The Tale of the Dueling Neurosurgeons

by Sam Kean

  My agent, Rick Broadhead, loved this idea from the get-go, and helped steer it to a great finish. And I thank, too, my editor John Parsley, whose encouragement and insight teased out the best I had inside me. I spent many hours writing before I knew John, but he taught me what I know about writing a book. Also invaluable were others at and around Little, Brown who’ve worked with me on this book and others, including Malin von Euler-Hogan, Carolyn O’Keefe, Morgan Moroney, Peggy Freudenthal, Deborah Jacobs, and Chris Jerome. I also owe a heaping helping of thanks to Will Staehle, who once again designed a kickass cover, and to Andrew Brozyna, who drew those delightful rebuses and illustrations of the brain.

  Finally, I offer a special thanks to the many, many brainy scientists and historians who contributed to individual chapters and passages, either by fleshing out stories, helping me hunt down information, or offering their time to explain something. They’re too numerous to list here, but rest assured that I haven’t forgotten your help.

  About the Author

  Sam Kean is the author of the New York Times bestsellers The Disappearing Spoon and The Violinist’s Thumb. His work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Mental Floss, Slate, Psychology Today, and New Scientist and has been featured on NPR’s Radiolab, All Things Considered, and Fresh Air.

  samkean.com

  @sam_kean

  ALSO BY SAM KEAN

  The Violinist’s Thumb

  The Disappearing Spoon

  Works Cited

  General

  Albright, Thomas D., et al. “Neural Science: A century of progress and the mysteries that remain.” Cell 100, no. 25 (2000): S1–55.

  Bergen, Benjamin K. Louder than words: the new science of how the mind makes meaning. New York: Basic Books, 2012.

  Bor, Daniel. The ravenous brain: how the new science of consciousness explains our insatiable search for meaning. New York: Basic Books, 2012.

  Doidge, Norman. The brain that changes itself: stories of personal triumph from the frontiers of brain science. New York: Viking, 2007.

  Feinberg, Todd E. Altered egos: how the brain creates the self. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

  Finger, Stanley. Origins of neuroscience: a history of explorations into brain function. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.

  Gazzaniga, Michael S., Richard B. Ivry, and G. R. Mangun. Cognitive neuroscience: the biology of the mind. New York: W. W. Norton, 1998.

  Goldstein, E. Bruce. Sensation and perception. Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth, 1989.

  Gross, Charles G. Brain, vision, memory: tales in the history of neuroscience. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1998.

  _____. A hole in the head: more tales in the history of neuroscience. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2009.

  Harris, Sam. Free will. New York: Free Press, 2012.

  Klein, Stephen B., and B. Michael Thorne. Biological psychology. New York: Worth, 2006.

  Macmillan, Malcolm. An odd kind of fame: stories of Phineas Gage. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2000.

  Magoun, Horace Winchell, and Louise H. Marshall. American neuroscience in the twentieth century: confluence of the neural, behavioral, and communicative streams. Lisse, Netherlands: A. A. Balkema, 2003.

  Ramachandran, V. S., and Sandra Blakeslee. Phantoms in the brain: probing the mysteries of the human mind. New York: William Morrow, 1998.

  Ramachandran, V. S. The tell-tale brain: a neuroscientist’s quest for what makes us human. New York: W. W. Norton, 2011.

  Satel, Sally, and Scott O. Lilienfeld. Brainwashed: the seductive appeal of mindless neuroscience. New York: Basic Books, 2013.

  Stien, Phyllis T., and Joshua C. Kendall. Psychological trauma and the developing brain: neurologically based interventions for troubled children. New York: Haworth Maltreatment and Trauma Press, 2004.

  Introduction

  Cheyne, James Allan, and Gordon Pennycook. “Sleep Paralysis Postepisode Distress.” Clinical Psychological Science 1, no. 2 (2013): 135–48.

  D’Agostino, Armando, and Ivan Limosani. “Hypnagogic Hallucinations and Sleep Paralysis.” Narcolepsy: a clinical guide. New York: Springer, 2010.

  Davies, Owen. “The Nightmare Experience, Sleep Paralysis, and Witchcraft Accusations.” Folklore 114, no. 2 (2003): 181–203.

  Santomauro, Julia, and Christopher C. French. “Terror in the Night.” The Psychologist 22, no. 8 (2009): 672–75.

  Chapter One: The Dueling Neurosurgeons

  Baumgartner, Frederic J. Henry II, king of France 1547–1559. Durham: Duke University Press, 1988.

  Faria, M. A. “The Death of Henry II of France.” Journal of Neurosurgery 77, no. 6 (1992): 964–69.

  Frieda, Leonie. Catherine de Medici. New York: Harper Perennial, 2006.

  Goldstein, Lee E., et al. “Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in Blast-Exposed Military Veterans and a Blast Neurotrauma Mouse Model.” Science Translational Medicine 4, no. 134 (2012): 134–60.

  Keeton, Morris. “Andreas Vesalius: His times, his life, his work.” Bios 7, no. 2 (1936): 97–109.

  Martin, Graham. “The Death of Henry II of France: A sporting death and post-mortem.” ANZ Journal of Surgery 71, issue 5 (2001): 318–20.

  Milburn, C. H. “An Address on Military Surgery of the Time of Ambroise Paré and That of the Present Time.” British Medical Journal 1, no. 2112 (1901): 1532–35.

  Miller, Greg. “Blast Injuries Linked to Neurodegeneration in Veterans.” Science 336, no. 6083 (2012): 790–91.

  O’Malley, Charles Donald. Andreas Vesalius of Brussels, 1514–1564. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1964.

  O’Malley, Charles Donald, and J. B. De C. M. Saunders, “The ‘Relation’ of Andreas Vesalius on the Death of Henry II of France.” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 3, no. 1 (1948): 197–213.

  Princess Michael of Kent. The serpent and the moon: two rivals for the love of a Renaissance king. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004.

  Rose, F. Clifford. “The History of Head Injuries: An overview.” Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 6, no. 2 (1997): 154–80.

  Simpson, D. “Paré as a Neurosurgeon.” The Australian and New Zealand Journal of Surgery 67, no. 8 (1997): 540–46.

  Strathern, Paul. A brief history of medicine: from Hippocrates to gene therapy. New York: Carroll & Graf, 2005.

  Vesalius, Andreas, and J. B. de C. M. Saunders. The illustrations from the works of Andreas Vesalius of Brussels. Cleveland, Ohio: World, 1950.

  Chapter Two: The Assassin’s Soup

  Ackerman, Kenneth D. Dark horse: the surprise election and political murder of President James A. Garfield. New York: Carroll & Graf, 2003.

  De Carlos, Juan A., and José Borrell. “A Historical Reflection of the Contributions of Cajal and Golgi to the Foundations of Neuroscience.” Brain Research Reviews 55, no. 1 (2007): 8–16.

  Everett, Marshall. Complete life of William McKinley and story of his assassination. Cleveland, Ohio: N. G. Hamilton, 1901.

  Finger, Stanley. Minds behind the brain: a history of the pioneers and their discoveries. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

  Goldberg, Jeff. Anatomy of a scientific discovery. New York: Bantam Books, 1989.

  Guiteau, Charles Julius, and C. J. Hayes. A complete history of the trial of Guiteau, assassin of President Garfield. Philadelphia: Hubbard Bros., 1882.

  Haines, D. E. “Spitzka and Spitzka on the Brains of the Assassins of the Presidents.” Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 4, no. 3/4 (1995): 236–66.

  Johns, A. Wesley. The man who shot McKinley. South Brunswick, N.J.: A. S. Barnes, 1970.

  Loewi, Otto. An autobiographic sketch. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1960.

  Marcum, James A. “ ‘Soup’ vs. ‘Sparks’: Alexander Forbes and the synaptic transmission controversy.” Annals of Science 63, no. 2 (2006): 139–56.

  Menke, Richard. “Media in America, 1881: Garfield, Guiteau, Bell, Whitman.” Critical Inquiry 31, no. 3 (2005): 638–64.

  Miller, Scott. The P
resident and the assassin: McKinley, terror, and empire at the dawn of the American century. New York: Random House, 2011.

  Paulson, George. “Death of a President and his Assassin—Errors in Their Diagnosis and Autopsies.” Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 15, no. 2 (2006): 77–91.

  Peskin, Allan. “Charles Guiteau of Illinois, President Garfield’s Assassin.” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 70, no. 2 (1977): 130–39.

  Rapport, Richard L. Nerve endings: the discovery of the synapse. New York: W. W. Norton, 2005.

  Rauchway, Eric. Murdering McKinley: the making of Theodore Roosevelt’s America. New York: Hill and Wang, 2003.

  Sourkes, Theodore L. “The Discovery of Neurotransmitters, and Applications to Neurology.” Handbook of Clinical Neurology 95, no. 1 (2009): 869–83.

  University at Buffalo Libraries. “Pan-American Exposition of 1901.” http://library.buffalo.edu/pan-am/ (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Valenstein, Elliot S. The war of the soups and the sparks. New York: Columbia University Press, 2005.

  Vowell, Sarah. Assassination vacation. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005.

  Chapter Three: Wiring and Rewiring

  Brang, David, and V. S. Ramachandran. “Survival of the Synesthesia Gene: Why do people hear colors and taste words?” PLoS Biology 9, no. 11 (2011): 1–5.

  Finkel, Michael. “The Blind Man Who Taught Himself to See.” Men’s Journal, March 2011. http://www.mensjournal.com/magazine/the-blind-man-who-taught-himself-to-see-20120504 (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Fisher, Madeline. “Balancing Act.” On Wisconsin. http://www.uwalumni.com/home/onwisconsin/archives/spring2007/​balancingact.aspx (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Hofmann, Albert. LSD, my problem child. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1980.

  Holman, James. A voyage round the world: including travels in Africa, Asia, Australasia, America, etc. etc. from MDCCCXXVII to MDCCCXXXII. London: Smith, Elder, 1834.

  Roberts, Jason. A sense of the world. New York: Harper Perennial, 2007.

  Chapter Four: Facing Brain Damage

  Alexander, Caroline. “Faces of War.” Smithsonian. February 2007. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/mask.html (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Caramazza, Alfonso, and Jennifer R. Shelton. “Domain-Specific Knowledge Systems in the Brain.” Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 10, no. 1 (1998): 1–34.

  Dubernard, Jean-Michel. “Outcomes 18 Months after the First Human Partial Face Transplant.” The New England Journal of Medicine 357, no. 24 (2007): 2451–60.

  Glickstein, Mitchell, and David Whitteridge. “Tatsuji Inouye and the Mapping of the Visual Fields on the Human Cerebral Cortex.” Trends in Neurosciences 10, no. 9 (1987): 349–52.

  Glickstein, Mitchell. “The Discovery of the Visual Cortex.” Scientific American. September 1988: 118–27.

  Hubel, David H. Eye, brain, and vision. New York: Scientific American Library, 1988.

  _____. “Evolution of Ideas on the Primary Visual Cortex, 1955–1978: A biased historical account.” Bioscience Reports 2, no. 7 (1982): 435–69.

  Khatchadourian, Raffi. “Transfiguration.” The New Yorker. February 13 and 20, 2012: 66–87.

  Moscovitch, Morris, Gordon Winocur, and Marlene Behrmann. “What is Special about Face Recognition?” Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 9, no. 5 (1997): 555–604.

  Nicolson, Juliet. The great silence, 1918–1920: living in the shadow of the Great War. London: John Murray, 2009.

  Pinker, Steven. “So How Does the Mind Work?” Mind & Language 20, no. 1 (2005): 1–24.

  Pomahac, Bohdan. “Three Patients with Full Facial Transplantations.” The New England Journal of Medicine 366, no. 8 (2012): 715–22.

  “Visual neuroscience: visual central pathways.” Visual neuroscience: visual central pathways. http://camelot.mssm.edu/~ygyu/visualpathway.html (accessed August 15, 2012).

  Chapter Five: The Brain’s Motor

  Anonymous. “The Case of George Dedlow.” The Atlantic Monthly. July 1866.

  Beatty, William K. “S. Weir Mitchell and the Ghosts.” Journal of the American Medical Association 220, no. 1 (1972): 76–80.

  Canale, D. J. “Civil War Medicine from the Perspective of S. Weir Mitchell’s ‘The Case of George Dedlow.’ ” Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 11, no. 1 (2002): 11–18.

  _____. “S. Weir Mitchell’s Prose and Poetry on the American Civil War.” Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 13, no. 1 (2004): 7–21.

  Finger, Stanley, and Meredith P. Hustwit. “Five Early Accounts of Phantom Limb in Context: Paré, Descartes, Lemos, Bell, and Mitchell.” Neurosurgery 52, no. 3 (2003): 675–86.

  Freemon, Frank R. “The First Neurological Research Center: Turner’s Lane hospital during the American Civil War.” Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 2, no. 2 (1993): 135–42.

  Goler, Robert I. “Loss and the Persistence of Memory: ‘The Case of George Dedlow’ and disabled Civil War veterans.” Literature and Medicine 23, no. 1 (2004): 160–83.

  Herschbach, Lisa. “ ‘True Clinical Fictions’: Medical and literary narratives from the Civil War hospital.” Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry 19, no. 2 (1995): 183–205.

  Howey, Allan W. “The Rifle-Musket and the Minié Ball.” The Civil War Times, October 1999. http://www.historynet.com/minie-ball (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Lein, Glenna R. The encyclopedia of Civil War medicine. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 2008.

  Mitchell, S. Weir. Injuries of nerves and their consequences. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1872.

  Ramachandran, Vilayanur S., and Diane Rogers-Ramachandran. “Synaesthesia in Phantom Limbs Induced with Mirrors.” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Biology 263, no. 1369 (1996): 377–86.

  _____. “Phantom Limbs and Neural Plasticity.” Archives of Neurology 57, no. 3 (2000): 317–20.

  Ramachandran, Vilayanur S., and William Herstein. “The Perception of Phantom Limbs: The D. O. Hebb lecture.” Brain 121, no. 9 (1998): 1603–20.

  Chapter Six: The Laughing Disease

  Anderson, Warwick. The collectors of lost souls: turning kuru scientists into whitemen. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008.

  Beasley, Anne. “Frontier Journeys: Fore experiences on the kuru patrols.” Oceania 79, no. 1 (2009): 34–52.

  “The End of Kuru: 50 years of research into an extraordinary disease.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 353, no. 1510 (2008): 3607–763.

  Gajdusek, D. Carleton. South Pacific expedition to the New Hebrides and to the Fore, Kukukuku, and Genatei peoples of New Guinea, January 26, 1967 to May 12, 1967. Bethesda, Md.: Section of Child Growth and Development and Disease Patterns in Primitive Cultures, National Institute of Neurological Disease and Blindness, 1967.

  The Genius and the Boys. DVD. Directed by Bosse Lindquist. Stockholm: SVT Documentary, 2009.

  Georgopoulos, Apostolos P. “Movement, Balance, and Coordination—The Dana Guide.” The Dana Foundation. http://www.dana.org/news/brainhealth/detail.aspx?id=10070 (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Hainfellner, Johannes A., et al. “Pathology and Immunocytochemistry of a Kuru Brain.” Brain Pathology 7, no. 1 (1997): 547–53.

  Ledford, Heidi. “ ‘Harmless’ Prion Protein Linked to Alzheimer’s Disease.” Nature.com. http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090225/full/news.2009.121.html (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Lindenbaum, Shirley. “Kuru, Prions, and Human Affairs: Thinking about epidemics.” Annual Review of Anthropology 30, no. 1 (2001): 363–85.

  Miller, Greg. “Could They All Be Prion Diseases?” Science 326, no. 5958 (2009): 1337–39.

  Nelson, Hank. “Kuru: The Pursuit of the Prize and the Cure.” The Journal of Pacific History 31, no. 2 (1996): 178–201.

  Norrby, Erling. Nobel prizes and life sciences. Singapore: World Scientific, 2010.

  Spark, Geridwen. “Carleton’s Kids.” The Journal of Pacific History 44, no. 1, (2009): 1–19.

  Stern, Nichola
s C. “Agents Investigated Nobel Prize Winner Daniel Gajdusek as Far Back as 1950s.” Frederick News-Post, October 25, 2009. http://www.fredericknewspost.com/​archive/article_9c620533-8d25-5ed5-8a53-96ac409697f5.html?​mode=story (accessed November 4, 2013).

  Chapter Seven: Sex and Punishment

  Batts, Shelley. “Brain Lesions and Their Implications in Criminal Responsibility.” Behavioral Science and the Law 27, no. 2 (2009): 261–72.

  Bliss, Michael. Harvey Cushing: a life in surgery. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.

  Byrne, John H. Learning and memory. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2003.

  Cushing, Harvey. “Partial Hypophysectomy for Acromegaly.” Annals of Surgery 50, no. 6 (1909): 1002–17.

  _____. The pituitary body and its disorders. Philadelphia and London: J. B. Lippincott, 1912.

  Damasio, Antonio R., Daniel Tranel, and Helen Damasio. “Individuals with Sociopathic Behavior Caused by Frontal Damage Fail to Respond Autonomically to Social Stimuli.” Behavioural Brain Research 41, no. 2 (1990): 81–94.

  Damasio, Antonio R. Descartes’ error: emotion, reason, and the human brain. New York: Putnam, 1994.

  Denzel, Justin F. Genius with a scalpel. New York: Messner, 1971.

  Devinsky, Julie, Oliver Sacks, Orrin Devinsky. “Kluver-Bucy Syndrome, Hypersexuality, and the Law.” Neurocase 16, no. 2 (2010): 140–45.