Reports on the Systemic and Nervous Reactions Caused by Foods (1900-1950):

In a two volume book, The Food Factor in Disease, published in Australia in 1904, Dr. Frances Hare described patients with headache, drowsiness and other nervous disorders who improved when common foods were eliminated from their diets.

In 1916, pediatrician B. R. Hoobler described disturbances in the nervous system in allergic infants and young children.  He commented on their "restlessness, fretfulness and sleeplessness" and their "tendency to irritability."  Several years later, W. R. Shannon, a Minnesota pediatrician described seven patients with generalized symptoms due to food allergy.  He emphasized symptoms of irritability and peevishness.

Beginning in the 1930s, Albert Rowe, Sr., and Oakland, California physician, published observations describing symptoms he had observed in people troubled by food allergies.  Here's an excerpt from one of his articles published in 1944.

"Allergic toxemia due to food allergy is characterized by fatigue, mental confusion, dopiness, inability to concentrate, irritability, generalized body aching and chilliness in varying combinations and degrees.... One boy observed by the writer was relieved of restlessness, inattentiveness and nightmares when allergy to all fruits and eggs were recognized... Skin testing usually fails to indicate any or all foods productive of the clinical symptoms .... trial diets are necessary to discover the offenders."

Beginning in 1947, food allergy pioneer, Theron G. Randolph, described many symptoms which were caused by food allergies and sensitivities.  Here's an excerpt from his article published in the Journal of Pediatrics.

"The allergic fatigue syndrome of children ... is not new.  Hoobler, in 1916, referred to it briefly, but it remains for Shannon in 1922 to give the first clear description in the medical literature ... pointing out that allergic children were restless, irritable, unruly, peevish, out of sorts, high strung and difficult to manage ...."

"Rowe is credited with a clear description of the clinical picture in 1931, stating that food allergy in childhood is commonly associated with restlessness, incorrigibility, bursts of temper, drowsiness, sullenness, depression, somnolence and marked changes in disposition."

Reports on the Systemic and Nervous Reactions Caused by Foods (1950-1984)