Although the nudist magazine incorporated a more alluring style, Boone hesitated to introduce more graphic pictures that would upset censors. To limit the potential eroticism of the naked bodies in the magazine, the editors used deliberate posing and group pictures and retouched pubic hair and genitalia. The magazine offered a guide to readers who wanted to submit pictures to the publication. The “most preferred” photos diverted attention from the eroticism of the body through movements that captured “work or play activities, whether indoors or outdoors.” Hoping to encourage the submission of pictures showing families, the editors also solicited images of “groups . . . from three to six persons.” More risqué images that displayed “two or more persons” needed to show activities such as volleyball, swimming, or hiking and to “tell a story” to ensure that the photo depicted nudist principles rather than titillating the reader.133 Pictures featuring “larger groups, couples, and singles” were undesirable since they might resemble pinups, evoke homosexuality, or imply group sex. A typical snapshot to remember family and friends, in which naked men and women stood “in a row in front of the camera,” represented the “worst possible picture,” according to the editors, because the naked body itself became the principal focus of the image.134 Relying on movement, recreational activities, and familial groups, the images in Sunshine and Health presented a desexualized aesthetic.
The decision to exclude genitalia from Sunshine and Health restrained the potentially illicit character of the magazine, but it also betrayed the movement’s commitment to sexual frankness. Since the magazine’s inception in 1933, the editors followed the criteria laid out by John Sumner and the NYSSV and self-censored the pubic hair and genitalia of men, women, and occasionally children. Nudists resented the “mutilated pictures” that regularly appeared in Sunshine and Health.135 The editors preferred to avoid airbrushing or scratching out the pubic area of men and women. This not only looked grotesque but, in direct opposition to the nudist cause, communicated shame and scorn for the natural body. Rather than appearing as hypocrites, they relied heavily on posed images that hid the pubic area but still appeared natural. In requesting pictures from readers, the magazine discouraged images that seemed to “call undue attention” to the pubic area, such as “full front views.”136 Instead, they asked photographers to send in pictures using “front quarter views and semi-side views” in order to “produce a 100 percent nudist picture [against] which no adverse criticism [could] be brought.”137 Numerous letters to the editor called for the publication to stop the practice, leaders within the movement felt that it disgraced the natural body,138 and nudist photographers decried the omissions as inartistic.139 Boone also objected to the assumption that the open display of genitalia constituted lewdness or prurience. Yet the managing editor of Sunshine and Health knew “he could not do otherwise at present.”140
The aesthetic of nakedness constituted another major factor in the depiction, promotion, and eroticism of American nudism. On the one hand, the movement wanted to present nudism as it was practiced at nudist camps across the country; on the other hand, the magazine also aspired to promote the benefits of the health-oriented nudist lifestyle. These often-conflicting interests resulted in a debate within the magazine over whether to include less aesthetically pleasing images alongside the many svelte, young, well-proportioned bodies that simultaneously advertised the therapeutic benefits of going naked and appealed to the non-nudist reader looking for erotica. One photographer recognized, “we are trying to sell social sunbathing to our fellow citizens,” and felt that the pictures should “present it honestly but attractively.”141 Although he maintained that “individuals showing the results of years of unhealthy living in the form of unsightly abdominal protuberance, scrawny limbs, or others having the misfortune to need trusses or leg irons” should be “welcomed and liked for their personalities” when met in camp, he maintained that including them in the magazine would “give a wrong impression to those who have not experienced the wonderful spirit and goodwill and wholesomeness that pervades [the] camps.”142 The aversion to exhibiting trusses and leg irons particularly conformed to public expectations that the disabled be hidden from public view. The Roosevelt administration went to great lengths to conceal the president’s disability at public appearances and in the media in order to assure the electorate of his health, strength, and competency to lead.143 Similarly, the photographer speculated that non-nudists would respond to such images by saying, “Do I have to look at that kind of thing if I go to your camp?”144 Many nudists thought that the display of healthy, young, and athletic naked bodies in Sunshine and Health testified to the physical benefits of nudism and encouraged membership growth.
The inclusion of the aesthetically pleasing body alongside more quotidian examples of nakedness helped blur the lines separating the pornographic from acceptable visual representations. By incorporating the attractive and unattractive, the magazine tried to balance its goals of presenting the health benefits of the nudist lifestyle, comforting apprehensive potential converts, and avoiding the ire of censors. In a “defense of the potbellies,” one nudist agreed that “no one will seriously contend that these [images] intrinsically are beautiful.”145 Yet he went on to observe that non-nudists most likely do not resemble “Apollo or Aphrodite” and maintained that an interested outsider might be “impressed with the fact that the nudists do not look like perverts, roués or idiots.”146 The non-nudist might be convinced to join the movement by seeing men or women who did not fear to show their less attractive body types. Although he hoped to “preserve them their quota of space in the magazine,” the author of the article also reminded readers that nudists “by definition love nature and everything that is beautiful.”147 He called for pictures of “beautiful women and strong men even though such pictures may obviously be posed.”148 He felt that these pictures when combined with “truly nudist pictures” such as the “potbellies” would not “impair [Sunshine and Health’s] function in the non-nudist field.”149
The effort to distinguish nudist representations from more erotic images did not stop Sunshine and Health from circulating widely among the troops serving in the Second World War. The editors of the magazine took pride in the fact that “thousands of boys in the services receive [the] magazines regularly.”150 Several men who wrote to the magazine to inquire about subscriptions or even to offer their endorsement confirmed the frequency with which soldiers shared and exchanged issues of the magazine with one another. One navy seaman admitted that the magazine “came into [his] hands quite by accident” when he was on a “ship in Pearl Harbor”; an initially skeptical soldier reported being won over to nudism after he “accidentally found” an issue, while another soldier “ran across it in the barracks,” and still another soldier got his “hands on it” after the magazine had “made the rounds” in his sleeping quarters.151 Letters that commented on the widespread sharing of Sunshine and Health revealed the magazine’s popularity and open acceptance within the U.S. military.
The restrained eroticism of Sunshine and Health made the magazine attractive to military officials, who enforced a policy that gave troops the freedom to pursue their sexual desires as long as they did so with discretion. The editors of the magazine reported that “several commanding officers” endorsed the publication’s “shipment to their commands abroad” and “certified that nudist publications were in the interests of the morale of the forces.”152 Generals and commanding officers valued virile soldiers and recognized that their troops needed to have an opportunity to satisfy their sexual desires while stationed far away from home. Yet they also worried that venereal disease posed a serious threat that needed to be avoided at all costs, and they assumed that reports of sexual indiscretions by soldiers would likely erode support for the war at home. These anxieties shaped military policies that publicly denied soldiers’ sexual activities even as commanding officers distributed condoms to men going on leave or, in some cases, played a role in setting up places of p
rostitution in an occupied territory or country. Domestically, the military hoped to satiate soldiers’ sexual appetites with respectable female companions rather than prostitutes, who in previous conflicts were blamed for spreading venereal disease.153 The military relied heavily on “patriotutes,” or women who provided entertainment, companionship, and even sexual favors to uplift the spirits of the troops.154 Displaying more graphic images than most pinups but under the guise of a health movement, Sunshine and Health directed troops’ attention away from prostitutes while still maintaining the appearance of respectability.
The nonthreatening, even humorous, character of American nudism found a place in Yank, a weekly magazine published by the U.S. military and written for and by soldiers during the Second World War. The military designed Yank to entertain and uplift the soldiers’ spirits. Priced at five cents, the widely read magazine represented a particularly good value for soldiers seeking humorous cartoons, reports about the home front, and sexual content. Each issue included a suggestive pinup of an attractive, often well-known celebrity such as Ingrid Bergman, Lucille Ball, Rita Hayworth, and Marilyn Monroe (one of the first published images of Monroe). In one issue, next to a pinup of the actress Gloria De Haven in a bathing suit, Yank ran a “People on the Home Front” feature on American nudism.155 The tongue-in-cheek column featured an interview with Alois Knapp and introduced the principles of the nudist movement while hinting at the erotic pleasures to be had in its publications. As Knapp explained the contributions that nudism could make to the war effort, improving health, promoting social equality, and minimizing voyeurism, the article described a picture displayed on the wall above his desk of a “brunette who has all the right trajectories” and “is peeled right down to the buff,” which the writer found to be “delightful buff.” The article also announced that Sunshine and Health included many similar “pictures which [did] not have titles” and “[spoke] for themselves.”156 Yank’s short profile on the nudist movement used humor to discreetly inform soldiers not already familiar with nudist publications that the magazine exhibited images far more graphic than the pinups officially sanctioned by the U.S. military.
The editors of Sunshine and Health began to experiment with more erotic content as more and more Americans felt comfortable with the erotic desires of the troops. The massive mobilization of troops into a sex-segregated environment provoked public fears of homoeroticism, because the “boys are deserted there with other boys,” and interracial sex, since the troops might also “be surrounded and seduced by women of other nationalities, races, or class backgrounds.”157 To restore the illusion of “normative middle-class American heterosexuality,” Despina Kakoudaki argues that the public embraced the pinup and insisted that “male soldiers need to be surrounded by photographs of sexy young women.”158 The shift toward greater tolerance for heterosexual desire and expression resembled nudist arguments that healthy sexual relationships depended on satisfying the “natural curiosity” to see and experience the naked body. While it also gave nudists greater liberty to use images and content that exhibited more than just sexually frank depictions of the body, the transformation of Sunshine and Health during the war weakened the movement’s arguments that nudist materials contrasted markedly with commercial publications that profited from sex and sexual display.
The letters printed in Sunshine and Health acknowledged and accepted the troops’ erotic interest in the publication. A soldier, who had been a botanist at the University of Illinois, wrote to the magazine reporting that “one of the fellows had brought it in thinking it was another of the ‘strip-tease’ publications which are so common here.”159 Expressing gratitude for the magazine, a member of the Army Air Force complained, “We get so lonesome at times that it is miserable,” and added, “We can’t find much comfort in the USO clubs,” since he did not care for the “very cold business” of “paid hospitality.”160 Another soldier, who had found the magazine floating around the barracks, admitted that his “first reactions were quite the same as those of the other fellows.”161 He thought, “It was a pleasure to have in my possession such a priceless gem!” After “scanning it from cover to cover,” however, he began thinking about nudism as a “sensible world movement rather than a false front for unleashed passion, which is the impression most people . . . seem to have of it.”162
Some soldiers used the publication for more than just pictures. Some used the publication to advance their social lives after they returned from the battlefront. They took advantage of the “Nude Culture” section to advertise their desire to meet other nudists. One “ex-air-gunner” provided information about his marital status, physical appearance, and interests in a letter he sent to the magazine.163 An “American of Polish decent” and a “widower by death” stated that he was “36 years of age,” stood “5 feet 5 inches tall,” had “brown hair and eyes,” and weighed “150 pounds.”164 The recipient of a “fair education,” he listed his interests: “outdoor sports, amusements, enjoy good health and interested in art, nudism.”165 He concluded his letter by soliciting “others, both men and women regardless of age, who are interested in similar ideas.”166 Listing his physical traits, interests, and marital history while soliciting communication without a reference to attending a nudist camp or function, his letter read more like a dating advertisement.
Sunshine and Health also celebrated the sexual virility and promiscuity of American soldiers on the battlefield. In an article titled “The Adventures of Hughie,” the reader relived “D-day and H-Hour” as the “Headquarters representative at the front” recounted his “experiences and feelings during an Amphibian landing against the Japs.”167 Referring to Hughie as “our hero” and detailing every explosion, the article highlighted the soldier’s bravery in the field. The Japanese’s prompt retreat into the jungle prevented the story’s hero from engaging in combat but did not stop him from boasting that he “would like to shoot a Jap for each of [his] girlfriends.” The deliberate reference to multiple “girlfriends” hinted at Hughie’s sexual prowess and celebrated his heterosexuality by acclaiming his promiscuity. The article, then, employed explicitly hyperheterosexual language that resembled the foreign-policy rhetoric of the Cold War, which relied on metaphors of penetration to articulate masculinized nationalism.168 Hughie bragged that if given the opportunity to meet a Japanese soldier, he would “shoot him in the Rising Sun, jab his trench knife into his Grand Chrysanthemum, and then kick him in the swastika. The wicked villans!”169 The assertion that the protagonist would forcibly castrate or sodomize Japanese soldiers with his knife or gun demonstrated the character’s passionate hatred for a queered or feminized enemy while again evidencing his hyperheterosexuality.
The nudist movement’s commitment to showing both male and female naked bodies appealed to men and women who began to explore their homosexual desires during the Second World War. The mass migration of people to cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York City freed young men and women from the moral restraints of their families and small towns and created an environment where they acted on feelings they had previously been forced to deny or keep secret. Prior to the war, little homoerotic content appeared in Sunshine and Health. Many articles in the magazine maintained that satisfying the natural curiosity to see the naked body guarded against “perversions” such as homosexuality that came about, according to nudists, because of repressive religious organizations and misguided government censorship policies. Nevertheless, many gay men and women turned to Sunshine and Health during the war as a safe way to view images of the naked body. The classified advertisements in the back of the magazine also offered a space and a vocabulary to safely contact other gay men and women. Rather than discourage this interest, the editors began to include images, articles, and advertisements that appealed directly and indirectly to a gay male audience.170 The support of a gay readership furthered the nudist goal to frankly display the naked body of both sexes and pushed the nudist movement to challenge the heteronormative
boundaries of modern sexual liberalism.
Many of the images of naked men in Sunshine and Health resembled the highly stylized representations used in male physique magazines that also gained popularity with a gay male audience during and after the Second World War. At the turn of the twentieth century, the physical-culture movement began publishing magazines that encouraged male readers to participate in sports and to develop a muscular body as a symbol of masculinity during a period in which white-collar work threatened to weaken middle-class bodies. However, according to the historian David K. Johnson, as more gay readers purchased physical-culture magazines and placed classified advertisements requesting “physical culture studies,” a group of gay-owned magazines emerged that used the trope of ancient Greece and bodybuilding to “legitimize male admiration for the bodies of other men.”171 In the early 1940s, Bruce Bellas, who later became known as Bruce of Los Angeles, began one of the earliest beefcake mail-order businesses using his photos of strong, muscled, nearly nude bodybuilders at competitions, at beaches, in his backyard, or in his studio.172 The snapshots often showed models outfitted as cowboys, Indians, or Greek gymnasts and reached gay audiences through the mail and on newsstands in the form of small, pocket-sized magazines. In Sunshine and Health, similar images of strong, handsome men flexing in a studio and posing to highlight the muscles in their back, chest, arms, or legs likely attracted gay readers who may not have been comfortable purchasing a physique magazine that increasingly served as a symbol of homosexual identity. Scattered in between images of men of all ages and body shapes participating in recreational activities, spending time with children, or working on a labor-intensive project stood the occasional picture that bore a striking resemblance to the representations featured in gay owned and operated physique magazines. By continuing to include images of strong flexing men, the editors revealed that they hoped to reach the same gay readership that purchased physique magazines as erotica.
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