SMOKE111607

Want to see what smoking can do to your looks? Today is your chance

Today is the Great American Smokeout across the nation, and smokers and nonsmokers alike have a chance today in Minneapolis to see how the deadly habit can change their appearance.

By Paul Walsh, Star Tribune

Last update: November 15, 2007 - 9:55 AM

Today is the Great American Smokeout across the nation, and smokers and nonsmokers alike have a chance in Minneapolis to see how the deadly habit can change their appearance.

To mark the Smokeout, a traveling photo display is available for viewing today of three Minnesotans who struggled to go smoke-free. Their stories are showcased in this exhibit, which can be seen today at Smiley's Clinic, 2020 E. 28th St., Minneapolis.

Those visiting the exhibit, open from 1:30 to 5 p.m., also can see how their own faces would become wrinkled and discolored if they smoked for years. Age-progression software demonstrations will show the effects of smoking compared to the natural aging process.

The exhibit is underwritten by ClearWay Minnesota, an independent, nonprofit antismoking organization whose funding includes money from the state's 1998 tobacco settlement.

The Great American Smokeout is held each year on the third Thursday in November.

The Smokeout's roots are traced to Minnesota. In 1974, Lynn R. Smith, publisher of the Moticello Times, spearheaded the state's first D-Day, or Don't Smoke Day. About 300 pledged to stop smoking or using tobacco, and Smith put their names on the front page of his newspaper.

Smith died in 2005 at age 84 after spending six years in long-term care following a stroke.

Inspiration for the Smokeout, however, may have been born three years earlier, the American Cancer Society says, when Arthur P. Mullaney of Randolph, Mass., had asked people to give up cigarettes for a day and donate the money they would have spent on the smokes to a high school scholarship fund.

The American Cancer Society (ACS) made the "Great American Smokeout" a nationwide event in 1977.

There are about 46 million smokers in the United States.

Smokers are most successful in quitting "when they have some means of support," the ACS reports, such as nicotine replacement products, counseling, prescription medication, literature, and encouragement from friends and relatives.

To learn more about quitting the habit, visit www.smokefree.gov, www.mpaat.org or www.quitplan.com.