It was a family road trip, kind of, a working vacation for father.

That's why mother stayed behind.

But father thought the experience would be good for the children.

They'd see some of America, this beautiful country.

Father was a very important man, a doctor. As the family wagon bounced

along the byways of late 1940s and 50s America, the children sang songs and played games like

I spy. Father whistled to himself as he navigated from a paper map spread out across the front seat.

Tucked on the floorboard beside him was a small leather case.

In it were the tools of his trade.

A pair of ice picks.

And they got a small beam of light against the air.

One, one. True, weird stuff.

On the evening of April 4th, 1950, some of the top surgeons in the United States gathered in Tuskegee, Alabama, for the 28th annual meeting of the John A. Andrew Clinical Society. There was a speaker that night,

a very well-known neurologist and consultant to both the VA and Walter Reed Hospital.

His name was Dr. Walter Freeman. He was deeply critical of the VA's policy that a patient

suffering from a mental health disorder

had to have been under observation for two years before surgery might be considered as a treatment option.

Dr. Freeman believed passionately that there was a simple surgical procedure that could be performed in the early stages of a mental health crisis

before what he called brain deterioration set in, a procedure that had the potential to free

the patient forever from their mental torment. Not everyone at that meeting agreed with Dr. Freeman.

There were some vocal skeptics in the room, which didn't stop Freeman from talking with great

enthusiasm about his method of psycho surgery.

...