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4A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL September 9, 2015 O PINION CONTACT YOUR ELECTED OFFICIALS Cottage Grove City Hall: 942- 5501. www.cottagegrove.org/ Cottage Grove Mayor Tom Munroe: 942-5501. 125 East 8th Street Eugene, OR 97401 Phone: (541) 682-4203 Fax: (541) 682-4616 Oregon State House of Representatives: Cottage Grove City Councilors: Rep. Cedric Hayden (REP) District: 7 900 Court Street NE Suite H-379 Salem, OR 97301 Phone: (503) 986-1407 Fax: (503) 986-1130 Email: rep.cedrichayden@state. or.us Mike Fleck, At Large: 942-7302 Heather Murphy, At Large: 942-3444 Jake Boone, Ward 1: 653-7413 Oregon State Senate: Jeff Gowing, Ward 2: 942-1900 Garland Burback, Ward 3: 942-4800 Lane County Commissioners: Faye Stewart, East Lane Com- missioner Lane County Public Service Building Sen. Floyd Prozanski (DEM) District: 004 900 Court Street NE Suite S-319 Salem, OR 97301-0001 Phone: (503) 986-1704 Fax: (503) 986-1080 Email: sen.fl oydprozanski@ state.or.us Offbeat Oregon History Portland man hailed as a hero for murdering sister’s ex-lover BY FINN J.D. JOHN For the Sentinel The Unwritten Law Files This column is one of a se- ries of case studies of the early- 20th-century mania for honor killings. It was popularly known as “The Unwritten Law,” and it was a social convention that permitted and/or obligated a man to murder anyone whom he knew to be working to seduce his wife or sister. Unwritten Law cases arose around the country in the 1890s and were alarming- ly common until around the time of the First World War. Today’s column discusses one such case, which took place in Portland in 1906. E arly in November 1906, 21-year-old Orlando Mur- ray went to pay a call on a 22- year-old acquaintance named Lincoln C. Whitney. The main subject of their conversation was to be Murray’s 16-year-old sister, Mary. Secondary topics for the two men’s tete-a-tete in- cluded wedding bells and a baby shower – not necessarily in that order – and, last but not least, a .38-caliber revolver. The conversation did not go well. Whitney had met Mary when she’d traveled from her Portland home to Hubbard, where Whit- ney lived, to work in the hop fi elds for a week. Whitney had, Orlando Murray said (and, later, testifi ed), sweet-talked the cute young out-of-towner into bed with fair promises of marriage, then disappeared as thoroughly as he could. Meanwhile, several weeks after their brief liaison, Mary suddenly found herself in a very awkward position. “My sister told my father that she was threatened with dis- grace unless Whitney could be induced to make good his prom- ise and marry her,” Murray told the Morning Oregonian. “My fa- ther and Mary went to Hubbard. Father talked it over with the elder Whitney and then called the young man himself. Whit- ney laughed in my father’s face and said he would not marry my sister. Mrs. Whitney then came out, called my sister a vile name and insulted my father.” The young Murray said that when he learned about the situ- ation the following week, he decided to settle the matter one way or another. So, once he tracked Whitney down, he gave his best shot at persuading the young Lothario to, as the saying goes, make an honest woman of the girl he had seduced. This Whitney steadfastly refused to do. Murray said he pleaded with him, appealed to his moral sense, and fi nally offered him money – all to no avail. Then he pulled the .38. Not even then would Whitney agree to marry the girl, Murray claimed. So Murray let him have it. Three shots, all lethal hits. Then Murray hurried to the sheriff’s offi ce and turned him- self in. And the next morning, newspaper readers across the state read the details with breath- less avidity. It was the opening act in yet another drama made possible by The Unwritten Law. A family circus If Orlando Murray had hoped his conversation with Whitney would save his sister from pub- lic shame and humiliation, its outcome was rich with irony. Murray’s subsequent murder trial bore a more than passing resemblance to a circus, with a main attraction (the trial); sideshows (including a fi stfi ght involving the defense attorney) and numerous clowns and jok- ers, both on the witness stand and in the crowd of onlookers. The whole sordid story – replete with insanity, sex, alcoholism, hysteria, and of course murder – was unpacked before capacity crowds of very interested spec- tators. Mary twice suffered hys- terical breakdowns and had to be removed from the court. Murray, of course, pleaded not guilty by reason of tempo- rary insanity – the classic Un- written Law plea. In entering it, his attorney claimed that “when he saw all chance and hope of Whitney’s making right by mar- riage the wrong he had done the young woman, (Murray) was suffering from emotional insan- ity, and not responsible for his murderous act,” the Oregonian reported. The defense’s moral case was bolstered by widespread ac- counts of Whitney having boast- ed of his “conquest” of Mary Murray. Its case for the insanity plea was bolstered by the bizarre sideshow spectacle of Orlando Murray’s aged mother testify- ing that insanity ran in Murray’s family; her brother-in-law, she told the riveted onlookers, “died a maniac at Salem, while anoth- er brother served a term in the Salem asylum,” the newspaper reported. She further testifi ed that Murray’s father (whom the newspaper never names) was compelled to give up his medi- cal practice three years earlier because of “mental incapacity, brought on by excessive use of alcoholic stimulants.” Perhaps it’s not much to be wondered about that Lincoln Whitney didn’t want to marry into the Murray clan. Others, however, did. Mur- ray’s attorney’s offi ce was soon fl ooded with marriage proposals for Mary, from all over the state – most likely from lonely bach- elors working in logging camps. shown that carotenoid-colored skin is perceived as healthier and more attractive. In the wild, carotenoids are responsible for the bright feather colors of male birds, which make them more attractive to potential mates. There is a much more subtle, but similar phenomenon in humans. An increase in carot- enoid-produced skin coloration was consistently found to be perceived as healthier in people of Caucasian, African and Asian descent. One interesting study found that people preferred the skin color caused by eating ca- rotenoids over the skin color from a suntan. Another study investigated skin carotenoid coloration changes in response to increased fruit and vegetable consumption. They found that photos of individuals a few weeks after increasing fruit and vegetable intake by three serv- ing per day received higher rat- ings of health and attractiveness than “before” photos. Further- more, the improvement in ap- pearance has been shown to be a motivating factor for increasing fruit and vegetable consump- tion, as reported in the journal Health Psychology. Each time the skin is exposed to the sun, some carotenoids are “used up” for their anti- oxidant, so they must be con- stantly replenished by the diet to maintain the protective ef- fects (smoking and alcohol also deplete additional carotenoids from skin). Consistently con- suming antioxidant-rich plant foods will build up the stores of these protective phytochemicals in the skin. You can even quan- tify your skin carotenoid levels using a specialized scanner to confi rm the accumulation of di- etary carotenoids in your skin. I use one of these scanners in my medical practice to confi rm that these benefi cial phytochemicals have accumulated in the skin of patients as they increase their consumption of carotenoid-rich foods. A Nutritarian diet is de- signed to be rich in antioxidant phytochemicals and promotes health inside and out, protecting against chronic disease and sun damage while giving the skin a natural, healthy-looking glow. Please see OFFBEAT, Page 12A Eating for beautiful, healthy skin BY JOEL FUHRMAN, MD For the Sentinel T he skin is the largest or- gan of the human body and a barrier that protects the body from microbial pathogens and other damaging elements. The health of the skin is a refl ec- tion of one’s over- all health, and the skin’s resilience to sun exposure and outward appearance can be enhanced with high-nutrient foods. Skin cancer is the most com- mon cancer in the U.S., affect- ing one out of every fi ve Ameri- cans. Ultraviolet radiation from the sun promotes aging and carcinogenesis via oxidative stress, infl ammation, and dam- age to DNA. Ultraviolet (UV) exposure also leads to alteration of the skin’s structural proteins, causing sagging and wrinkling. Taking proactive measures such as using a safe mineral sun- screen and limiting mid-day sun exposure are crucial to protect- ing your skin from the sun’s UV rays. Phytochemicals from nat- ural foods can provide an extra source of protection, by enhanc- ing the body’s natural defenses to help prevent sunburn, and its associated dangers, and by slowing the aging of the skin. Carotenoids are one class of phytochemicals that offer pho- $ PUUBHF ( SPWF 4 FOUJOFM 116 N. 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No subscription for less than Ten Weeks. Subscription rates are subject to change upon 30 days’ notice. All subscritptions must be paid prior to beginning the subscription and are non-refundable. Periodicals postage paid at Cottage Grove, Oregon. Postmaster: Send address changes to P.O. Box 35, Cottage Grove, OR 97424. Local Mail Service: If you don’t receive your Cottage Grove Sentinel on the Wednesday of publication, please let us know. Call 942-3325 between 8:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. Advertising ownership: All advertising copy and illustrations prepared by the Cottage Grove Sentinel become the property of the Cottage Grove Sentinel and may not be reproduced for any other use without explicit written prior approval. Copyright Notice: Entire contents ©2015 Cottage Grove Sentinel. toprotection. After we consume carotenoid-rich foods, carot- enoids accumulate in the skin, where they oppose UV-induced oxidative stress. Individual ca- rotenoids, mixed carotenoids and carotenoid-rich whole foods have been shown to have photo-protective qualities that prevent or repair DNA damage to the skin caused by the sun. For example, lycopene, found in tomatoes and pink fruits such as watermelon, grapefruit and papaya, helps to protect the skin from sun damage. Similar results have been found for lu- tein and zeaxanthin, found in leafy greens, and beta-carotene, found in yellow and orange veg- etables. In addition to carotenoids, an- other class of antioxidant nutri- ents—polyphenols—may have photoprotective actions. There are hundreds of polyphenols, and they are present in most whole plant foods. Polyphe- nols from cocoa and green tea, for example, have been shown to counteract UV-induced skin damage in human studies. Wrinkles and other signs of skin aging are related to chrono- logical age but also strongly infl uenced by UV rays. It is es- timated that 80 percent of the visible aging in a woman’s face is due to sun exposure. The phy- tochemical-rich foods that offer sun protection also offer some protection against wrinkles. In one study of older adults, higher intakes of vegetables and le- gumes and lower intake of dairy and sugar were associated with less visible sun damage. Anoth- er study assessed skin aging in middle-aged American women, and found that higher dietary vitamin C intake was associated with fewer wrinkles. In a study of Japanese women that related dietary variables to “crow’s feet” wrinkling, higher intake of green and yellow vegetables was associated with fewer wrinkles. In studies on green tea and co- coa polyphenols, in addition to UV protection, these interven- tions improved appearance fac- tors such as elasticity, hydration and softness. Structural proteins in the con- nective tissue of the skin are also affected by diet. There is preliminary evidence that beta- carotene reduces the levels of one such protein that promotes skin wrinkling. Also, tomato paste supplementation was found to reduce the activity of an enzyme known to degrade structural proteins in the skin, presumably slowing skin aging. Healthy-looking skin In spite of the well-known damaging effects of the sun on our skin, many of us still per- ceive a suntan as healthy-look- ing. Food-derived carotenoids can also affect our skin col- oration, and new research has Maintain skin antioxidants with consistent healthful eating Dr. Fuhrman is a New York Times best-selling author and a family physician specializing in lifestyle and nutritional medi- cine. Visit his informative web- site at DrFuhrman.com. Submit your questions and comments about this column directly to newsquestions@drfuhrman. com. The full reference list for this article can be found at DrFuhrman.com. 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