More pictures of the skull

Another fascinating picture of Phineas' skull!!

Phineas himself

A picture of Phineas Gage

More pictures of Phineas' skull

Phineas' skull and tamping iron up close.

Phineas Gage's skull

A picture of Phineas’ skull and how the tamping iron passed through it.

Phineas Gage video

Here is a video summary of Phineas Gage's accident. Enjoy!!

Later on…

Dr. Harlow writes Phineas’ mother and request to dig up Phineas’ body and use it for science to help understand the body and brain better. His mother does however allow for this to happen. So in 1868 Dr. Harlow goes to the Medical Society in Massachusetts and tells them everything and anything about Phineas, his accident, and how it affected him mentally, emotionally, and physically. Brain science begins to unravel and is broken down and new questions are raised and new things are made. But no one questions they still left unanswered was: “If there are exact locations in the brain that allow for the ability to hear or to breathe, is there a place that generates human social behavior? If that place is damaged, do you stop acting human?”

Phineas’ Life Goes On

1851-Phineas comes home and works around town at a stable.

Early 1852- Phineas meet a man who said he wants to have a stagecoach line in Chile, so spontaneously Phineas just says goodbye to New England and began a life in Chile as a stagecoach driver.

1859- Phineas goes to see family in San Francisco. He gets a plowing job for a farmer. Soon after he comes to San Fran, he experiences many seizures, (known as epileptic seizures.) Doctors tried to “bleed” Phineas or reduce his blood pressure by taking blood, to help the pressure on his brain, but this does not help the seizures. It is unknown exactly why he experiences them, maybe it’s from his accident before, maybe he hit his head again, or maybe he had an infection, it is unclear why, but them constantly occurring wears Phineas down and he passes away on May 21, 1860.

1862-Paul Broca a French surgeon from Paris discovers something new about the brain. He examines brains of people who experienced strokes and lost speaking ability. He then became aware of an injury in a certain spot on the brain located by the left front lobe. This is known as the “Broca area” found just above your left ear hole, two inches in front. Trauma to this area may cause you to not be able to speak ever again. Not long after, a man named Carl Wernickle who was German discovers another area of the brain that is in charge of interpreting speech. This area is found by the left temporal lobe and if damage it could hurt someone’s competency of apprehending speech. As you can see brain science slowly begins to develop and become clearer.

Following Phineas Gage

Phineas Gages story ended up at the “P.T. Barnum’s American Museum”, located in New York City on Broadway. This was no ordinary museum. This was a museum of the unthinkable; people would come from all over just to see. The museum included things such as “mermaids”, “bearded ladies”,” living giants”, bizarre animals and creature’s people just wanted to see for themselves. Among these things were pictures and models of Phineas’ head and explanations of what happened. At times Phineas himself would be presented at the museum with his tamping iron.

What we thought about how we thought- The Brain

In January 1858 and Dr. Bigelow goes to Boston to speak with and let doctors examined Phineas. They make a mold of Phineas’ face and discuss what happened and why it happened. Dr. Bigelow speaks with doctors and sort of makes a presentation about Phineas’ accident. Two main accumulations of doctors are intrigued by what Dr. Bigelow present. They come to their own conclusion of what happened and how it happened.

In the 1800s Franz Joseph Gall an Austrian Dr. makes the statement that intelligence and emotions are centered in the brain.

Long, long ago people said they “knew” emotions center in the heart, and the spleen controlled anger, and to me this is silly how nearly 300 years ago people said they “knew” for sure this is what happened in our body. Our thoughts about the body have changed just a bit.

In 1850 doctors however didn't know a lot about our body, they knew we had certain organs, they knew the skeletal makeup, but they were unclear about the brain exact functions.

The brain is covered by your cerebral cortex. Your daily functions are kept going by your brainstem, which connects into the spinal cord. The cortex is where all your emotions develop. You also remember, dream, speak and think in your cortex. You also experience your five senses in the cortex. All these things occur in your cortex, in the brain.

In 1850 doctors did not know much about cells, nerves, and neurons that were contained in the brain and spinal cord of the body. Messages and signals are transmitted through a person’s neuron. This was all unknown to them at time.

The two types of doctors examining Phineas each had very different thought processes. The one group referred to as the “Whole Brainers” thought the brain was a whole or one, and it was all connected somehow. The second group referred to as the “localizers” thought the brain was split into different sections and each section had a job. They thought specific “Organs” located in the brain were in charge of certain functions that occurred. They said that the “Organs of respect” and “kindness” were found right above the left eyebrow, which was where Phineas was struck, (They thought maybe this is why he has been acting different lately.) This group of doctors or “Localizers” found that the brain has 37 “Organs.” They concluded that if you have a strong organ, your skull will come out a little. If you had a week organ the skull will be indented in that spot. For example if your “Organ of Amativeness” has a strong bump after it then you have strong physical love. This thought process is known as phrenology. However the “Localizers” were incorrect about the “Organs” found in the brain, but they were correct about “Localization.” And as far as the “whole Brainers” thought process, they were incorrect about the brain as a whole, but correct about how it is all connected.

The brain does have many different functions found throughout the cortex which has many parts. The cortex allows you to pick out certain things, walk, and allow you to perform many other different tasks; it is all possible because of this part of the body which is found in your brain.

What we thought about how we though- Doctors of the 1850’s

Doctors during this time period were said to have dressed like proper gentleman. Lots of pictures were painted of them to make them look extra good. They had cleaned cut shaves, gold jewelry, expensive looking clothing, or jackets, and especially looked smart. Although lots of pictures were made of doctors, there were not many pictures of him doing anything like performing any operations or examining any patient's. This was because back then it was hard to take a picture of a moving object, no one really had the right equipment to focus in on and take a picture fast enough of any object in motion. A man named Josiah Hawes from Boston was probably the first to take a picture of doctors performing tasks that make them doctors. Back then only males were doctors and many times when they performed an operation or examined a patient, rarely any of them wore gloves, masks, or scrubs. No protective gear was included in these pictures.

Ten Weeks Later

Phineas’ recovery was remarkable after ten weeks. He then decided to go to New Hampshire to see his mother, and then returned back to Cavendish in the spring. Phineas is still able to speak, feed and dress himself, but he has trouble seeing out of his left eye and has a couple of scars, he is still not the same.

Dr. Harlow writes an article about Phineas’ case, and it was very appealing to a professor at Harvard, Henry J. Bigelow. He tells Dr. Harlow he wants more information and eyewitnesses that say this accident is really true.

After Phineas returns home in the spring he goes back to work. But he is different. He comes across as a mean, angry man that you can no longer rely on. He seems mad, he yells and acts very rude to people. So Phineas’ is fired from his job. Dr. Barlow observes and writes comments on how he behaves, but he does not share them with anyone, he is not allowed to unless Phineas gives him permission.

Fourteen Days Later

Fourteen days after Phineas’ experience with the iron rod, he began forming abscesses, a fever and he was no longer hungry. So Dr. Harlow continues to care as best as he could for Phineas and once again miraculously Phineas was okay and everything was healing normal. Dr. Harlow saved Phineas’ life. Phineas however was not staying in bed and was not listening to Dr. Harlow's orders so he gave him two prescriptions that were very strong and would help clean out his stomach and bowels, and basically forced Phineas to stay in bed, and that's when he finally did.

Louis Pasteur and Joseph Lister

At the time of 1848 Louis Pasteur, a Frenchman was in the process of examining and researching fermentation, infection, and decay, which are all caused by “germs “as Pasteur called them.

Joseph Lister who was an English surgeon was motivated by Pasteur’s theory about “germs.” Lister wanted to conduct surgery only under conditions that were sterile or clean. He began boiling his medical instruments, and cleaning his hands and clothes thoroughly before performing surgery, because of this man’s sterile procedure before surgery, in 1868 deaths caused by infection were reduce significantly.

Even though this information is useful now, it was unfortunately, unavailable and was unknown at the time of Phineas Gage’s accident. So Phineas’ Doctor, Dr. Harlow did his best to keep Phineas’ cut clean and hidden.

How much did people really know in 1848?

Even though it was then that Englishman Robert Hooke came up with the basic unit of life, cells, and the first to examine single-celled organisms closely was Leeuwenhoek, a lot was still unknown about bacteria at the time.

In 1848 the word infection was never used by doctors. However they knew if someone had an infection or not. They referred to it as a “septic” wound. However doctors didn't really know much about gangrene, fungus, viruses, streptococci, staphylococci, doctors were not cautious of bacteria laying everywhere, on their medical instruments, on their hands, or even in the air.

An open cut allows bacteria inside it if not treated correctly. Once bacteria is inside the body the body's immune system fights it and the bacteria fights back by releasing chemicals that are toxic to the body, this war between bacteria and the immune system is known as an infection.

“Horrible Accident” in Vermont (Part 2)

Phineas Gage made his way into town after the accident without a problem; he was still surprisingly conscious, and continuing to talk to everyone about what had just happened about 30 min. ago. Can you just imagine walking by and seeing a man covered in blood with a hole through his head, but yet still alive and talking to people as if nothing was wrong? To me this is crazy and seems unreal!

At this time Dr. Edward Williams arrived at the hotel Phineas was waiting at. He asked the people around and the workers that assisted Phineas what had happened (since he figured Phineas was a little out of it considering how he looked) but Phineas demanded to tell the doctor himself. After Dr. Williams examined him Dr. John Martyn Harlow (the regular physician from that town) takes over. He helps Phineas inside and then begins to clean his wound. Dr. Harlow does the best he can to wrap and clean off Phineas’ head wound, and he realizes Phineas’ arms are burnt, so he begins to wrap them as well. The doctor is surprised that Phineas is alive and survived this open brain injury. Phineas should have died instantly, but didn't. Phineas should have died from all the blood he lost, but didn't. Phineas should have died from his brain swelling, but didn't. How is this all possible?! Can anything else go wrong?!

“Horrible Accident” in Vermont (Part 1)

The question lucky or unlucky is always asked when talking about Phineas Gage. On September 13, 1848 Phineas Gage’s life was turned upside down from that day on, and it will never be the same. Phineas was only 26 years old and worked as a railroad constructor in Cavendish, Vermont and at the time, this job was very strenuous and hardworking. There weren’t any machines to help out the human hands. Phineas had a special talent at the construction sites, he blasted! His job was to blast rock that was in the path of work. In order to do this, Phineas needed a tool called the “tamping iron.” This was used to position explosives. It was designed to have one end for pressing down on the powder and the other end was very sharp to set the fuse through the gun powder.

 Gunpowder is very sensitive when it is dry, it could go of at any moment, and it did! Phineas was getting set up as usual but the fuse is left exposed by accident and Phineas had got distracted and the fuse was set off! The tamping iron soars through the air and the Phineas fly’s backwards. The rod had passed right below his left cheek bone, going behind his left eye then in front of his brain. Surprisingly Phineas gets up and sits on a cart to be taken to the doctors and the whole time Phineas talks to everyone and is describing what just happened and why there was a hole in his head and blood was gushing down his face.

I chose to read the book, Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science by John Fleischman. This book is about a man named Phineas Gage who was a construction worker on railroads, and one day he had a terrible accident with a metal rod that had passed straight through his brain. He surprisingly lived and now this accident has helped others understand how the brain functions exactly.