By Ken Walker- I have co-authored or edited six health-oriented books the past three years, including Jumpstart!, which Siloam Press released this week. This process has proved quite educational. Still, it took a good part of those three years before a message emphasized by most of the authors I have worked with sank in: Drink…
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By Ken Walker- I used to hate the cliché, “When life hands you lemons, make lemonade.” However, after watching Huntington making lemonade in recent years, I am a bit fonder of this saying. The lemon came in the form of national headlines labeling us the “nation’s fattest city,” based on a Centers for Disease Control…
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By Ken Walker- Obesity remains a problem in West Virginia and a dozen other states, according to a story on the most recent annual study by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Five years ago, a CDC report on the Huntington area’s nation-leading problems with obesity and its related diseases prompted grassroots action, as well…
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By Ken Walker- In my last blog I wrote about Cabell Huntington Hospital taking over the operation of Huntington’s Kitchen, the healthy-cooking-classes initiative that sprang up after Jamie Oliver filmed his ABC mini-series here. Equally exciting when it comes to such grassroots-driven activity is the Wild Ramp. The healthy foods market opened in downtown Huntington…
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By Ken Walker- After the national spotlight fell on Huntington in 2006 thanks to the popular We Are Marshall movie, it returned a few years later when Jamie Oliver’s production crew came to town to film his award-winning mini-series for ABC. Yet more proof of the long-term impact of Oliver’s visit surfaced recently with the…
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By Ken Walker – The year before Jamie Oliver came to Huntington, West Virginia to film his award-winning ABC mini-series, the area’s obesity epidemic cast a bleak shadow over the state. How bleak? In our book, Winning the Food Fight, Steve Willis wrote about a report issued by the Centers for Disease Control that reviewed…
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By Ken Walker- Now that three years have passed since Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution aired on ABC Television, it is reasonable to ask whether many people around Huntington still care about healthy lifestyles. Is the excitement that stirred then still alive? After participating in the volunteer crew that helped stage the latest Healthy Huntington Day…
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By Ken Walker- The danger of emphasizing healthy living is sounding like a broken record or offending those who struggle with their weight. But since I still know what that struggle is like, I believe this message is one that never goes out of style. Besides the vegetarian lifestyle I adopted, the constant reminders of…
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By Ken Walker- When famed British chef Jamie Oliver came to Huntington, West Virginia in the fall of 2009 to produce his first Food Revolution mini-series for ABC, I never imagined that I would become part of a healthy reformation that continues to this day. Filming stretched to April of 2010, when Oliver’s crew taped…
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