Chapter 8 - Ignored, Then Vindicated: Early Voices on Minerals, Water, and Health.

The forgotten researchers who traced vitality to the soil and wisdom to the water.

The Pull of Medical History

Throughout my career, as I repeatedly dove into researching transformative therapies, I developed a deep appreciation for the history of medicine in that I loved reading academic papers from 100 to 150 years ago—the sheer depth of knowledge always amazed me. How did they know so much back then? With such primitive scientific tools?

What they uncovered through simple, careful clinical observation was often nothing short of profound. And what fascinated me most was the prescience of early visionaries. Every time a treatment or practice eventually proved transformative, there was always—somewhere in the archives—a lone, often ignored voice calling out decades earlier for its potential value.

Of course, the darker side of that realization is harder to ignore: the countless visionary physicians and researchers whose insights were dismissed, discredited, or deliberately silenced. But let’s not go there just yet—I’m trying to stay on my best, most positive behavior here.

This chapter highlights the people who saw the “bigger picture” around trace minerals and purified, structured water before most. From soil scientists to Nobel Prize–winning chemists, all tried to point out to the world that missing trace minerals—silent and unseen—were shaping everything from crop yields to chronic disease.

Elmer Heinrich

Elmer Heinrich, author of “The Untold Truth” is one such visionary. Here’s an excerpt from that book:

Many movies have been made about the migration of the American settlers in the early 1800s. We all know they had to cross the Great Plains of the United States. What we don’t know or realize is that few of these people settled in one place for an extended period. Every few years, they would have to pick up and move. They’d start a small farm in the Midwest, such as Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, or Nebraska, with a milk cow, a couple of pigs, maybe some sheep, and a few children. After a few years, Dad would always be constipated, and the cow would quit giving milk (Ed: see Chapter 27, Section 3 for the hypothesized mechanisms for why this might have been. Short answer - magnesium depletion). The cucumber plants, tomato plants, and farm crops would not grow, so they would almost starve. If they were lucky enough to make it through the winter, they’d load all their belongings into a covered wagon and move west with the milk cow in tow. When they found a suitable place, they started another farm. In a few years, both Mom and Pop would be constipated all the time. The crops, cucumbers, and tomatoes would quit growing, and the cow would again quit giving milk. And, if they survived the winter, they’d load everything in a wagon and move farther west again.

Soil Depletion and “Bottomland Advantage”

What was the problem? Heinrich explained it as soil mineral depletion. Crops and plant growth removed too many minerals from the soil due to continuous year-to-year planting and inadequate fertilization—unless they were lucky enough to own a piece of bottomland near a river.

What was the deal with “bottomland?” Well, when the farms in those areas flooded, new topsoil, silt and additional minerals from miles upstream were deposited. Thus, the “fertilizer” came to them during the flood. As a result, if they had “bottomland,” they didn’t have to move!

The above made me recall a conversation I had with AMD about their “How to Have a Healthy Bowel Movement” post. In that post, AMD stated that 15% of people who suffer from constipation are felt to have an “idiopathic” cause (i.e., unknown). I can’t help but wonder if that “unknown cause” involves trace mineral deficiencies (or major minerals like magnesium)—just a thought.

Commercial Fertilizer and the Limits of “NPK”