In 1848, railroad worker Phineas Gage suffered an unusual injury, in which a three foot tamping iron was blown through his skull, making him on of the greatest medical curiosities of all time. We’ll discuss his time in Boston, his life post-injury, and the impact of his case on modern neuroscience.
Content warning: The details of Gage’s accident and injury are a little gory.
Phineas Gage
- Today, a roadside monument near Cavendish, VT marks the spot where Phineas Gage suffered his famous injury.
- The skull and life mask of Phineas Gage at the Warren Anatomical Museum.
- Stories of Phineas Gage exhibiting himself on Boston Common are told in Alton Blackington’s More Yankee Yarns.
- An Odd Kind of Fame: Stories of Phineas Gage is Malcom Macmillan’s exhaustive treatment of Phineas Gage’s life, injury, and contributions to medical science.
- A story from NPR about neuroscience’s continuing fascination with the case of Phineas Gage.
- The story of how two antique photo collectors discovered that they owned the first known picture of Phineas Gage.
- The comic “Bring Me the Head of Phineas Gage” is available as part of the compendium of science comics Boundless, volume 1.
Featured Historic Site
An elite medical school may seem like a strange place to find a history museum, but that’s exactly where we’re going to send you this week. Tucked away on the campus of Harvard Medical School, you’ll find the Warren Anatomical Museum.
It’s named after Dr. John Collins Warren, a surgeon who performed the first surgery that used ether as anesthesia. He was the son of Harvard Medical School founder Dr. John Warren, and the nephew of Dr. Joseph Warren, the patriot hero who dispatched Paul Revere to Lexington and died in the battle of Bunker HIll. John Collins Warren founded the New England Journal of Medicine and became the first dean of Harvard Medical School.
Starting in 1799, Warren began collecting what were called “teaching preparations,” preserved skulls and skeletons from people with interesting injuries or congenital abnormalities. His collection slowly grew to include all sorts of preserved body parts, basically anything that could be used to help instruct medical students on the human anatomy. When he retired from teaching in 1847, he gave this collection to the school, along with a large sum of money to maintain the collection.
For the next century and a half, the collection grew, and today it contains
approximately 3200 anatomical and osteological preparations, 750 wet tissue preparations, over a 1000 watercolors, drawings, photographs, and lantern slides, an estimated 1000 anatomical models and casts, 500 human and non-human calculi, and roughly 8500 medical, dental, and public health instruments and devices.
It even holds Phineas Gage’s famous skull and the tamping rod that went through it!
The museum is open to the public Monday to Friday from 9am to 5pm. Admission is free, you just need to bring a photo ID and check in at the security desk.
Upcoming Event
“Speak Out! The 4th Annual Boston Massacre Anniversary Orations” will be held at Old South Meeting House on March 21 at 6pm. From the event listing:
Each year from 1772 to 1775, massive gatherings of men, women and children were held at Old South Meeting House to commemorate the anniversary of the Boston Massacre, with rousing speeches by patriots John Hancock, Benjamin Church and Dr. Joseph Warren. Join us to hear selected excerpts of these speeches, performed by an inter-generational group in the grand hall where the orations took place 240 years ago! Learn about the orations and their significance with special guests Bostonian Society Executive Director Nathaniel Sheidley, historian Robert Allison, and Dr. Joseph Warren biographer Dr. Samuel Forman. Audience members will also have the option to read from a selection of excerpts; prizes will be awarded to the most rousing orators in youth and adult categories!
The event is part of the Occupation Series, marking the 250th anniversary of Boston’s 1768 occupation by British troops.
This free event will be held on Wednesday, March 21st at 6pm. Reserved tickets are required.