Hippocrates, one of history’s earliest known physicians, once asserted, “Walking is man’s best medicine.” Over the last three centuries, people have endorsed walking for a variety of reasons—health among them. Before the 1700s, people walked as an essential part of their lifestyle. With the coming of the transportation revolution—and the advent of such conveyances as horse-drawn coaches, railways and automobiles—walking became something that was done increasingly out of choice rather than necessity. England’s fashionable society engaged in afternoon promenades as a stylish fad. While America’s vast distances and sparse settlements made this activity impractical, Americans nevertheless took to walking in other ways, including engaging in long distance walking competitions complete with spectators and prize money. Thus, for most of the twentieth century, the activity of walking was much more than a means of transportation. Beginning with the history of walking as a social activity, the book discusses the various issues which have affected walkers, including increased automobile traffic, the attention of the marketing industry and pedestrian regulations. The work examines the contemplative, psychological and observational qualities of walking as well as famous personalities—including Leonardo da Vinci, William Shakespeare, John Keats and John James Audubon—who endorsed these intellectual qualifications. During the 1970s fitness boom, walking was reinvented yet again, becoming an activity of numbers and equations as participants fought to maximize health benefits. The book concludes with a legal analysis of pedestrianism as it relates to sharing space with the automobile....

Each year, men spend an enormous amount of time and money searching for a cure to male pattern baldness. Numerous psychological assessments indicate that the reasons behind their futile efforts are sound: attitudes toward bald men are overwhelmingly negative. From the first torturous attempts at hair implants early in this century to the faddish, well-hyped drug treatments of today, the extremes to which men have gone in an effort to regrow hair or cover their bald scalps are examined in this work. The various causes for baldness advanced by credible members of the medical establishment over the years are detailed, as well as instances of outright quackery prompted by numerous individuals and companies. Wigs, weaving, transplants, flaps and scalp reduction are among the techniques explained....

Though the history of tipping can be traced to the Middle Ages, the practice did not become widespread until the late 19th century. Initially, Americans reviled the custom, branding it un-American and undemocratic. The opposition gradually faded and tipping became an American institution. From its beginnings in Europe to its development as a quintessentially American trait, this work provides a social history of tipping customs and how the United States became a nation of tippers....

The relationship of Hollywood and television, initially turbulent, has ultimately been profitable from the first sally in what was expected to be a war of attrition, up through the soliciting of movies by major networks, independent stations, basic cable networks, premium cable channels, pay-per-view systems and even the corner video store. When their initial efforts to acquire ownership interests in television outlets were thwarted, Hollywood's major movie studios determined to withhold from the tube not only their films but also their actors, no doubt in hopes of making the rival medium appear a weak substitute for cinema. With ticket sales shrinking and television set purchases booming, the studios, erasing their last contemptuously drawn line in the sand, grudgingly released their films to television--and made a fortune....