WALTER FREEMAN IILOBOTOMY

By: Lynelle Tremelling

William Williams Keen

Walter’s Grandfather Brown University Jefferson College Served in the Civil War in

the US Army as a surgeon Performed the first brain

operation to remove a tumor and also operated on President Grover Cleveland

He was a showman in surgery

Walter’s Father (Walter Freeman) was a successful Doctor

Born in 1860 Double majored Took classes in

Philadelphia to court Corrine

Cold and strict father Distant husband to Corrine

Keen

Walter Freeman I

Walter II mother Daughter of William

Williams Keen Born in 1868 Distant cousin to Lizzie

Borden Very cold, strict Walter II said that he

admired her but never loved her. Spent most of her time with the children, liked to talk about feelings.

Corinne Keen

Walter Freeman II Childhood

He was born into a very affluent and prominent family on Nov. 14, 1895

He was very sick as a child Grandfather performed surgery “Little Wonder Boy” Tutored in dancing in riding, had a

governess Leather whip when misbehaving Gold coin

Walter in College

He had an odd personality and an odd sense of fashion

He liked poetry and to show off his family’s wealth-limo

A friend of his remembered meeting him at Yale for the first time while he was wearing a Mexican sombrero and swinging a cane.

Walter Freeman’s Higher Education

He attended Yale and got

his Undergraduate from 1912 to 1916

1918 World War I-Student Doctor

1920 Neurology school University of Pennsylvania Medical School.

Began work in 1924 as a neurologist

He earned his PhD in neuropathology

Never got a license to perform surgery

College continued…

William Spillar rejected Freeman Traveled to Europe visited asylums

in London and Paris. He worked with psychiatrists in

Vienna and Rome. St. Elizabeth’s Hospital and George

Washington University He returned to the states

depressed. He saw no real treatment for the insane. He wrote, “I looked around at the hundreds of patients and thought, what a waste.”

Marjorie Barnard College stayed until

earning her masters for Economics

Became an assistant professor at 25

Earned PHD in Economics When the couple met Six children with Walter U.S. Tariff for 20 years Inattentive grandmother Marjorie passed away in

1932

Swiss Psychiatrist Born in 1836 in

Switzerland Performed the first

psychosurgical operation Received his medical

doctorate in 1860 Died in 1907 from

Pnemonia

Johann Gottlieb Burckhardt

Neurology

Millions of soldiers were wounded in WW1 and returned to England, Germany, France and the US with brain damage.

In earlier wars soldiers would have died because there was no penicillin.

Scientists had many subjects to study because of this.

Psychotherapy

Sigmund Freud had published his theories and they were beginning to spread and accepted worldwide.

Freeman wasn’t intrigued by Freud or psychoanalysis. He thought the approach could be dangerous.

Treating the Mentally Ill Electrotherapy

Hydrotherapy Electric Showers- patient wears

helmet that gives a shower of electricity.

Rest cure-isolation Sleep therapy-induced sleep and

keep the patient there for 4-6 weeks. Metrazol-Caused violent convulsions Infected teeth The Media left out the bad

Lobotomy 20th Century Used to cure aching pains in the body, as well

as behavioral issues Then later began being used for no visible

reason at all The U.S. performed the most lobotomies The majority took place between the 1940s-

1950s In 1950 the Soviet Union, Japan, and

Germany prohibited it as well stating, the procedure was contrary to the principles of humanity.

1935 Conference

Walter Freeman and Antonio Egas Moniz attended

Results were shown about chimps in which their fronal lobes had been operated on. They became passive and subdued but no one knew why.

Moniz immediately started his own research

Wrote an article in a French magazine saying that subjects with anxiety and depression seemed to respond best to leucotomies but those with Schizophrenia didn’t respond at all.

Antonio Egas Moniz-Leucotomy

Portuguese neurologist 1935 he performed the first

brain operation used to treat mental illness

Drilled holes in his patient’s skull to access the brain

Nobel Prize in medicine in 1949

Walter Jackson Freeman II

Studying cadaver brains Massive doses of insulin

and use of Metrazol Giant volts of electric

shock Was not a very successful

doctor but was a good professor with his theatrical personality

The Penis Ring

Tools

Prefrontal Lobotomy Convincing in telling people that

lobotomies would cure various conditions.

1936 first prefrontal lobotomy performed in US with the help of his research partner James Watts.

He believed that cutting certain nerves between the thalamus and the frontal lobes would stabilize a person’s personality.

First lobotomy performed in 1936 suffered from insomnia and hysteria

Operation took an hour Slipped into comatose and

regressed to a child. Forgot to eat, speak, did get better.

She was able to stay out of mental hospitals with lessened anxiety

She died of pneumonia at the age of 68

Alice Hood Hammatt

He did five more prefrontal lobotomies before presenting his findings

He said they all were anxious, depressed, nervous. And now were all more content and more easily cared for.

15% fatality rate Giving the public hope

Presentation in Baltimore

Rosemary Kennedy First daughter born to JFK Senior and Rose

Kennedy She was born with intellectual disabilities Had lobotomy at the age of 23 in 1941 Lobotomy failed and was institutionalized

in WI where she passed away They explained to the public years later

that she was “mentally retarded”.

Italian psychiatrist Performed the first

transorbital lobotomy in 1937

Transorbital rarely practiced until Freeman

Freeman believed it was less intrusive than Moniz’

Fiamberti became Director of the Psychiatric Hospital of Varese when it was opened in 1964.

Ammaro Fiamberti

Media puts spotlight on mental hospitals

U.S. mental hospitals look like concentration camps

Public reaction Freeman felt he could help

with a cheaper and simpler method

Bedlam 1946

Transorbital Lobotomy 10-minute procedure-no side

effects Patient would become

unconscious with electroshock

Freeman then would peel back the eyelid and place an ice pick

He then would hammer the ice pick into the frontal lobes of the brain moving the tool back and forth

He would follow the same process with the other eye

Transorbital Lobotomy Watts backed out Competitions with himself-25

in 1 day Called reporters to get

crowds Two eyes at one time

Colleagues protested mutilation not an operation

James Watts stopped participating due to cruelty and overuse of the lobotomies.

No consent from the mentally ill

Asked to leave hospitals because of his work being unethical

Jonathon Williams said he did not sterilize anything and held people down against their will.

Critics

Los Altos Symptoms were long term in

patients 1950s Thorazine Classes cancelled Lobotomies becoming

unpopular on East Coast Moved away to resurface his

career Keen-Yosemite National Park

Falls Extramarital affairs

Howard Dully Freeman diagnosed Dully with

Schizophrenia at the age of 4 Stepmother and father had him get a

lobotomy at the age of 12 in 1960 Howard misbehaved as a child It took him years to recover and was in and

out of juvenile correctional systems. He lived homeless and as an alcoholic at this time as well.

My Lobotomy

Housewife one of his first ten patients. Kept having relapses of psychiatric symptoms.

Lobotomies performed in 1946 and 1956

Passed away during her third lobotomy in 1967

Freeman’s surgical privileges were revoked and he retired soon after.

Helen Mortensen

He charged $25/Lobotomy Traveled the country State hospitals were

overcrowded so they accepted this practice more than private hospitals.

Portable electroshock device began to fail

Lobotomobile

Marjorie’s Health

Alcoholic Unhappy marriage Nursing home Amputation Walter’s son’s argued and

about went to court over it 1972 passed away due to

Pneumonia

Walter’s Remaining Years

Spent with family Randy passed from

Malignant Melanoma Visited former patients Wanted to prove his theories

were correct Battled with Colon cancer

and passed away in 1972

U.S. Psychiatrist Member of the American

Psychological Association Led to the use of psychiatric

drugs

The Henry Ford of Lobotomy

Questions

Reactions to how the Kennedy’s handled things with Rose?

Lobotomy-valuable knowledge or a medical travesty?

Do you think Freeman became more interested in helping the mentally ill or getting the attention from the public and media?

References

Dully, H., & Fleming, C. (2007). My lobotomy: A memoir. New York: Crown.

Hai, J. (2005). The lobotomist: A maverick medical genius and his tragic quest to rid the world of mental illness. Hoboken, N.J.: J. Wiley.

Kessler, The Sins of the Father, p. 226

Tartakovsky, M. (2011). The Surprising History of the Lobotomy. Psych Central. Retrieved on February 2, 2015, from http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2011/03/21/the-surprising-history-of-the-lobotomy/