Lobotomy
Did lobotomy fix minds or break them?
4.2 (11)
34 mins
Explore how lobotomy emerged from wartime brain injury studies and animal experiments, promising relief from mental illness. Discover the chilling rise of ice-pick lobotomies and how speed and simplicity overshadowed safety.
Ep 1:
The Birth of a Brain-Cutting Cure
From a wartime suicide attempt to chimpanzee experiments, discover how lobotomy was born from flimsy theory, rushed into human trials, and marketed as a miracle despite chilling hidden costs.
Ep 2:
The Ice Pick and the Innocent
Walter Freeman's ice pick turns brain surgery into an office procedure—unlicensed, unsterile, and devastating—as doctors reframe brain damage as childlike innocence and pet-like contentment.
Ep 3:
Rosemary's Silence, Freeman's Fall
Rosemary Kennedy's life is shattered by her father's secret decision, while mounting deaths and hollow survivors finally push lobotomy toward its quiet, unceremonious decline.
Ep 4:
The Nobel Prize for Harm
As pharmaceuticals replace ice picks, the medical world reckons with a Nobel-winning procedure that turned thousands of patients into shadows of themselves—with no apology in sight.
Discussions (17)
Sal
Level 3 · 9 mo agoIt wasn't harsh enough.
Vernon
Level 3 · 9 mo agoIt is insane that Joe Kennedy didn't tell his wife before the surgery. He destroyed Rosemary just because she was becoming inconvenient for his image.
Suzanne
Level 7 · 9 mo agoThe Rosemary Kennedy story absolutely guts me. I can’t believe her father authorized that without telling her mom. She deserved so much better 💔
