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It is a commonplace to state that elderly people and the old are becoming an increasingly important group in the community in most countries of the world. Nutritionally, at least, it is not yet a commonplace to investigate them. Durnin, Blake, Brockway & Drury (1961) give the results of measurements on the food intake and energy expenditure of seventeen elderly women living alone in their separate households. The present paper describes, as part of a large-scale study on elderly people in Scotland, similar measurements on some elderly men working in three different types of engineering. Only the mean results of the study of energy expenditure are referred to briefly here; the details of the type of work and of the results obtained are given separately (Durnin & Blake, 1962). METHODSMeasurements of the total food intake and expenditure of energy during a period of I week were made on thirty-three men, aged about 60 years and weighing about 70 kg. Values for the physical characteristics of the subjects are given in Table I .Nine of these men worked in a steel mill and were said to have one of the most physically energetic jobs in the works. Twelve men worked in a factory which made and assembled motor lorries. The remaining twelve were employed by a very large firm producing sewing machines.Type of work. The men in the steel works were first-hand melters, i.e. they were Figures in parentheses are the numbers of subjects. 37-2https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi