The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 62 - Goat Doctor John Brinkley

Episode Date: March 1, 2015

Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds examine not actual doctor John R. BrinkleySOURCESTOUR DATESREDBUBBLE MERCHPATREON

When you're staying at an Airbnb you might be like me wondering could my place be an Airbnb and if it could what could it earn? You could be sitting on an Airbnb and not even know it. That in-law sweet guest house where your parents stay only part-time Airbnb it and make some money the rest of the year whether you could use a little extra money to cover some bills or for something a little more fun. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca host. Hello you are listening to the doll-up this is an American History podcast. Each week I read a story from American History to my

friend Gareth Reynolds who doesn't know what the topic is about to be. I've changed it. Do you want to look who to do? I'll do one buck. People say this is funny. Not Gary Gareth. Dave okay. Someone or something is tickling people. Is it for fun? And this is not gonna come to tickling podcasts. You are queen fakie of made-up town. All hell queen shit of Liesville. A bunch of religious virgins go to mingle and do my thing. I can't eat. No. I see you've done my friend. July 8th 1885. John Romulus Brinkley entered the world.

Romney. John Richard Brinkley was a poor mountain man who practiced medicine in North Carolina and served as a medic for the Confederate Army during the American Civil War. Brinkley was a true mountain doctor having quote read medicine but with no formal training. Sure. He read medicine. So he read books. Medicine. I can fix it. There we go. There it is. Put that rat there. There we go. And dead. And dead. The senior Brinkley was married four times in 1970. So this is his dad. Right. Okay. Who was who thought Richard was a little too common. He's married four times in 1970. He married Sarah T. Mingus. After some time Sarah's cousin who

was also named Sarah moved into the house. Oh dear. She's 24. John started banging her. Yep. Little Connell Mingus. Yep. Sarah too became pregnant and gave birth to John Romulus Brinkley out of wedlock. Just. Terrific. Good situation. Perfect. Normal. Normal. And reality shows were invented. When John was just five his mother Sarah too died of pneumonia and tuberculosis. Lovely. So the double. It's great. Throw the double. Yeah. You thought your situation was bad now. You thought you could die. You could just die from tuberculosis. About a little pneumonia. His aunt Sarah and dad moved to a home near the Tuckaski River. Uh huh. When John Romulus Brinkley's dad died

he was just 10 years old. Okay. So things are good. So now his parents are gone. Now he's just with his aunt. Yep. Cousin. Awkward. Yeah. Okay. John attended a one room log cabin school for three or four months a year. He finished his studies. Yeah. It's just so great. It's really tremendous. And the rest of the time go to the field. He finished his studies to 16 and began to work as a roving railroad telegrapher. John traveled to New York City to work for Western Union and then to New Jersey in late 1906. Word came that his aunt Sally was sick and he returned to North Carolina. She died on December 25th 1906. John was comforted by his former teacher at the log cabin schoolhouse Sally who was just a year

older than him. It's normal. I remember one time when I was a kid I was I was 11 and my mom got me a 12 year old babysitter and I was like what the fuck this is bullshit. What is happening right now. She's like I don't know. Feels like you should probably finish your vegetables. I was like listen lady listen to me. You are eight months older. So it's a lot like this. Yes. It's a lot like that. He ended up marrying. All right. There's the difference. Yep. Well I probably tell me think about all the times he was jerking off thinking about her and now he gets to bang her. Wait. Why is that just inferred by the way. I assume if your teacher is one year older that you're just going to think about that. He's just

being okay. Right. Sure. Having not earned enough money as a railroad telegrapher John decided to become a doctor like his father sort of was. Sure online. His medical career began in 1907 when he posed as a Quaker physician in a North Carolina medicine show posed posed as a Quaker one more time with that one. He posed as a Quaker physician in a North Carolina medicine show. So number one he's pretending to be a Quaker. Number two he's pretending to be a Quaker doctor. Number three there's a medicine. Number three is big for me. So here it is a medicine. Medicine. Panic. Pfizer should bring back the medicine. Yeah. Well we have now would be great. There's a lot of boner comedy. Yes. Yes. Tremendous amount.

He and Sally set out traveling and pros posing as Quaker doctors giving rural towns a medicine show where they sold patent medicine. Okay. So it's almost like a live infomercial. Well patent medicines are compounds promoted and sold as medical cures that just don't work. So yes it is. So it is an info. So it was bait. I mean it's basically like drug company advertising almost. Yeah pretty much. Okay. It's good times. Cool. So that's awesome. Next John worked with a man named Dr. Burke and together they sold virility tonics. Sure. This will make you get a boner I would say to the guy walking by. Excuse me. Yep. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm a fake doctor. I should point out I'm a fake Quaker doctor. Sorry.

Sorry. I should probably lead with I'm a fake Quaker doctor and then talk about your penis. But this wasn't leading to enough money. So John decided to become a real doctor. Sort of. Sort. He moved to Chicago to attend medical school. Okay. At the time famous education reformer Abraham Flexner labeled Chicago's medical schools quote the plague spot of the country. Awesome. Now that could be taken one of two ways. No it's not the actual plague. Okay. Keep going. John enrolled in the Bennett School of Eclectic Medicine. Unaccredited school. That's just a lot of red flags in that name. I've seen some problems. I've seen some major problems. That's like sometimes out here when you get real deep in the holistic

stuff you'll be like well what are we this seems a little there's a few too many terms in here for my liking. You know what I need right now is an eclectic doctor. Just somebody who is an eclectic doctor. Eclectic practitioners claim to select the most effective forms of medical treatment. Eclectic medicine made use of botanical remedies along with other substances and physical therapy practices. So everybody died. The term was coined by Constantine Raffinesc a physician who lived among Native Americans and observed their use of medicinal plants. Oh now I'm back on board by the way. Well Raffinesc used the word eclectic to refer to those physicians who employed whatever was found to be beneficial to their patients.

Well now that's pretty vague. That's super vague. It should just be called the School of Veg Medicine. I am Dr. Throwshit at the wall and sees what sticks. No it then says what sticks. That worked. There we go. I don't know. Shut up. So John worked as a telegrapher during the night and attended school during the day. During this time he and his wife had a baby Wanda. Due to debt John took on a second shift working as a telegrapher. After two years John came home one day and discovered Sally had left with their daughter. Oh my God because he was working nonstop. She filed for divorce and at first John went along but after two months he decided to kidnap Wanda and flee to Canada. Well you know there's

he gave it a shot. Sally couldn't get extradition from Canada so she dropped her alimony and child support claims and John returned with Wanda. That's healthy. Then the happy couple reunited. That's good. How could they not. Of course. It's a lot like the reunion at the end of Gone Girl. It's exactly like that. In his third year studying in medical school Sally left again. This time she went back to North Carolina. She was pregnant at the time and had another girl Erna. Amazing that there's another kid. Named Erna. Yeah Wanda and Erna. John dropped out of medical school and bailed on his tuition debt following his family to Tuckusky, North Carolina. The family wandered around for a while and ended up in

St. Louis, Missouri. There John found another eclectic medical school but because he had not paid off his debts to the Bennett College they refused to release his records so he did what any man would do in this situation. He just bought a medical degree from the Kansas City Eclectical Medical University and returned home to North Carolina. So there's two options when you want to get into the eclectic doctoring game. There's the one where you do the training. The normal way where you learn to be a doctor. Which already sounds a little sketchy I would say. Probably. Like if a Native American is doing it I have faith in that way more than if a man who is building telegraphs is doing it. But then the other option is to just buy

it. Yeah. Okay. It's a lot like when you would go to an arcade and you would earn all those tickets only to find out if your dad paid $100 you could just get like the stuff fucking there and be gone. Right. They had another child, Naomi. Now they are a family of five. Jesus Christ. They're not doing well. No. You can't just throw babies at the problem. Well I think that's what you do. All right. They then moved to New York City. Sally wanted John to give up his goal of becoming a doctor but he refused to. He achieved his goal. He took a helicopter to Everest. So Sally left him again taking the three girls to North Carolina. John moved to South Carolina and set up a storefront clinic in Greenville with a man

named Crawford. They called it the Greenville Electrometic Doctors and placed advertisements to attract men who were concerned about their ability to sexually perform. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Kidoke. Those who came to the health center could acquire electric medicine from Germany. Okay. I mean one thing I know about. Okay. So. Electric medicine. I'm pretty excited. I'm pretty excited. I'm as excited as a man who just got electro treatment on his thing. Patients were injected by John or his partner with a shot of colored water for $25. There better be more. Patients were told the shot cured everything from a sleepy demeanor to syphilis which is why it would cost so much. It cost $25 which is

the equivalent of about $600 now. Holy shit. They were just a journey. Water. To cure syphilis. To cure syphilis. So then some guy would think he was cured. Finally I could go horn again. After two months the two quickly bailed on their clinic and scurried out of town without paying their rent utility bills and debts for clothing and pharmaceutical supplies. That town now called syphilisville. The local newspaper reported that they left about 30 to 40 local merchants with unpaid checks. They ended up in Memphis, Tennessee. There. They set up another bullshit store. John met and married 21-year-old Minerva Jones. All right. Known as Minnie. Fuck yeah. The daughter of a local doctor. Oh boy. They'll

have a lot to talk about. Their courtship was an entire four days. Good. Right amount of time. The one hiccup in the marriage was that John was still married to Sally. Oh but besides that. Come on. Everybody's got baggage. Right. A lot of times they're not still holding it but yeah. John and Minnie honeymooned in Kansas City, Denver, Pocatello and Knoxville where John was arrested and extradited to Greenville and put in jail for practicing medicine without a license and for writing bad checks. Okay. Naturally John told the sheriff it was all Crawford's fault then gave up Crawford in a true snitch fashion. Using the information provided by John police were able to arrest

Crawford in Pocatello and then John and Crawford were reunited in jail. Hey. Hey what's up? Bro. Hey. How you doing? So little awkward. Yeah. I sort of snitched. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I know. But you know. Dude. I'd look man. We've gotten the colored water and game cured syphilis together. Right. Yeah. John and Crawford ended up settling out of court with the merchants they had screwed over for several thousand dollars most of which Crawford paid. It would be great if they tried to be like we can give you the money or we could inject you with some of this magic. That's more colored water. All right. No, it's magic. John's new father-in-law paid his bail but only gave him two hundred dollars for his fraudulent

debt settlement. John then went to Memphis where Minnie was living. There Sally showed up and told many that John and she were still married and he was a bigamist. Minnie responded by moving to Judsonia, Arkansas with John. So she's like all right. Well, we're going somewhere out. We're leaving. John was then offered to take over a doctor's office who was moving out of state. He did and actually turned a profit. Who would put any faith in him? I don't think anybody cared. They were like, oh, you're a doctor. Yeah, sure. Yeah. I mean, I've been jailed for lying. Yeah. Yeah. I do doctor things. Yeah. He advertised his specialty as quote diseases of women and children. Good. He made a little bit of money

and also joined the Army Reserve Medical Corps. Perfect. You want him on the front lines with the money he made. He was able to pay off Bennett College the money he owed. Okay. This enabled him to move to Kansas City and finally a role in the Eclectic Medical University to finish out the last year remaining of his medical degree. But he bought the degree, right? But now he's going to actually learn. He needs to get it signed. Yeah. At the Kansas City Eclectical Medical University, John studied irritations and enlargements of the prostate gland in elderly men. Oh, yeah. That's my calling. She's a bigam. Old prostates. As a student, Brinkley began dabbling into what was referred to as quote the wild side of

medicine. At one point, he and one of his peers injected patients with colored water claiming that it was a miraculous cure for venereal disease. So he's still doing it. We've been there. He finally graduated on May 7 1915. His diploma from Eclectic allowed him to practice medicine in eight states. Jesus, those poor states. John took a job as the doctor for the Swift and Company plant, patching minor wounds and studying animal physiology. It was at the plant that John learned from workers that the healthiest animal slaughtered was the goat. Oh, dear. He tucked away this knowledge for the future. And I feel like we're going to find out about this knowledge. At this point, many was concerned about the old

bigamy thing. So she pushed John to file to divorce Sally. He did so in September 1915. But he needed to avoid having the court inquired directly to Sally. So he wrote that they had been married in New York City. And he did not know her current place of residence. She was just gone. The court was like, okay, cool. All right. That's good judging. The divorce was finalized on February 21 1916. Four days later, many John were married again in Missouri. Yeah, sure. All right. In 1917, John was called up from the Army reserves to serve in World War One. But he was not sent to the front because he spent two months having a nervous breakdown until he was discharged. That's a cool look. The greatest generation. Oh my

god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh no. No, no, no, no. This isn't happening. It's not happening. Yeah, you're not had. No, no, no, no, no. Oh my god. I want more water. Water. You're done. Water. You're good. You're good. You're good. By Bob. By Bob. In 1980, John and mini move to Milford, Kansas, where he opened up a 16 room clinic. This time, his experience with the locals was positive. He paid good wages to workers, helping to invigorate the local economy and made house calls on patient suffering from the deadly outbreak of the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

One day, a man came into the clinic looking for a fix for being sexually weak. Oh, boy. Jokingly, John said he could always so quote a pair of those buck goat glands into you. No, no, no, no. Because as he had learned from the plant, no, goats were an amorous and active creature, the desperate man begged John for

the operation for the op. It's not an operation. Never not a procedure. Never willing to turn down money. John agreed and performed the operation for a hundred and fifty dollars. Goat testicles were inserted into the man's balls. Well, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, what?

What do you mean? What? So what? So he's having problems performing sexually. So we're going to give him goat nuts. There's an animal that's awesome. I mean, is this is a guy who's just been putting colored water in people for 15 years. So you take the goats nuts out and you put them into the other

dude's nuts. But is that there's no very good procedure? The procedure is not ready to get back into this. The procedure was successful by both men's accounts and the farmer's life was restored. What? So he just threw goat balls. I mean, I guess he just put them in this dude's scrotum.

We'll learn more about that later. I don't know if I want that. Years later, the patient's son told the Kansas City Star that John had offered to pay his father handsomely if he'd go along with the experiment. So John paid the guy money to put the goat balls in him and then and then he spread the word that the goat balls cured. So he fabricated the story of the guy coming in and saying,

please give me goat balls. In actuality, he approached the guy and was like, hey, man, I want to put goat balls in you and I'll give you money to do it. The guy was like, OK. Well, that's quite a different tale. Brickley sees the moment and publicized the operation and it's beneficial results. But did it did it?

The fact that it had beneficial results also bullshit. Yeah. Yeah. OK. Right. You can't just put balls next to balls. What are you talking about? How do you know?

You know the truth is I don't know. Right. Soon patients were lining up to have goat balls put in their balls. All right, Dave. It's been a lot of fun. Is this the end? I think we might be there. When people are lining up to get goat balls put in their balls,

it feels like we're good. Yeah. The goats are like, oh, what's happening? Yeah. Oh, the goats are like, well, this trend isn't good. This is a horrible trend. Ah, my balls. Ah.

Xeno transplantation became all the rage, not just because people wanted help with their virility, but because Brickley was a magnetic man. Within months, John was performing more than 100 rejuvenation operations a week for a fee of $750, which is equal to $100 million. $9,000 today. $9,000.

So much so that he began to have a hard time coming by goats. So patients were required to supply their own goat. Oh, my god. So you had to go shh. That takes away the anonymity of the thing if you're walking down the street with a goat. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Where are you going? I'm going to get his balls. How's your wife? John's reputation increased when a man impregnated his wife after the surgery. With a baby goat. This gave the clinic some credibility. Newspapers wrote up the amazing cure.

John began promoting that goat glands were useful for much more than just fertility. Oh, yeah. They cured up to 27 ailments. Absolutely. You could alleviate dementia, flatulence, emphysema, and even spinal tumors by heading to the clinic in Milford.

That's right. Little, there's nothing that'll confuse a person on dementia less than opening their ball bag and putting goat nuts in there. Just when I thought my connection to reality wasn't working. He started a direct male blitz and hired an advertising agent who came up with the slogan, quote, the ram that am with every lamb.

What? I don't even know what that means. The first two, you need a good third. The ram that am with every lamb. Anyway, that's the advertising guy you hired. Yeah, that guy. You thought the guy putting goat glands into people was ripping someone off.

I mean, it rhymes. If it does one thing, it rhymes. The publicity attracted the attention of the American Medical Association. They sent an agent to investigate the clinic undercover. The agent saw a woman hobbling around the clinic who had been given goat ovaries as a cure for spinal cord tumor.

Goat? Oh. Goveries? Goveries. They put goat ovaries into her ovaries. Goveries. Goveries. From that point on, the AMA kept a close eye on John Brinkley.

Why? In reality, following one of his operations, the body of a patient would typically absorb the goat gonads as foreign matter. The organs were never accepted as part of the body since they were simply placed into the human male testicle sac or the abdomen of the women near the ovaries. The ovary wrinkle is almost more disturbing.

Yeah. Other doctors were also experimenting with gland transplantation, including Serge Voronoff, who had become known for grafting monkey testicles into men. OK. Ha, ha, ha. If it's just the overview. In 1920, Voronoff demonstrated his technique

before several doctors at a hospital in Chicago. John showed up and was barred from entering. No, keep the goat testicle guy out of here. This is not monkey testicle. You want to get these balls. Get your goat testicle bullshit out of here. Let's go monkey ball doctors. But his appearance elevated his profile even more

in the press. He eventually gave his own demonstration at a hospital in Chicago. There, Brinkley transplanted goat testicles into 34 patients, including a judge, an alderman, a society matron, and the chancellor of the University of Chicago Law School, all while the press watched. 34?

34 while the press watched. There will be sandwiches. Just keep them coming. All right, here we go. You guys get a shot of that? There you go. There we go. Here are your goat balls, Your Honor.

And go ahead and slice that goat. I'm here to take pictures. All right, we got a long line of bloody goats here, guys. His profile grew more, and his nut injection business did as well. In 1922, he was invited to come to Los Angeles by the owner of the LA Times, Harry Chandler. He challenged Brinkley to transplant goat testicles

into one of his editors. If he, I wonder if the editor was like, I'm fine. Excuse me, I'm just, I'm good. I'm actually just pretty, you over there. Or did he know, or was he like, the editor was like, I can't get hard. I'm an in bed reporter. Yeah, I can't.

Like, how did he know? Yeah. I mean, the editor couldn't. Jim, you can't get your dick hard. Come over here. Let's do a story on it. If the operation was a success, he would make John Brinkley quote the most famous surgery

in America. If it was not a success, then Chandler said John should consider himself damned. OK. So California didn't recognize Brinkley's license to practice medicine from the Eclectical Medical University, but Chandler pulled some strings and got him a 30 day permit.

Hey, there we go, right? You can just be a doctor for 30 days in some states. Hey, 30 day doctor. There we go, there's a reality show. The operation was considered a success, and John got the accolades from the LA Times. While he was in Los Angeles, the Times was installing KHJ, the city's first radio station.

John was very impressed with the new phenomenon. The LA trip turned out to be incredibly profitable. The Los Angeles record carried an advertisement of William Stitsworth and his son, Billy, who was the first goat gland baby. They were appearing in a film. Well, LA hasn't changed, first of all. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.

You got to be nervous when someone's pregnant with your baby and you have goat balls. Yeah, fuck yeah. I mean, a little bit of you has to be like, oh, god, don't have a tail. It's just going to have one horn. Daddy, I love you. A large crowd turned out to see the film

and Brinkley's profile increased. while in LA, John also operated on several Hollywood stars, earning him a profit of $40,000. Wow. There was such a demand for services that some local businessmen offered to establish a hospital in Sanitarium and in Sonata. They went as far as to Lisa Hotel and signed a contract

with a local rancher to supply goats. I mean, I mean, a fucking hotel and a rancher? Ready to go. All set up. Good to go. This is a lot. But the California Medical Board denied his application for a permanent license to practice medicine,

having found his resume, quote, riddled with lies and discrepancies. So they read it. Yeah. The trip to California greatly increased business at the clinic. On the eve of the Great Depression, John was on his way to unimaginable wealth.

He bought a Stutz Bearcat car, a symbol of wealth at the time. And his wife, Minnie, got her first fur coat. They took the test. Made of goat. Made of goat fur. Goat fur. For testicle fur. Well, yeah.

She got her first scrotum coat. Scrote. The coat from the crazy doctor. That's a Dr. Seuss book, right? The scrote, yeah. The scrotes? The scrotes. They took the testicle show on the road

and traveled to the East Coast. In Connecticut, John operated on a man while a Fox motion picture cameraman filmed the procedure as doctors and nurses watched. So let's just say that if at the start of this podcast, you had told me the sentence, John decided to take his testicle show on the road to the East Coast.

Yeah. I would have said, this is going to be a crazy fucking story. Yeah. But it's pretty normal. Oh, no, nothing strange has happened, Dave. Don't get me wrong. Also, now a Fox motion picture,

guy is filming it. Yeah. Right. Which is cool because we all did your testicle sign a waiver. Yes. Business just kept increasing. And John added a 24 by 27 foot addition to the clinic

to provide a special operating room. John was still looking for ways to expand his business. In 1923, he bought the fourth commercial radio station in the US, KKFB in Milford, Kansas. He rapidly built it into a regional presence. Kansas First, Kansas Best, the Sunshine Station from the heart of the nation. KKFB provided weather reports for local farmers,

market reports at Chicago, and gave early exposure to Western stars like Roy Rogers and Gene Autry. KKFB was also the first station to offer college courses on the air. Oh, my God. Well, in a world where you can put fucking goat balls into someone and call yourself a doctor,

you may as well take college by just turning on a radio. You're learning physics. All right. We'll be right back with some more class after these commercials. Lectures were transmitted by telephone from what was then called the Kansas State Agricultural College.

It's just making it up. John added fundamentalist preaching and regular programs offering medical advice. And through arrangements with pharmacies in the region began prescribing medicine over the radio. Oh, my God. Wow, this really is like the beginning of Pfizer. John was very successful in creating a radio personality

that appealed to rural Americans. He had a noticeable, though not heavy southern accent and a mesmerizing voice. When he spoke, rural listeners got a sharp visualization of a skilled and trusted physician. A Kansas politician said that, quote, any number of women have been heard to remark about Brinkley that a man with such a pleasant voice must be a good man.

Yep. I remember hearing that about Bush when I was in Texas. Yeah. He's a good person. He sounds good. He's a nice man. Women appreciated his warning to husbands that their wives also had sexual needs,

a topic that was not really discussed at the time. His image was that of a humble, home-spun country doctor who, quote, only wanted to help my friends out in radio land. But oh, my friends, he would say, you must help me. Remember, your letters asking advice must be accompanied by $2. KKFB attitude John Brinkley's fame and wealth, but his exposure and methods created enemies.

I was shocked that it took so fucking long. It may have been because of his show Medical Question Box. Oh, boy. People wrote to the radio station with ailments. Oh, dear. He's not equipped to handle this. John would read the letters, diagnose the patients without ever seeing them, and prescribe treatments.

Wow. Wow. Over the radio. Oh, my god. The treatments could only be bought at one of his pharmacies in the, quote, Brinkley Pharmaceutical Association. Wow. This is evangelical doctoring.

This is crazy. The Brinkley Pharmaceutical Association was a pact between Brinkley and many pharmacies. He would push treatments, send people to specific pharmacies who would then charge high rates for the treatment and pass on a cut of the profits to Brinkley. Brinkley would sometimes send people to pharmacies to buy treatments, and if the treatments were being sold cheap,

the pharmacy would be removed from the Pharmaceutical Association. Yeah, that's not good. He had, like, secret shoppers go out and be like, hey, man, I got a problem with my thing. He's going to be cheap. Oh, you know what? Just go ahead and take this. You're busted, motherfucker.

You son of a bitch. You're out of the association. You should be fucking people over. Wow. I mean, this could not, I mean, it's so much like today. It really is. The pharmacies would bring in over $14,000 a week, almost $200,000 in today's market.

Jesus Christ. In 1923, the Kansas City Post and the St. Louis Star began publishing a series of articles concentrating on eclectic colleges in Kansas City. Uh-oh. It was revealed that the institutions were selling degrees for $1,000. After getting their licenses, the doctors fanned out

all over the country. Connecticut was one of the worst. The state then revoked the licenses of all eclectic practitioners, including John Brinkley. No. Further investigations led to the arrest of a man named William Sacks. He'd worked...

Yeah, that's an unfortunate name for this episode. Uh-huh. Tell me about Billy Sacks. At least his name wasn't Ball Sacks. Ball-y Sacks. Uh, Sacks had worked at different schools and estimated he had provided certificates and degrees, allowing over 15,000 people to practice medicine with false

credentials. That's a lot of people. That seems like a lot of people. That's a lot of people. He turned state's evidence and provided information to convict others. California and Connecticut conducted investigations and asked John Brinkley to appear.

But he was touring the world, putting goat testicles in people in Europe and Singapore. In the hearings, Sacks revealed he had sold John his medical degree. Okay. California had guided John on the charge of conspiracy to circumvent the medical licensing requirements of the state.

Brinkley described the situation as, quote, a persecution no more justified than the persecution of Christ. Yeah. So he's totally holding on to perspective. Yeah, he's keeping it real. Yeah. I mean, but he also, like, he's just, he's just

put a set of goat balls at a guy and told them to say it worked. Yeah. There had to be some complications at some point of somebody getting horribly sick. Oh, come on. You'd go goat testicle rotting in your testicle? Rotting?

Or you're in your scrotum either way. It's just... When California sent extradition papers to Kansas, the governor of Kansas, who happened to have been a patient of Brinkley's years ago, asked, quote, what do you want him for? California responded, he is not a regular doctor and might injure our people by giving poison

instead of treatments. The governor of Kansas responded, well, Kansas is a long way from California and I don't believe your people are in any danger from him. Well, that's good. That's good thinking. Brinkley was bringing in Kansas a lot of money

from medical tourism. The extradition was denied. John's profitable trips to California were over, however. But he took to the airwaves to crow about his victory over California and the AMA. More people came for his procedures now from all over the globe.

Brinkley spoke for hours on end, each day on the radio, promoting his goat gland treatments, appealing to men and women's desires to be more sexually active. His radio station was so lucrative in combination with his clinic that he gave back to Milford. John paid for a new sewage system and sidewalks,

installed electricity, built a bandstand and apartments for his patients and employees, as well as a new post office to handle all his mail. He was named an admiral in the Kansas Navy and sponsored a hometown baseball team called the Brinkley Goats. Oh, wow. The fact that you're not even, you're loving it.

What are the goat balls? But Brinkley, who was now concerned that the legitimate medical establishment was closing in on him, so he decided the best move was to get a foreign medical degree. Yeah, those are good. He and his wife set sail for Europe. He went to Dublin,

but the Mayo brothers were well established there and eclectic doctors were not wanted. Yeah, I would think not. Next, he went to London, only to discover England did not recognize degrees of eclectics, homeopaths and osteopaths. Checking in on Scotland, he learned Glasgow had adopted the same rule.

So off he went to Italy. He found Italy to also be difficult until he came across the University of Pavia. John hinted he would like to donate money to the school and then jumped into a strenuous 19 days of exams after which he was given a medical degree.

But those two and a half weeks. Oh, a total nightmare. Saturday and Sunday off. I mean, obviously. He returned to Italy a few months later, took more exams and received a license to practice. Good. Brinkley then wrote the AMA,

which had expelled him from the membership, demanding them to list him for a medical degree from Pavia instead of Kansas' eclectic school. The AMA then contacted Pavia and told the University where Brinkley had studied and asked the school to rescind his degree.

Yeah. But the school dragged its feet. So the AMA went straight to Benito Mussolini. Holy shit. And Brinkley's Italian medical degree was rescinded. Holy shit. Don't fuck with the AMA. No.

Yes. Benito, it's us. You want to get rid of this guy? Yes, he said that. But while John was in Europe, he continued his work and added a refinement to his goat testicle procedure. What?

Refine it. This is like... It's not good. No, it's not. He said he could improve the results of his treatment by adding a feeder nerve and a blood vessel at the testicles. No fucking way.

That's when we're going to be getting goat babies. Gavies. I mean, if he's trying to attach the ball to the nerve? Yeah, he's attaching a feeder. I guess he takes the feeder nerve and blood vessels out of the goat. He's taken three weeks of doctor...

Like, he's been in college for medicine for about three weeks. He's taken more stuff out of goats and putting it into the nuts, the dudes. Just before he was kind of just like, fuck it, I'll put him in there, hope this guy's okay. Now he's like, it's time to get it involved in your system. Yeah, now he's got a plan.

Meanwhile, the New York Evening Journal and other newspapers printed Brinkley's planted story about his degree from Pavia. Patients flooded to the clinic. On weekends, the streets of Milford were packed with people arriving for operations. Publicity was his main weapon. On one occasion, he performed the operation

on a 71-year-old man, Chancellor J.J. Tobias of Chicago, who was then caught in a photo clicking his heels while jumping. The press ran the photo nationally as proof of Brinkley's abilities. Old man fucking again. He jumped up and clicked his heels. At the time was really how you showed elation, though.

Oh my god. Yee-hee! I'm a going fucking! Brinkley kept an extensive mailing list who he sent endless letters about the clinic's success. He sent out a pamphlet called PAW and MAW, which he dedicated

to, quote, the Prostate Man. It ended up being a great solicitor for elderly men with sex issues, also known as elderly men. The Kent City Star who owned a court competing radio station in town published a series of articles accusing Brinkley of fraud

and the newly formed Federal Radio Commission began looking into his broadcasting practices. Uh-oh. They're probably not going to find good things. No, it'll be fine. It was revealed that at the clinic he was prone to perform surgery while drunk. Oh, Jesus!

He can't even do his bullshit sober. And use dirty equipment. Oh my god. Yeah, these have been in somebody else's balls. Oh, a goat. Oh, right. No, I dipped these in a goat and then another dude and then another goat and then another dude, but it's fine. Anyway, your turn. They were all good. Here we go.

Whoops. I mean. I'm not a doctor. Many patients who had not been cured were interviewed giving the impression Brinkley was just giving people shots of vitamins. It was revealed by 1930 he signed over 42 death certificates for transplants gone bad.

Oh. That means he put he put, I assume dirty dirtiness into people's nuts. Yeah, or oh, God. Jesus Christ. Well, nut infections is a tough thing to shake.

It's going to be a great movie on HBO, though. The the nut infections. Nearly everyone of nearly everyone of the 42 who died were not sick when they arrived at the clinic.

Shocked to hear that. No one knows how many patients became ill or died in the many other places Brinkley performed his operations. The Kansas Medical Board held a formal hearing to decide whether Brinkley's medical license should be revoked. It was. Yes. The board stated that Brinkley quote has performed an organized

charlatanism quite beyond the invention of the Humble Mountbank. Jesus. No idea what that means. It doesn't. I mean, it doesn't matter because it really is nice to just hear them be like, he's full of shit and you're full of weird

balls everybody. So it's kind of closed and he decided to go to politics as a way to fight back. Jesus. He ran for governor of Kansas. If he were to win the governorship, he would be able to put whoever he wanted on the medical board, which would allow him to get his medical license back.

I mean, the obsession to put goat balls in people still. He kicked off his campaign just three days after losing his license, running on a vindication ticket. Oh, sure. He used his radio station as the main weapon in his campaign. He campaigned on a strange

form of public works like a state lake in every county. And also more goats. We really need to get the goat numbers up. Everybody gets nine goats and there'll be a lake in every town. Alrighty. Make sure to get out there and go. He also wanted to lower taxes,

give kids free textbooks and create old age pensions. He hired a plane to fly him impressively to his rallies. He was the master of the grand stunt when a newspaper reporter ran a negative article about his lack of qualifications to run the state. He sent the

reporter a goat. Just a ballless goat. That's his way of saying nut up. But Brinkley had made a crucial error. He filed too late to get on the ballot, so he was a write in candidate. The Kansas Attorney General had been the one who

prosecuted Brinkley before the medical board, so he made it as difficult as possible for John to win. He announced the rules for writing candidates had changed and the only way one could vote for Brinkley was to write J.R. Brinkley on the ballot. Oh, no. Brinkley ended up with 30%

of the vote. It was estimated that up to 50,000 ballots were disqualified by the strict writing rules and Brinkley would have won the governorship if the rules had not been changed. Oh, my God. Six months later, his misfortune increased. The Federal Radio Commission refused to renew his station's

broadcasting license finding that Brinkley's broadcasts were mostly advertising that he broadcast obscene material and that his medical question box series was, quote, contrary to public interest. Yeah. He sued the commission, but the courts upheld it and the case

Brinkley versus the FRC became a landmark case in broadcast law. Well, it's interesting to know what Brinkley's history was on that. He ran for governor in 1932 and 1934, but was defeated again by a future presidential candidate, Alf Landon.

It was just such a layup to beat him at this point. You're like, hey, it doesn't matter what I'm going to do. But people fucking loved him. Well, I mean, yeah, we are Americans. No one was like, the goat thing doesn't work. No, people are like, he's a good man. He's good. He's helping

people with the testicles. He sees heart is in the right place, even though those balls are in the wrong spot. So Brinkley sold the radio station to an insurance company for 90,000 and decided his fortunes lay just across the border in Mexico. Oh, yes, of course.

He moved to Del Rio, Texas, and built the radio station XERA, ZARA, just across the Mexican border out of the reach of US regulators licensed for 300,000 Watts by the Mexican government. Zara often turned up its power to

500,000 and sometimes a million Watts. The world's most powerful broadcast station was sending a signal to US into Canada and occasionally over the North Pole into Russia. Holy shit. The signal was so strong it made Bed Springs home and it could be picked up

by car headlights. Jesus. John R. Brinkley no longer had a regional audience. He had a national audience not only for his clinics and pharmaceuticals, but for the entertainment he provided. Well, well done. This is where he became the granddaddy

of country music. What the fuck? What the fuck? Enough. Zara's contributions to the early country music were huge. The Carter family performed for three years on Texas radio rocketing them to national fame. Tennessee Ernie Ford,

Roy Rogers, Patsy Montana, Gene Autry, Little Jimmy Dickens, Red Foley, Shelley Lee Alley, Jimmy Rogers, and Cowboy Slim Reinhardt all had appearances on Brinkley's radio station. Whalen Jennings and Johnny Cash remember listening to the border radio

broadcasts. Performers who played in school houses, churches, and on local radio stations now had their first outlet that broadcast them all across the United States, some of Canada, and occasionally other international markets. A regional form of music became nationally known except it encraved,

but Brinkley didn't care that he was spurning the growth of an entire new genre of music. He cared that Roots musicians caused the most fan mail and that they helped move the most merchandise. Audiences heard on-air pitchmen selling everything

from crazy water crystals to baby chicks to tomato plants to last supper tablecloths to autograph pictures of Jesus. Who should I make this out to? You want me to sound like Jesus or the son of God? Here we go. Oh, you want me to sound like killed by Jews?

I died for your sins. What can I do? Repent your main man. Oh, Jesus Christ. Catch you later, girl. Brinkley added to his medical fortune. He used Zara to urge patients to visit his new clinic and buy a variety of gimmicks including

the vials of colored water at a price of six for a hundred. Brinkley sold Peruna to knock out the torture of colds and Color Buck which scientifically impart the color and charm to gray hair.

Okay, sure. Gotta just put goat balls in someone's head. Now he was rarely implanting real goat glands but substituted what he described as commercial glandular preparations. What a motherfucker. He won't even put real goat balls in anymore.

I mean, at least at one point there was like there was some... there was something he could maybe believe in a little bit. There's goat balls. No, he's like putting marbles in people. Yeah, he's putting two marbles in.

He also performed numerous prostate operations in vasectomies. He personalized the vasectomies with a squirt of murkyochrome which colored the urine. He did that... To make it, to make people be like wow, it's working.

Hey, if it's blue tomorrow, you're good. Yeah, if you piss blue then you're not having any more babies. He offered three levels of prostate softening. Ranging from the $100 regimen for poor people to the full works for $1,000. It's like a car wash.

It's... The works. It is estimated that he earned $12 million annually between 1933 and 1938. Holy shit. Annually? Annually. In the summer, he avoided the Del Rio heat

by sailing his 372 foot yachts while on board he dressed as an admiral and carried a sword. I think I'm starting to like him. The Brinkley mansion on the Rio Grande river had a large fountain and a neon sign of his name.

Cool. However, his conspicuous display of wealth, a lavish mansion, a dozen Cadillacs, private planes, yachts, and exotic animals got the attention of his adversaries and competitors. A cut rate competitor named

James Middleton opened a clinic in Del Rio. Things escalated quickly and soon the two doctors were using rival gangs of thugs to hook prospective patients as they arrived at the train station. They get off the train and they're like, hey, you drive? Then things got ugly.

Soon men arriving in town who did not want vasectomies were being carried to Middlebrow or Brinkley for operations. What? Did you get off the train and then you just get your tubes died? They like Shanghai vasectomies. Yeah.

Excuse me, where are we going, driver? Don't worry about it, man. If you people knew it worked. It's all good. I'm in town to see my daughter. Well, you ain't gonna have no more daughters. No more daughters. Come on, get in here.

Brinkley reached out to city leaders for help to stop Middlebrow explaining how much business and property it brought to the area. The city leaders gave him the cold shoulder so Brinkley up and took his clinic to Little Rock. Brinkley's wealth seriously upset

Dr. Morris Fishbine, a member of the board of the AMA who would eventually become the editor of the Journal of American Medicine. Brinkley was elected and did not like those during the profession of medicine. He set out to completely ruin John Brinkley. He was publishing a medical journal

at the time called Hygia. Two separate issues titled Modern Medical Charlatans focused on John Brinkley. He described Brinkley as a complete quack and he described Brinkley's career as quote, filth and falsehood.

Good. Brinkley then sued Fishbine and the AMA for libel and $250,000 in damages. Pardon me, but the ball's on this guy. Yeah. Brinkley drove to the first day of the trial

in a fire red Cadillac that has name stenciled all of the exterior. That's cool. Nice. That's a good look. Super into me. At night Brinkley would take to the airwaves and broadcast commentary. The defense produced a deposition

of Brinkley's old partner Crawford who is now serving time in Oklahoma for armed robbery. Well, okay. The tale of two men. Crawford broke down their fraudulent ways of the past for the court. When Brinkley testified he appeared disinterested as he

fidgeted with a gold toothpick in his mouth. Hmm. What a fucking monster. I've got caviar between my teeth. I can't believe you're talking to me little person. Hmm. After two days the cross examination came down

to one important question about goat testicles. For 20 years Brinkley had claimed that he had carefully grafted goat testicles into his human's patients. But Brinkley admitted on the stand that he had simply slit the human testicle open, popped in a goat testicle

and then sewed up the incision. What? I didn't realize that. Yeah. Oh my god. I just got really upsetting. Oh, the pain. Oh god, the pain. Oh my god. A ball, a ball surgeon.

A ball in your ball. A ball cut open and then another ball put in your ball forever. Oh. It's fucking monstrous. It's monstrous. I mean...

I... Oh. Oh my god. Jail for life, right? Oh god. With that admission the case... With that admission the case died

after four hours of deliberation that Johnny exonerated Fishbine and the AMA. John Brinkley's reputation was in tatters. Ugh. He was labeled a quack, legally. Ugh. The decision prompted 3 million

Americans Brinkley to top it off the move to Little Rock had gone horribly. He was forced to lay off much of the staff and reduce the salaries of those who stayed. The clinic was in dire straits and he could not afford to return to Del Rio. And the IRS was now investigating him for non-payment.

So... He did what any man would do. He moved to Kansas City and opened an aircraft school. Okay, okay. Okay. Can he not just take a hint?

Stop spreading your message. Okay, so you just go ahead and put the testicle in the aircraft. Excuse me? I mean, it's a pilot. The pilot. Get that goat in here. What? Cut her open.

I mean, cut the... He claimed that mechanics who enrolled could not be drafted to improve enrollment. Which was completely false. Should have been true. If you signed up for the school, you avoid the draft. Perfect. Also, you want to fuck more?

That's... Even with such guarantees, the school went nowhere. Then the U.S. and Mexico reached an agreement on allocating radio bandwidth and shut down Zara. Okay. By that time, so many other border stations had popped up

mimicking Brinkley's station. Brinkley was forced to file for bankruptcy in 1941. Wow. How the mighty of Baldwin. Three months later, he offered his creditors six horses, 90 heads of cattle,

40 goats, and other questionable assets. Well, I have the 40 ducks. I know I owe you two million dollars, but... Would you like some ducks? Wouldn't you rather 40 goats without balls? How about 40 ball-less goats?

Well, it's a yacht. It feels like I should keep the yacht, and you could just have these cows. In July, the Mexican government seized his radio station on the grounds that Brinkley had broadcast programs sympathetic to the Nazis. Ah, finally.

Indeed, Brinkley had come to admire Hitler and even decorated the tiles around his pool with swastikas. Hey, you know, sometimes you make weird choices. Here's something I'm not going to regret. All right, so we're just going to have a pretty limited guest list. That's our deal.

In August, after three heart attacks, he had a leg amputated due to a blood clot while in Kansas City. She just put a horse hoof on it. While he was... Hey, can you put a goat testicle in my leg?

Hey, I want my leg back. Will you put a goat penis in me? When he was operating at the hospital, he was served with a 15-count male fraud indictment. Jesus. He died penniless in his sleep in San Antonio of heart failure before he saw trial.

A former patient who wished to remain anonymous wrote to a local paper that, quote, I knew he was bilking me the whole time, but I liked him anyway. That's terrible. Buried in Memphis, Brinkley left behind three daughters by his first wife, Sally, and one son by his second wife, Minnie Jones.

Brinkley is still visible to passing motorists in a stone fence facing North Carolina Route 107. Holy shit. Well, that... that's something. Oh, wow. Jesus Christ.

I mean, Jesus. How did that happen? There have to be rules. How did that happen? You just... How did that happen? They just get to say whatever they wanted. How does it happen for a long period of time?

How does he become famous? But who was like... Then he goes to Hollywood and everyone's like, I'll do it. It sounds great. Oh, lovely. Put that in my testicle. Yeah, we'd love trends. Trends that involve testicles

should not be trends. I mean, what the actual fuck? That's just so... He's not a doctor and he's opening testicles and putting other animals testicles in the testicles and then letting people leave

and then people are going out and trying to fuck. Yeah. Whoo! He's a good... One thing we've definitely learned from the dollop is that all doctors were monsters. Monsters?

And probably still are. There's some good ones, but Jesus Christ. Yeah. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Shit. Fuck.

All right. Anyway, buy tickets to my one-man show in Melbourne and get tickets at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival site. Oh, boy. We'll be back with more dollop next week. Oh, boy. Sorry.