Episode 117 (Elizabeth)

the memory palace

Nate DiMeo

Radiotopia, Publicradio, History, Natedimeo

4.8 • 7.2K Ratings

🗓️ 7 November 2017

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Memory Palace is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX, a curated network of extraordinary, story-driven shows.

Music

Up Niek Mountain by Peter Broderick
El cascabel de plata by Federico Durand
We hear just a little bit of imgs/ r by Kara-Lis Coverdale
Dissolving Clouds by Biosphere
Nebula by Julianna Barwick
Only in the Dark by Ben Lukas Boysen

Notes

Bittersweet: Diabetes, Insulin, & the Transformation of Illness by Chris Feudtner
Breakthrough: Elizabeth Hughes, the Discovery of Insulin, and the Making of A Medical Miracle by Thea Cooper and Arthur Ainsberg
I'd also recommend searching the New York Times archive for Elizabeth Hughes and Diabetes. It's remarkable to go back and watch the story unfold.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is the memory pass.
0:03.3	I'm Nate Demet.
0:05.6	Let me get through this quick.
0:08.1	Because this story breaks my heart.
0:10.6	And you'll forgive me if I don't linger on certain details.
0:14.6	There was this girl.
0:15.7	Her name was Elizabeth.
0:17.0	And when she was 11 she got sick.
0:19.6	Just out of nowhere.
0:21.4	She was a happy and bright-eyed kid and then she wasn't.
0:25.5	She'd go to a friend's birthday party and have some cake and it would destroy her.
0:30.2	She would need to drink and drink and drink afterwards.
0:32.9	She had this insatiable thirst.
0:35.5	And she started to lose weight.
0:37.3	She was exhausted all the time and one day she got diarrhea and it almost killed her.
0:42.6	In her doctor diagnosed her with diabetes.
0:45.7	And he told Elizabeth's parents, he didn't tell Elizabeth, that she would probably die
0:50.1	before the year was out.
0:52.0	This was 1919 and that's just what happened to diabetics.
0:55.8	They just died.
0:57.6	But there was a clinic, a psychiatric hospital, and farm country in New Jersey.
1:02.8	And there was a doctor there who had figured out a way to keep people alive for two years.
	...

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