Hirshbein L D
Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA.
Can Bull Med Hist. 1999;16(1):89-124.
In 1914, Progressive Era reformer Irving Fisher and the wealthy contractor Harold Ley founded the Life Extension Institute (LEI), a business venture organized to address the problems of American health. For approximately two decades, from 1914 until the death of its medical director in 1931, the Life Extension Institute widely promoted its health maintenance program of annual physical examinations and health literature. The advertised goal of the LEI was to extend life without old age, as well as improve masculinity and good business practices through adherence to health principles. The first two decades of activities of the Life Extension Institute offer a window for examining early twentieth-century ideas about the relationships between health, old age, and masculinity. The LEI literature constructed a picture of healthy, vigorous, and efficient American working men that helped to cement ideals of masculinity to ideals of health.
1914年，进步时代的改革家欧文·费舍尔和富有的承包商哈罗德·利伊创立了生命延长研究所（LEI），这是一家为解决美国健康问题而组织的商业企业。从1914年到1931年其医学主任去世的大约二十年里，生命延长研究所广泛推广其年度体检和健康文献的健康维护计划。生命延长研究所宣传的目标是延长寿命而无衰老，以及通过坚持健康原则来提升男子气概和良好的商业行为。生命延长研究所最初二十年的活动为审视二十世纪早期关于健康、衰老和男子气概之间关系的观念提供了一个窗口。生命延长研究所的文献描绘了一幅健康、精力充沛且高效的美国在职男性的图景，这有助于将男子气概的理想与健康的理想紧密结合。
