Episode 195: Dr. James R. Wright and Walt Whitman's Brain

The Long Island History Project

The science of the brain was changing throughout the 19th century. Medical researchers were peering ever deeper into cerebral mysteries and one question piqued their interest more than any other: who has the biggest brain?

On today’s episode we turn for answers to Dr. James R. Wright, medical historian and retired professor of pathology and laboratory medicine at the University of Calgary. He introduces us to brain clubs, mutual autopsy societies and above all, the American Anthropometric Society of Philadelphia. The AAS had a particular interest in collecting and studying the brains of prominent scientists and intellectuals. You can imagine their excitement then, when Walt Whitman died in 1892 not far from their laboratory.

Wright walks us through the ensuing complicated tale uncovered by him and other historians. Did Whitman really donate his brain to science? Why did Henry Ware Cattelll, who performed the autopsy, keep changing his story? And how does eBay and the 1931 movie Frankenstein play into it all?

Join us for a special Halloween episode that is not for the feint of heart.

Further Research

• Wright Jr, James R. “Henry Ware Cattell and Walt Whitman’s brain.” Clinical Anatomy 31, no. 7 (2018): 988-996.
• Hecht, Jennifer. The end of the soul: scientific modernity, atheism, and anthropology in France. Columbia University Press, 2005. (Find in a library via WorldCat)
• Burrell, Brian. “The Strange Fate of Whitman’s Brain.” Walt Whitman Quarterly Review 20, no. 3/4 (2003).
• Gosline, Sheldon Lee. “” I Am a fool”: Dr. Henry Cattell’s private confession about what happened to Whitman’s brain.” Walt Whitman Quarterly Review 31, no. 4 (2014).
• The Walt Whitman House. Camden, NJ
• Music
  • Horror Music by Tele50 via Pixabay.
  • Glass Jar Tap by ekfink. License: Creative Commons 0
  • Funny Halloween by FASSounds via Pixabay