The “Oxygen Man”: The 1924 Blueprint for a Millionaire

If you walked into a boardroom (or a speakeasy) in 1924 and asked to see the most successful man in the room, you wouldn’t be looking for the quiet genius in the corner. You would be looking for the Oxygen Man.

In the Roaring Twenties, optimism wasn’t just encouraged—it was the currency of the realm. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had more than doubled since 1921, skyscrapers were transforming American skylines at an unprecedented pace, and the ideal businessman was conceived as nothing less than a force of nature: loud, energetic, perpetually optimistic, and capable of “absorbing knowledge like a sponge.” This was the era of the “go-getter,” the “booster,” the relentless promoter who could sell ice to Eskimos and make it seem like the deal of the century.

This week’s archival find from Character Reading magazine (December 1924) introduces us to one of the most fascinating pseudoscientific concepts of the Jazz Age: the “Oxygen Type.” Published during the height of America’s love affair with personality classification systems, this magazine offered readers a window into how success, character, and even destiny were believed to be written in the very chemistry of one’s body.

The “Go-Getter” Was Made of Air

According to the “chemical personality” theory that captivated American readers in the 1920s, your success wasn’t merely about your work ethic, your education, or even your connections—it was fundamentally about your biology. Specifically, it was about the elemental composition of your physical body.

This theory was pioneered by Dr. Mary Olmstead Stanton way back in 1879—a full forty-five years before this article was published. At a time when women were largely excluded from scientific establishments, Stanton published her groundbreaking (if scientifically dubious) work: “The Human Physiognomy and Organism Considered Chemically, Architecturally, and Mathematically.” The book was even dedicated to Ernst Haeckel himself, the renowned German biologist and philosopher who coined the term “ecology.”

Stanton’s theory proposed that human personality and capability stemmed from the predominance of different chemical elements in one’s physical makeup: oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, and hydrogen. By the 1920s, her ideas had been adapted, popularized, and transformed into a full-fledged system for understanding human potential. The Character Reading magazine served as one of the primary vehicles for spreading these ideas to middle-class Americans hungry for self-improvement guidance.

The Oxygen Type was crowned the “Success Type.” The reasoning? Because oxygen creates combustion.

The magazine’s article argued that individuals with an excess of oxygen in their system functioned as literal furnaces of energy. Their large lungs pulled in great quantities of air, their active hearts pumped vigorously, and their faces took on the telltale “red and round” appearance of constant circulation. These were the natural promoters, the politicians who could work a room, the builders who erected America’s new skyline. In an era obsessed with vitality and “pep,” the Oxygen Man represented the biological ideal.

According to Dr. Stanton’s original 1879 work, oxygen entered the system through the lungs, skin, and food, assisting in the combustion of materials that renewed worn tissues and generated body heat. Where oxygen appeared in excess, certain organs operated at higher capacity—particularly the lungs, heart, liver, skin, brain, and nervous system. This heightened activity, the theory claimed, produced elevated mental faculties including hope, ambition, cheerfulness, analytical power in art and science, rapidity of thought, and what Stanton called “elevated and lofty sentiment and desires.”

The Original “Type A” Personality

The description of the Oxygen Man reads remarkably like a profile of every charismatic CEO, motivational speaker, or social media influencer you’ve ever encountered. The parallels to what would later be termed “Type A personality” (coined in the 1950s) are striking:

They are “Automatic Salesmen“: According to the magazine, Oxygen Types don’t even have to try to succeed. They are “literally a magnet for success.” The article claimed that an Oxygen Type could open a small store in a new neighborhood “without doing a cent’s worth of advertising,” and customers would be magnetically drawn from all around. In the hyper-competitive business landscape of 1924 America, this quality was considered nothing short of supernatural.

They are Information Sponges: One of the most amusing characteristics attributed to the Oxygen Man was his ability to read a book for five minutes and discuss it as though he’d studied it for years. The article notes: “He absorbs knowledge more readily than any sponge ever created absorbs water, and he makes more use immediately of his five minute study from a book than most of us do who study a lifetime.” The magazine described how Oxygen Men would “sweep like the wind” down upon scholarly, studious types, absorbing their knowledge with lightning speed and building it into “practical useful shape.”

They are “Light on Their Feet”: Despite often being heavy-set with what the magazine colorfully described as the “Mack Truck” build (a reference to the popular commercial trucks of the era), Oxygen Types were supposedly graceful dancers. Why? Because of their “air” nature. The article explained that their weight was “made principally by air”—over ninety pounds of their body weight in a 161-pound person was attributed to oxygen. This made them surprisingly nimble and light-footed despite their bulk.

They Dominate Any Room: “He roars at us in public like a lion, and always has the center of the stage,” the magazine proclaimed. The Oxygen Man could “put up a bluff of success when everything around him is blue.” Even his speaking style was distinctive—”flowery, emotional, musical, rich, and yet forceful.” Wives would come home from hearing an Oxygen husband speak and declare they’d heard “the most wonderful lecture,” though when pressed about the content, they could only respond: “I don’t know what it was about, but it was wonderful!”

The Cultural Icon: Babbitt

It is no coincidence that Character Reading magazine used Willard Louis as the prime photographic example of the Oxygen Type. Louis was the actor who portrayed the title character in the 1924 film adaptation of Sinclair Lewis’s famous novel Babbitt, which had been published just two years earlier in 1922.

Babbitt was one of the defining works of 1920s American literature. The novel’s protagonist, George F. Babbitt, was a real estate broker in the fictional Midwestern city of Zenith—a man who embodied every quality of middle-class American conformity, boosterism, and relentless optimism. Babbitt was a joiner (member of multiple lodges and clubs), a booster (constantly promoting his city and its business prospects), a loud talker, and an indefatigable hustler. He spoke in clichés, thought in slogans, and measured success purely in material terms.

Sinclair Lewis had written the novel as satire—a cutting critique of American business culture, conformity, and the hollowness beneath the era’s relentless optimism. The literary establishment recognized this immediately, and the novel cemented Lewis’s reputation as one of America’s foremost social critics (he would become the first American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1930).

However—and this is the fascinating cultural disconnect—Character Reading magazine lionizes Babbitt. The magazine presents him not as a cautionary tale but as an aspirational figure. To the magazine’s readership in 1924, being a “Babbitt” wasn’t an insult or a warning about the dangers of conformity and shallow materialism; it was the goal. This wasn’t ignorance of Lewis’s satirical intent—it was a fundamental difference in values. The traits Lewis mocked were precisely the traits that much of middle America admired and sought to cultivate.

The magazine listed other exemplars of the Oxygen Type, all prominent figures of the era: Walter Heirs (a popular comedian), William Hale Thompson (Chicago’s flamboyant mayor from 1915-1923 and again from 1927-1931, known for his bombastic style and questionable ethics), William Howard Taft (former president and current Chief Justice of the Supreme Court), William Windsor (a famous phrenologist), and Frank W. Gunsaulus (a renowned Chicago preacher and educator). These were men who commanded attention, influenced crowds, and built institutions—all supposedly thanks to their superior oxygen intake.

The Physical Markers of Success

The magazine provided detailed physical descriptions so readers could identify Oxygen Types on sight. These biological “go-getters” supposedly carried their weight at the shoulders while tapering toward the feet. Their faces were characteristically red and round, their noses short with ample nostrils (the better to intake that success-generating oxygen). The crown of the head sat low, the back of the neck was full, and the upper central part of the forehead was well-developed, supposedly indicating generosity, kindness, and warm sympathy.

Their hands weren’t muscular but were instead “padded with white flesh,” with fingers longer than other “vital types.” The lighter and redder their hair, the article claimed, the more activity and social desires they possessed.

The Shadow Side and the Science of Success

Interestingly, the magazine acknowledged that the Oxygen Man had his vulnerabilities. Despite his public persona of roaring confidence, at home he experienced “lulls” when he needed comforting and “mental rocking to sleep.” He recovered quickly from illness but when he did fall sick (usually from overeating), he became “very, very ill,” inevitably reporting that “the doctor said it was the worst case he ever saw.”

The article also noted the Oxygen Type’s tendency toward excess—particularly in eating and socializing. His “strong love of association” led him to overindulge, sometimes hiding his “spiritual side in the earth earthy,” suffering from high blood pressure and its effects on heart and kidneys.

The magazine concluded with practical advice, reflecting the era’s faith in scientific self-improvement. Readers were encouraged to increase their own oxygen through proper breathing techniques (referencing Hindu Yogi breathing sciences), diet (eating foods high in potassium, iron, calcium, sodium, oxygen, and hydrogen), and even a commercial “pep cocktail” advertised in the issue. The magazine warned that devitalized teeth, crowns, and permanent bridges could harbor “a graveyard of poisons” that prevented proper oxygen absorption.

“Show us a man who holds grudges and meanness,” the article declared, “and we will show you a man who does not breathe deeply. A cesspool is short of oxygen, and that is why it is cesspool.”

The message was clear: Oxygen is money. Oxygen is success. And in 1924 America, you could supposedly cultivate it through science, willpower, and the right mail-order supplements.

Are you an Oxygen Type? The complete digital download of the December 1924 issue of Character Reading magazine offers readers a window into how our great-grandparents understood personality, success, and the supposed science behind human achievement.

Original Text: He Gets His Success From the Air

(Transcribed from the December 1924 Issue of Character Reading)

The air type, the first of the vital temperaments is covered in this lesson

So many of our readers have asked us when the first work on the chemical types was done in this country that we are publishing the details.

Like the discovery of radium, the discovery of the chemical types of human beings was likewise made by a woman.

Dr. Mary Olmstead Stanton in the year 1879—forty-five years ago—published her first book, “The Human Physiognomy and Organism Considered Chemically, Architecturally, and Mathematically.” The book was dedicated to no less a person than Ernst Haeckel himself.

For those lovers of study and original sources, we are printing, word for word from this rare book, her first work on the chemical types of human beings. In the first lesson she shows us why the man of Air, or Oxygen, is invariably successful.—Editor’s Note.

“TRACING man to his origin, the Monera, or, as some naturalists claim, the Amoeba, we find entering into his constitution four essential elements, or primal components. These, in the language of chemistry, are called nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, and hydrogen. These elements are first exhibited in the air and water; they are taken up by plants, and upon these elements all vegetable life subsists. All organized life proceeds from the same elementary powers: First, plant life; then insect organisms; after these, reptiles, fishes, birds, beasts, and last of all, Man.

In every one of the varied and various organisms the same universal principles prevail; very little of any other elements enter into the composition of any of these bodies. The different phenomena are produced only by difference in proportion, by chemical action and chemical changes. The plants suck up through the roots the nourishment needed to give them form, color, and stability. The leaves also assist in their nourishment by taking up through their innumerable pores, or mouths, the elements which they require from the air. One hundred and twenty thousand of these inhalers have been counted on one small leaf by the aid of the microscope. Animals feed upon the plants, and the same elements still reside in their organisms. The form is changed, it is true, and one might suppose that the animal form was composed of entirely different materials from those which create and nourish the plant; but it is not so. The very same elements are there; there is no addition of other principles; they have simply assumed different forms through the power of chemical action. The same activities which formed the Moneron, or germ cell, of all organic life continue the process of chemical action, but in a more complex manner, to form the animal organism, as well as all the intervening grades of organic life. Chemical analysis proves this truth. The elements of plant life and animal life are identical, differing only in proportion. These elements take on other forms, and are called by other names, according to the location in which they are found and the organism in which they reside or create. Yet the chemist never loses sight of them.

Here are three oxygen or “air” types. This baby is already a success. He is the kind that takes to himself plenty of oxygen. Viewed from the side, the lower lobe of his ear is large, in proportion to the rest, indicating a predominance of the vital temperament. In the center, Willard Louis, the actor who so perfectly portrayed “Babbitt” in the screen version of that famous novel, is an excellent example of the oxygen type. He is the true “go-getter.” At the right, Chicago’s ex-mayor, William Hale Thompson, is abundantly nourished by oxygen—the success-making chemical in politics.

and no matter what metamorphoses take place, he knows that they are sure to appear, and identifies them regardless of the forms which they assume.

Before these elements can become human organisms they must pass through many complex and subtle chemical changes. They must have had an existence in minerals, air, and water. After this stage, they pass into plant, insect and fish life; later on, into the various organized birds and beasts; these in turn, feed upon and increase by the help of plants and water, and upon plants, beasts, and water, Man is sustained.

In the blood and tissues of man they are found after many transmutations, and are then known as fibrine, albumen, caseine and water.

It is a well established truth that the natural surroundings of man control and create in a great degree his individuality.

In these surroundings, in the aggregate acting upon his organism, fashion and shape his mentality—his physical powers, sustain and nourish his blood, bones, nerves, muscles and tissue of every sort whatsoever, it would seem possible to discover and separate the different influences and elements at work in forming him, and analyze their character and properties.

Hence we must infer, if the origin of these elements can be ascertained, as well as the effects they produce upon man, that the destination of the several elements of creation and sustentation can be traced to the localities which they inhabit in his organism, and the exact parts which they each nourish and rebuild, AND THE KIND OF CHARACTER EACH IS INSTRUMENTAL IN CREATING; also that as these elements give form, quality and color, each according to its nature and power, IT FOLLOWS THAT MAN’S CHARACTER MUST BE JUST AS SUSCEPTIBLE OF ANALYSIS AND COMPREHENSION AS ARE THE MATERIALS AND ELEMENTS WHICH, AGGREGATED, COMPOSE HIS ENTIRE INDIVIDUALITY.

OXYGEN

Oxygen is introduced into the system by means of the lungs, skin, and food, and assists in the combustion of those materials which serve to renew the worn out tissues, and also those matters which are to be cast out as waste after having been burned in the body to furnish its heat. It is likewise instrumental in maintaining the normal standard of heat in the system. Where we find an organism that inhales oxygen in excess, we observe certain organs and functions in more active operation than where there is a lack of this element. As oxygen creates heat by combustion, it produces color, and color shows heat and activity; and so we come to the conclusion that an excess of oxygen in the organism of man endows him with activity, warmth (by reason of activity) and color.

The organs involved in the production of these phenomena are the lungs, skin, blood and tissues generally, for the action of oxygen, where it is excessive, shows its effect in a general and very decided manner. It causes an increased development of the lungs (the inhabitants of mountainous regions are proof of this) heart, liver and skin, as well as an increased activity and quality of the brain and nervous system. By reason of this excessive action in this class of organs, an increase in those mental faculties which these organs create and sustain is induced.

To those who have never thought of relating mental faculties with physical functions, let me ask right here, Whence do they suppose that these

(Continued on Page 26.)

(Continued from Page 7.) faculties derive their power? One may answer from the brain or nerves. That would be putting too much work on these already overworked organs. If the brain or nerves are competent to perform all these operations, what need is there for heart, liver, lungs, muscles, or intestines? The human body is the most perfect system of cooperative labor which it is possible to conceive. Each part must perform its own work, and each receives its reward according as the work is well or ill done. If any part is badly performed, all suffer, but the chief sinner the most, which seems to the finite mind a just penalty.

The mental faculties to which an excess of oxygen in the physical organs gives rise are first, a high and active quality of brain and nerves; hope, ambition, cheerfulness, amiability, analytical power in art, mechanism, literature, science, and discovery; rapidity of thought and motion, purity of conduct, and elevated and lofty sentiment and desires. All this will plenty of oxygen give to the human family.”

It is because of these premises of Dr. Stanton’s that we have been able to find the why of the oxygen man’s success.

Oxygen goes everywhere—associates everywhere, up and down the boulevards as well as the alleys. The oxygen type of man likewise associates everywhere with great democracy.

He sees no necessity of holding things to himself, any more than the wind does. He advertises and promotes your personal affairs with as great efficiency as he promotes a charity campaign, the selling of oil stocks, or a new religion.

Dr. Stanton tells us that he has analytical power in art, mechanism, science, and discoveries. We find him the world’s greatest builder of buildings, large bridges, a builder of science and its promotion. But while he does these things, he does them in his own way, by absorption. He sweeps like the wind, down upon the scholarly studious types of people, absorbing their knowledge with lightning speed, and building it into practical useful shape.

Oxygen is forever building and destroying—destroying and building—attacking and purifying everything in nature. The oxygen man comes along likewise with his loud voice, punching holes in everything he sees, without fear, and building up better ways of doing things after he has attacked them.

“Is it useful?” he wants to know, whether he is studying a man’s knowledge or a piece of metal. If it isn’t useful and will not bring money or success on a large scale he isn’t interested. He sees the “use” value in everything, and knows intuitively whether a new invention will pay or not. A girl of this type makes one dollar buy two dollars worth in her economy, and yet she is attractively dressed, and her home is comfortable.

Such people are never still. Oxygen seemingly runs through them like the wind, carrying them with it to success, new hope and new ideas, causing them to forget grudges, yesterday’s failures, and all revenge.

Oxygen causes their physical bodies to take on their weight as Dr. Stanton points out, at the shoulders, while they taper toward the feet. The face is red and round, the nose short, and the nostrils ample. The mental types are not as red in color, but the figure will still follow these lines.

They try to reduce, but it is hard for them to do so because their weight is made principally by air. A special diet of the foods which do not attract oxygen must be given them. They are not inconvenienced by weight, however, as much as are other stout temperaments, because their great proportion of oxygen—over ninety pounds to a weight of 161 pounds as an example, causes them to be light on their feet, and graceful in dancing.

He is built on a large scale as a rule—more like a Mack truck than a Baby Peugot roadster. The crown of his head is low, the back of his neck full, and the upper central part of the forehead as a rule well developed, which indicates his generosity, kindness, desire to help, and his warm sympathy. The lighter and redder his hair, the more activity and social desires he has to restrain.

Because he is a vital type, his hands are not muscular but are padded with white flesh, while the fingers are as a rule longer than in other vital types.

He roars at us in public like a lion, and always has the center of the stage. He can put up a bluff of success when everything around him is blue. His wife, however, will tell us that he too, like the wind, has his lulls, when he needs comforting, cheering, and mental rocking to sleep but at these times he is only getting ready for another attack at promotion of something—public speaking, organizing, building, or acting. He quickly recovers from illness, though if he gets ill, which is seldom, except from overeating and its many effects, he is very, very ill, at which times he tells us “the doctor said it was the worst case he ever saw.”

He can talk about everything from horse racing or psychology, pile driving or Buddhism as though he has very intimate acquaintance with every library on each subject. He studies five minutes, however, from books, and is able to get the high spots and to give the impression to listeners that he has gleaned his information from years of isolation and book lore. He absorbs knowledge more readily than any sponge ever created absorbs water, and he makes more use immediately of his five minute study from a book than most of us do who study a lifetime.

Wives who hear him speak from the platform come home and say that they heard the most wonderful lecture.

“What was it about?” the husbands say.

“I don’t know what it was about, but it was wonderful!”

And that is the way with oxygen. A singer of this type sings A B C and the audience weeps. The oxygen barker at the side show tells us about the wonders inside, which we paid our money for in vain last year. But all seems new—like a breath of fresh air—to us again, so we go in anyway.

Oxygen oratory is flowery, emotional, musical, rich, and yet forceful. While oxygen talks it all seems perfectly logical. It inspires us—sweeps us with it, whether the subject is religion or land in Florida. Such an orator or promoter tells us all about the fruits to be grown on the land in Florida which he is trying to sell us, but somehow forgets to mention the swamps. He tells us that God will bring us everything on a silver platter, but after he has gone we find he has not told us of the exact telephone number of God so that we can get in touch with this silver platter and its manufacturing plant.

Dr. Stanton lays stress on the elevated and lofty sentiments and desires of the oxygen type. He can always be interested in any philosophy which means the continuity of life for himself and others. While he is spiritual and inspirational, intuitive, generous, forgiving, creative, inventive, he also has another side of himself which pulls him strongly to earth. His strong love of association causes him to eat too much, and to temporarily hide his spiritual side in the earth earthy, and he suffers from high blood pressure and its heart and kidney effects.

Big schemes, oratory, social work, promotion, politics, meat markets, building, wrecking, advertising, management of people, municipal engineering, organizing, theater management, acting, auctioneering, institution management, publishing—we find him in all these fields and more, wherever the success of the work depends on handling people—influencing them, managing them, inspiring them, or separating them from their. (Continued on Page 30.)

(Continued from Page 26.) money, by the power of oratorical oxygen.

Oxygen is an almost automatic salesman.

It is literally a magnet for success. A man or woman who has an abundance of oxygen in his system can open a little store in a new neighborhood, and without doing a cent’s worth of advertising, customers are magnetically drawn to him from all around.

We learned that the bony man made his big success late in life, or in middle life, because he learns slowly, but never forgets. The man of air, or oxygen makes his success early in life because of his quick absorption of knowledge, but he does not stick to one thing as long as the bony type does. As soon as he conquers one line of promotion he wants to start on another with his cyclonic personality.

Walter Heirs, the comedian, William Hale Thompson the politician, Wm. Howard Taft the ex-president, Wm. Windsor the famous phrenologist, Frank W. Gunsaulus the preacher—these men are very high grade types of the oxygen temperament, with the mental temperament in the lead, and with great intellectual development. In the more physical types with less mental development we find the talents run more to noisy promotion and earth earthy recreation than to the high grade work done by the above named men.

But whether we are mental and vital, or only mental, without strong vitality, the greater proportion of people need more oxygen.

Oxygen purifies, builds anew our health each minute of the day and night, inspires, removes gloom and grudges and failure as the first breath of morning takes away the fatigue and troubles of the night and the day before.

Oxygen is money.

Oxygen is only another word for success. For every failure oxygen makes a dozen victories.

The Hindoo Yogi makes breathing a science, and he knows it is the first step to mastership.

Show us a man who holds grudges and meanness, and we will show you a man who does not breathe deeply. A cesspool is short of oxygen, and that is why it is a cesspool. We are mental cesspools ourselves when we cheat ourselves of this money making chemical. Our thoughts, our words, and our physiognomy show the lack of it.

A course in correct breathing is a non-stop success course in salesmanship, health and happiness.

By eating the potassium, iron, calcium, sodium, oxygen and hydrogen foods we attract oxygen to ourselves. The pep cocktail advertised in this issue contains these elements.

If the mouth is free from devitalized and crowned teeth and permanent bridges, so that the system is not harboring a graveyard of poisons, so dangerous because there is no pain to warn from these dead areas, then the individual can by breathing and using the cocktail three and four times a day between meals positively attract oxygen to himself. He needs to worry no more about success, for that is automatic, in his particular sphere.

In the next lesson we will cover Dr. Stanton’s work on the Nitrogen type.

Are you an Oxygen Type? The complete digital download of the December 1924 issue of Character Reading magazine offers readers a window into how our great-grandparents understood personality, success, and the supposed science behind human achievement.