of the log target. The beginner should first try to put the ax edge into the log. Later he can try driving spikes into the wood with the ax head. Adroit Captain Butler can cleave a piece of garden hose three out of five times at eight yards.

Captain Butler, 58, began his fantastic calisthenics when he was commanding officer of the Naval Medical School at Washington (1921-24, 1927-32). He pursued it while he was director general of public health in Haiti (1924-27). Captain Butler’s predecessor in charge of the Brooklyn Naval Hospital was Perceval Sherer Rossiter, 58, who this year became Surgeon General and a Rear Admiral.