TOPICS IN EXPERIMENTATION
Scroll through our gallery to see topics in Medical Experimentation History.
PLEASE NOTE: Images and descriptions displayed in this museum may be disturbing for some viewers.
Discretion advised.
EXPERIMENTATION ON CHILDREN
Children were not exempt from the desire of medical research professionals to test hypothesis of treatments for various conditions, real or imagined. From electroshock to vaccines, discover "treatments" given to some of the most vulnerable among us.
[Image: "Little Albert" a 9 month-old is conditioned to fear animals. /John B. Watson/News Dog Media]
SUFFERING THE XX CHROMOSOMES:
WOMEN AND EXPERIMENTATION
Despite enduring 30 harrowing procedures repeated over the course of her life, this image of Anarcha Westcott on the table of J.M. Sims shows a calm, clean, and ordered environment. The reality of Anarcha and other women like her, pushes back against this sterile version of history, but only if we tell their story.
(Image credit: Pearson Museum, Southern Illinois University School of Medicine)
BIRTH CONTROL- BODIES AT RISK
The 21st Century brings many options for prevention of pregnancy. While it remains a potentially impactful decision for the body, the history and discovery of these options did not always protect and inform those who would use it.
[image: The New York Times, May 7, 1917. Advertisement for founder of Planned Parenthood and supporter of Eugenics, Margaret Sanger's documentary, Birth Control. The film was banned under the 1915 Supreme Court decision Mutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio.]
GOVERNMENT EXPERIMENTATION
As much as any enterprising physician looking for new techniques to treat physical or mental ailments, so did the government have incentive to protect 'national interest' by any means necessary - even if it meant testing theories on citizens it swore to protect without their informed consent.
[image: emblem of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)]
TREATMENTS FOR THE "INSANE"
"Cures" for mental illness relied on physical shocks to the system, either through ice bath hydrotherapy, through direct contact with the brain by lobotomy, or through electroshock therapy as shown to the right.
[image: National Museum of Health and Medicine. World War I era patient in a Bergonic Chair undergoing treatment for "psychological effect, in psycho-neurotic cases."]
QUEER REJECTIONS
Attempts to root out sexual difference in the United States has a long and devastating history. Those who didn't fit gendered assumptions often found themselves at the mercy of medical professionals' attempt to find a 'cure.'
[image: Uncensored Magazine, 1969. Magazine article headline, "Homosexuality Can Be Cured" with two people shown in a negative exposure photograph.]
A CAPTIVE AUDIENCE
Questions of consent are front and center when considering prison populations. Is it possible for an inmate, who has no freedom of movement, to fully give permission without things like coercion coming into play?
[image: Interior of San Quentin Prison. Long hall with multiple levels, prisoners standing outside cells with armed guards watching.]