21 July 2002 PHINEAS GAGE: A GRUESOME BUT TRUE STORY ABOUT BRAIN SCIENCE by John Fleischman, Houghton Mifflin, 2002

"...With the thoughts I'd be thinkin'

I could be another Lincoln

If I only had a brain..." --The Scarecrow from the movie, The Wizard of Oz.

We don't know whether Abraham Lincoln ever met Phineas Gage...or had any thoughts about him. We do know that Phineas Gage died less than six months before he would have gotten the chance to vote for Honest Abe. That Lincoln had heard of Phineas Gage was quite possible, since Phineas was both a scientific marvel--a textbook case in brain science--as well as a reputed freakshow attraction. This was all due to the fact that Phineas Gage spent his last nearly twelve years alive--1848 to 1860--as The Man With A Hole in his Head. Veteran science writer, John Fleischman, uses the story of Phineas Gage--a railroad foreman who had a thirteen pound rod accidentally shoot through his head--as the centerpiece of a fascinating book for young people about the history of brain science and an introduction to our current knowledge of how our minds function.

The story of the accident is, indeed, gruesome! Phineas's tamping iron accidentally triggered an explosion. This tamping iron was a tool he used in preparing the charges for blasting granite deposits blocking the path of the rails being laid. The forty-three inch long tamper entered his cheek and exited just above his hairline. Talk about a bad hair day! My kids delighted in telling each other how Phineas was brought to town--conscious--and then sat on his porch relating the details of the accident to his landlord while a doctor was summoned from the next town. Sadly, though as could be expected of anyone who has had an inch-and-three-quarters diameter rod travel through his head, Phineas, who had been a diligent and well-liked foreman, was not ever the same person again.

" 'We have been informed by the best authority that after the man recovered, and while recovering, he was grossly profane, coarse, and vulgar, to such a degree that his society was intolerable to decent people.' " --American Phrenological Journal, 1851

So Phineas ends up in Boston for a time, where two warring groups of doctors, the "Whole Brainers" and the "Localizers/Phrenologists," both attempt to use him as poster boy for their respective theories of brain function. In fact, the head of the "Localizers," Dr. John Harlow, ultimately gains control of the head of Phineas Gage (the skull portion) which remains to this day at Harlow's old stomping grounds, Harvard Medical School.

While this is all very fun, my teenage daughter has taken days to finish the seventy-five page text, as she memorizes the parts of the brain, the parts of nerve cells, and other well-illustrated facts about what's happening between her Walkman headphones. Fleischman also includes an excellent glossary of terms. PHINEAS GAGE: A GRUESOME BUT TRUE STORY ABOUT BRAIN SCIENCE will surely have your kids scratching their heads about the mysteries of the mind.

Richie Partington

http://richiespicks.com

BudNotBuddy@aol.com