John Theophilus Richter (June 10, 1863 – January 24, 1949) andVera May Richter (néeWeitzel, December 11, 1884 – January 13, 1960) were an American married couple who ran an earlyraw food restaurant inLos Angeles, theEutropheon, which became a meeting place for influential figures in the development ofalternative lifestyles inCalifornia between 1917 and the late 1940s.[1]
Theophilus John Richter was born inIllinois,[2][nb 1] the first son ofPastor Frederick Leberecht Richter and his wife Caroline Wilhelmina (née Grauman), who were immigrants from Germany and married inChicago. When he was a child, the family lived inSt. Peter, Minnesota, andMinneapolis, before settling in the late 1870s in the newly established city ofFargo, North Dakota, where Pastor Richter became adrug store owner andphysician.[3] During the 1880s, Theophilus Richter worked as a machinist while taking a natural healing course in Chicago, based on the "Battle Creek" system devised byJohn Harvey Kellogg.[3] He adopted avegetarian diet, and also gained a diploma in the "Swedish movement cure".[2] According to Richter, he took over some of his father's patients in Fargo, and began treating them successfully using natural remedies.[3] In 1891 he married Violet Berry, and in the early 1900s they moved with their children from Fargo to Minneapolis. He gained a qualification and began practicing there as anaturopathic physician. By 1911, he adopted araw food diet, influenced by the theories ofBenedict Lust and talks held in Minneapolis by a Chicago doctor, George Drews,[2] and decided to dedicate his life to the promotion of the raw vegetarian diet.[3]
After his first wife's death, he remarried in 1918, to Vera Weitzel, a native ofPennsylvania.[4] Little is known of her background. The couple moved toLos Angeles, where he became known as Dr. John T. Richter. Shortly afterwards, the couple established a raw vegetarian food restaurant, the Eutropheon (fromGreek words meaning "good nourishment"), at 833South Olive Street. In 1925, Vera Richter published a book,Mrs. Richter's Cook-less Book, which included many of the food recipes served in the Eutropheon, and received considerable local publicity. The couple favored eating fruit in the morning, green vegetables and nuts for lunch, and root vegetables and nuts in the evening.[2] They were opposed to the use ofcoffee,sugar,salt,tobacco,alcohol,meat,dairy products,cooked food, andrefrigeration, and promotedmassage,heliotherapy,iris diagnosis,sun gazing,barefootwalking, andnaturism.[3] They defended the ideals of theRussian Revolution, and supported US socialist leaderEugene Debs. They lectured in the area, promulgated works on health and natural living by German writers such asArnold Ehret,Louis Kuhne, andAdolf Just,[5] and were regularly patronized and promoted by Los Angelesgymnasium owner, newspaper columnist and radio hostPhilip M. Lovell. The Richters established two further Eutropheon restaurants insouthern California, which Lovell described as "the only ... restaurants in the country that function without the aid of a cookstove".[3] In 1936, Dr. John T. Richter publishedNature the Healer, a book that went through several editions. The widespread use of the term "raw fooder" has been attributed to the Richters. They believed that, with a raw food diet, people should all live to be 140 years old.[3]
According to one source, "the Eutropheon's phonograph boomed outHawaiian music while uncooked soups were served with a side of raw vegetables. Thebody builder community of Los Angeles's first weights rooms and fitness centers rubbed shoulders with the CalifornianNaturmenschen, the 'nature boys.'"[5] The restaurant became known as a venue where the Californian "nature boys" – who includedWilliam Pester,Robert "Gypsy Boots" Bootzin, andeden ahbez – would occasionally work, meet, stay, and share experiences. There, ahbez met singer, songwriter and radio personality Cowboy Jack Patton, who heard ahbez's song "Nature Boy" and encouraged him to pass it toNat King Cole; Cole's recording of the song became a worldwide hit in 1948.[3]
The Richters sold the Eutropheon restaurants to a former employee, Milan Geshtacoff, during the 1940s. It is thought that the restaurants closed in the late 1940s. John Richter died in 1949, aged 85, and his wife Vera died in 1960, aged 75.