Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 466 - Acres of Skin: Inside the Terrordome

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

Philadelphia's Holmesburg prison, before it was officially shut down in 1995, had been a house of horrors for much of its history. In addition to being grossly overcrowded and its prisoners being subjected to sometimes lethal abuse by prison officials... for over two decades - from 1951 to 1974, Dr. Albert Kligman performed wildly unethical medical experiments on its prisoners. Inmates were burned, infected with incurable diseases, exposed to radiation, carcinogens, and more without their informed consent. These atrocities and more earned the prison the nickname of The Terrordome.Merch and more: www.badmagicproductions.com Timesuck Discord! https://discord.gg/tqzH89vWant to join the Cult of the Curious PrivateFacebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" to locate whatever happens to be our most current page :)For all merch-related questions/problems: [e-mail] (copy and paste)Please rate and subscribe on Apple Podcasts and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcastWanna become a Space Lizard? Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcast.Sign up through Patreon, and for $5 a month, you get access to the entire Secret Suck catalog (295 episodes) PLUS the entire catalog of Timesuck, AD FREE. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch.

Picture this. It's 1955. President Eisenhower is in office. Elvis has just made his debut on TV. The U.S. military is starting to deploy advisors to Vietnam. Rosa Parks gets arrested for refusing to move to the back of the bus in Montgomery, Alabama. And you? You're stuck in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, locked up in Homesburg Prison. And your life at Homesburg is hell on earth. The prison which will soon come to be known as the Terror Dome was originally built to house approximately 600 inmates and is horrifically overcrowded with well over double that amount. About 1500 inmates call the Terror Dome home and 75% of them haven't even been convicted

yet. They're just awaiting trials. And you're one of those men. And somehow you need to make enough money to pay your bail and await trial at home instead of in this godforsaken shithole. You also need money so you can buy all the basic necessities you've been denied like socks, underwear, a toothbrush, a toothpaste at the commissary. Additionally, it would be fantastic if you had enough cash to keep the big guys at the prison, the ones

who've been there the longest, the ones who are the strongest and are now the least human in many ways, from brutally sexually assaulting you in the shower. Then one day an old muscular skinny white dude in an even whiter coat, some kind of doctor, offers you five bucks to let him rub some lotion on your back for some kind of experiment he's conducting. Sounds simple enough, but within days your skin is bubbling and blistering and flaking off in chunks. The doctor? He doesn't flinch at this troubling development. In fact, he calls it progress. He doesn't tell you what's in the lotion, but he does stay true to his word and you get five bucks. And then the next week

he comes back with a new offer. He'll pay you 50 bucks to sit in a so-called temperature chamber for six hours. Light work. But after you get out, he'll need a portion of your sweat gland to be cut out of one of your armpits for some observation. 50 bucks for six hours of your time and a small piece of your flesh. As gruesome as it sounds, you figure it beats the hell out of working as a janitor in one of the cell blocks, which only pays 25 cents a day. So you agree and you make comparatively a good bit of money. Pretty soon, you're volunteering for more experiments, making more money, getting closer and closer to paying off your bail,

until one day you find yourself laying down in the exam table and that same doctor is towering over you, injecting your dick with herpes. Not to treat it, literally just to watch what happens. But you don't know that. You were never told you were intentionally being given an STI. You have no idea it's herpes in that syringe. All you know is what the doctor tells you and what he tells you is intentionally vague. You're in good hands. Don't worry about it.

This is not some dystopian sci-fi horror story. This really happened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania not that long ago and it happened for over two decades. Welcome to the Terror Dome, Homesburg prison, the institution that from 1951 to 1975 allowed a renowned dermatologist from the University of Pennsylvania to conduct unethical, non-consensual, and deeply disturbing experiments on inmates in exchange for small amounts of cash. Yes, we're back to the realm of unethical medical experimentation in the United States, shit that happened recently in the 20th century. The dermatologist in question is Dr. Albert Kligman, a charming, brilliant, arrogant,

duplicitous, ego maniacal researcher who treated prison inmates like they were nothing more than lab rats. Over the course of 23 years, Dr. Kligman tested everything from bar soap and baby shampoo to STIs to radioactive isotopes and psychotropic incapacitation chemicals on inmates. To perform such experiments, Dr. Kligman received round after round of funding from various drug and compound manufacturers like Johnson & Johnson and Dow Chemicals, as well as the US Army. Today we're getting into the nitty-gritty of the extremely grotesque human experiments conducted at Homesburg Prison and the horrific and highly successful career of Dr. Albert Kligman, a man who to this day is praised as a trailblazing genius by many members of the medical community. So strap on those boots, stay tuned to find out how Homesburg Prison became the Terror Dome.

All that and more in today's historical dark chapter in American science and skincare's history. Yet another reminder not to forget the past so we can try our fucking best never to repeat an addition of Time Suck. This is Michael McDonald and you're listening to Time Suck. You're listening to Time Suck. Happy Monday and welcome or welcome back to the Cult of the Curious. I'm Dan Cummins, the Succinator 5000. The horse of the Kled Monster. Orgasm proponent, but maybe not orgasmic meditation proponent, and you are listening to Time Suck. Hail Nimrod, hail Lucifina, praise be to good boy Bojangles and glory be to Triple M, who

beat the shit out of me for not paying tribute to the gods of the suck last week. I can barely move, but I must record, for if I do not, another another beating is coming and before he hits me again Let's get started Do you have acne? Hey, hey, I'm talking to you, Captain Whitehead. Don't look around puss face. You walking pimple waiting to be popped Do you take prescription medication for acne? Is the medication you take perhaps a tretinoin or a Vita? Well, then you are complicit in human experimentation, you piece of shit.

That's probably why you got acne in the first place. God's punishment for you being so completely morally bankrupt and souls and shitty. JK, you're not a shitty person. I don't think, probably not. I don't know you, you know? So you might be, you might be a demon disguised as a human. You might be depravity personified and someone I'd enjoy pushing off a cliff, but probably not. But anyway, that part about human experimentation, that's actually legit.

Treaded No One was discovered by Albert King-Kligman while conducting human experiments on unwitting inmates at Homesburg Prison in 1962. To this day, it remains the single most popular treatment for acne in the world. For over two decades, Kligman ran a private research lab at a Homesburg Prison in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was a celebrated dermatologist. He turned a crumbling Philadelphia prison into his own private science dungeon. The inmates he experimented on, of which there were hundreds and hundreds or thousands. We actually don't know the exact amount. We were never told the exact amount. And they were never told what was being injected, smeared, or even sewn into their skin. They were just told it was safe. They were told that even if it definitely for sure was not safe,

that it was safe. They were handed a few bucks and locked back into their cells. Some of these men had their skin sliced open that slit was then stuffed with gauze that had been saturated in some kind of mystery substance and then stitched back up. Some had their fingernails ripped off one by one with no anesthetic for five bucks a nail. Others had baby shampoo poured directly into their eyes over and over and over for hours and they weren't allowed to rinse their eyes out. Some had ringworm rubbed directly into their scalp. Some were given mind-altering military-grade chemical agents and locked in a padded cell. Others had dioxin, a highly toxic, very carcinogenic chemical compound used in Agent Orange,

rubbed on their foreheads, feet, and their arms twice a day for a full six months in heavy amounts. To share the insane story of how all this came to be and went down, we're going to spend almost all of today's episode in the timeline. We'll start with the construction of the prison in 1896, making our way up to the birth of Albert Kligman in 1916, his initial unauthorized human experiments in the early 1950s, the times he used radioactive material on prisoners in the 1960s, and when his research program was finally shut down in 1975. And we'll finish today's timeline around the time of Kligman's death in 2010. A little more recent than actually.

Along the way, I'm also going to throw in a few examples of some other lesser known human experiments happening around America at the time, including one where a fucking psychopath made his wife eat a neat concoction of blood, shit, and piss samples he had taken from the diseased and dying. Oh yeah. Miles, you going to weigh in on that or not, buddy? I fucking can't make it. There we go.

So I fucking can't make it. Yeah, that's the outrage I wanted. All right, I think we're all set up and ready to go. Are you fucking kidding me? Yeah, that's the outrage I wanted. Alright, I think we're all set up and ready to go. Let's dive in. Shrap on those boots, soldier. We're marching down a time suck timeline. Homesburg Prison was first built in 1896 to the cost of $1.4 million equivalent to around $50 or $60 million today. But it actually probably cost a whole lot more than that to build a prison of the same

size now due to stricter building codes, better union wages for laborers, modern tech, safety compliance considerations, etc. Sprawling across 17 acres, the facility was originally built to alleviate overcrowding at the Philadelphia County Prison, which was both overrun with convicted prisoners and understaffed. Rough combo. Like most American prisons being built at the time, Homesburg had a radial design with a central building for wardens and administration in the middle, and then 10 cell blocks radiating

outwards like spokes on a wheel. The blocks contained either 68, 74, or 78 cells, each of which were 6 feet wide and 8 feet long, a whole whopping 48 square feet, which is still the average size of a prison cell today. When construction of the prison was finally complete, the general public responded poorly to its design. They tended to find it cruel. And after visiting the

prison himself one newspaper reporter wrote that the entire facility sends a clear message of, abandon hope all ye who enter here. Another reporter described the new prison saying, not a window can be seen and a spectator gathered the impression that light too is denied the unfortunate who are condemned to spend years of seclusion within these abhorrent limits. Jumping ahead a decade we get a glimpse of the kinds of experiments that will later make this prison infamous. Experiments being conducted by another American doctor on the incarcerated overseas. On November 16th 1906 while working abroad in Manila in the Philippines American physician Dr. Richard Strong. Oh, yeah, Dr. Dick Strong

Is there a more masculine name in the history of names? Can we all hope his middle name was Hard And? He injected 24 inmates at Billabid Prison with the brown viscous liquid. The prisoners were not told what was in the syringes Nor were they asked for their consent and if a refused the injection, a guard would step in to help persuade him to participate. You know, as in the guard would beat him half to death. Within days, 13 of these 24 human test subjects were dead. Their cause of death? The bubonic plague. Dr. Dick Harden Strong gave a dozen humans the fucking plague. When a half-assed investigation into their deaths was opened by the government of Manila, Dr. Dick Harden Strong gave a dozen humans the fucking plague. When a half-assed investigation into their deaths was opened by the government of Manila

or the Philippines, Dr. Strong lied his weasel ass off and said that he had intended to inject the inmates with a cholera vaccine he was working on to test its effectiveness. But you know, somehow the tube of his vaccine, you know, it got mixed up with a tube of bubonic plague he just happened to have lying around. Whoops! You know, what do you do? Accidents happen, right? Oh, where'd I set that tube of plague?

Next to the tube of battery acid? No. Maybe next to the tube of rat poison. Is it near the syringes I keep loaded up with bleach? I gotta get this shit organized one day. Unsure of what to do with the case, the government in the Philippines deferred to the US Attorney General to decide Dr. Strong's fate. Without ever opening an American-led investigation into the episode, the US official found Dr. Strong innocent of any criminal negligence or wrongdoing. Just got away with some serial killing.

Though it was never been officially confirmed, based on Dr. Strong's testimony and his superior's private letters written to a friend about the physician's strange behavior and conduct, it is widely strongly assumed that Dr. Strong infected the men with the bubonic plague on purpose. I mean, obviously he did. He had for many years been outspoken about his theory that the human body could withstand the same amount of plague organisms as a guinea pig and then he longed to test his theory and That is a fucking weird thing to be fixated on crazy thing to keep bringing up

Yeah, sure mark. No, I know I'd love a cheeseburger. Thank you. I think for inviting me to the barbecue serious though a Person could at least handle as much plague as a guinea pig, right? I mean, we're so much bigger than getting pigs We have to be able to handle at least that same amount, if not more, plague. I mean, god damn it. I got to test this one day. I have to, Mark.

It's all I think about. It keeps me up at night. Fuck. Six years later, after being appointed head professor of tropical medicine at Harvard University, Dr. Dick Hardenstrang conducted another experiment, this time using inmates at an unnamed American prison. While he will later say he intended to just study how long it took gasoline to evaporate once it was poured onto a human body, what he actually did was set prisoners on fire in their

cells, studying how long it takes somebody to burn to death. 346 prisoners were accidentally burned alive. On average it took 83 seconds for them to die 25 seconds longer than dr. Dick Harden strong had theorized and I'm kidding that's too fucked up and ridiculous even for him No, he was trying to test the effects and treatment of berry berry though quote a deficiency disease Characterized by paralysis mental disturbance and heart failure this guy loved to make people sick Three inmates intensely deprived of nutrients. Berry berry is caused by a B1 vitamin deficiency. They died during the experiments. Those that survived they were rewarded with quote cigars and cigarettes. That's cool. Sorry about almost killing you needlessly when we intentionally let you develop a lethal deficiency. I hope this

carton of cigarettes makes this you know even as even as shit. I mean, are we good? Sorry, it's hard to hear you now that you're too weak to speak clearly. Are we good? Please try and speak. Don't just moan. Ride around in pain and croak. The following year, 1907, during a wave of government crackdowns on food manufacturing, the U.S. Department of Agriculture put a hold on molasses production due to the high percentage of sulfuric acidant. Because of the time the Louisiana State economy was largely dependent on molasses production, they

were anxious to show everyone that it's really not that bad for you. I mean, come on! It's sugar! And we all know that eating lots and lots of very nutritious, pure sugar is very good for you. The more you eat, the better you feel. So in August of that year, the Louisiana State Board of Health conducted an experiment to prove their theory. This is also so fucked up. For five whole weeks a dozen black prisoners from the state prison were literally fed nothing but molasses. Like only that dark liquid byproduct of making sugar. That's like the equivalent of literally only eating fake maple syrup for over a month. Can you fucking imagine how you'd feel?

The results of the experiments were then published across the country in cheerful sugar-coated articles. Pun intended and despised. Here is one of those articles from the Southern Sentinel titled, Diet Experiment a Great Success. That wording reminds me of Sacha Baron Cohen's Borat character. Great success! Much sugar, yum yum, who need teeth when you have molasses? Great success! They wrote, and apologizes for the outdated cringy language, if a gain of 14 pounds in weight is a sign of good nourishment, then Louisiana molasses meets every

requirement of the term. This much was proven by the pure food experiments that have just been concluded at the House of Detention. Twelve Negroes selected from the prisoners held at the parish prison were used for the experiment. They were taken to the House of Detention where they were confined and kept under a strict guard and confined to a molasses diet. Dr. Bluen of the Louisiana Experimental Station conducted the experiment and considers it a genuine success now that the blacks have passed more than the necessary period and have shown such wonderful physical condition. All of the prisoners fared well and one of them gained 14 pounds. Their health was splendid and Professor Bluen remarked to Sheriff Long and

Captain Meredith of the parish prison that the experiment was a great success Better results could not be hoped for and when the world at large is informed It will be a bloom to the sugar industry of the state Get the fuck out here 14 pound weight gain in five weeks often nothing but a byproduct of sugar making No fucking way that was healthy weight. Did that poor bastard gain diabetes by the end of the five weeks as well? No fucking way that was healthy weight. Did that poor bastard gain diabetes by the end of the five weeks as well? Prior to the commencement of the experiment one local newspaper assured the readers that quote There is thought to be no danger of the diets killing the inmates and they do not object to submitting themselves to the test

Because it would not do any good if they did I feel like you can hear that good old boy's drawl in those final words Would not do any good if they did. We just whip real good. While most of the population either didn't know about or didn't care about such prison experiments like the molasses test in Louisiana or the plague test in Manila, there were a few that criticized the exploitation of prisoners and a response to that criticism one Harvard professor and scientist wrote that there seems to be a quote Most curious misconception that the aim of science is for the cure of disease of saving human life Quite the contrary the aim of science is the advancement of human knowledge at any sacrifice of human life

If cats and guinea pigs could be put to any higher use than to advance science. We do not know what it is Similarly, we do not know of any higher use we can put man to. That guy's fucking scary. Fuck you unnamed professor. Would you still hold that belief if it was your children, your parents, your spouse, yourself? You fucking pile of shit. Another infamous human experiment conducted in the first few decades of the 20th century were the or was the or worthy. Palagra. Clifford where are you? Anybody science guy? Palagra tests carried out at Rankin State Prison in Mississippi. Palagra is a disease characterized by the four D's of diarrhea, dermatitis, dementia, and death. Sounds very fun.

Additional symptoms include scaly hyperpigmented plaque covering the face Neck arms and legs mucus filled sores on the lips tongue roof of the mouth inside of the cheeks Red swollen tongue muscle twitches tremors overall confusion and lack of coordination I mean, I mean very pleasant. I don't I don't know what the problem is here What a blessing that must be to have that. I hope I get it. I hope we all get it. It would be so fun to rebrand, right? Go from the cult of the curious to the cult of pellagra. Pellagra, we now know, is a form of malnutrition caused by deficiency of vitamin B3, a.k.a. niacin.

Because B3 is crucial to proper cell function of the whole body. Without it the whole body essentially deteriorates. And I mean that's got to feel good just to have your whole body deteriorate. God what a treat. Back then most people thought the disease was infectious and that it could be caused by things like poor sanitation or spoiled corn randomly. Gotta watch out for that spoiled corn it'll deteriorate your entire body. Which it kind of will actually. Scientist Dr. Joseph Goldberger disagreed though. He was certain that pellagra was not something that could be transmitted from one person to another because at every institution he had visited including orphanages, psych wards,

hospitals and prisons where there were high rates of the disease none of the people attending the patients ever contracted it themselves. Instead Goldberger believed the cause of the disease to be the typical poor and monotonous diets of most southerners and he wasn't wrong. To prove this he asked the governor of Mississippi for access to prisoners at Rankin State Farm in Penn... oh wait let me... oh... Penitentiary, nailed it, one of the few prisons in the south with no reported cases of pellagra. Apparently the cooks there were actually trying to keep the inmates at least somewhat healthy. His plan was to take a select group of healthy white inmates, isolate them in clean cells to eliminate all chance of infection, then feed them a more typical southern diet to

see if they'd develop pellagra. The governor agreed and the experiment commenced. At first the inmates chosen were ecstatic. In exchange for their participation in the experiment, each of them were to receive a full pardon from the governor plus five dollars and a new suit. On top of that, in comparison to prison food, maintaining a steady diet solely comprised of corn grits, pork fat grits, gravy, and syrup didn't seem all that bad. I mean it does sound better than only eating molasses. However, after just two months in the experiment, which was scheduled to take half a year, every single one of the 11 human subjects were literally begging to be released.

Six of them had already developed full-blown pellagra, complete with constant diarrhea, mucus mouth, dizziness, excruciating headaches, skin plaque on their scalps, faces, and legs. Turns out a balanced diet, or at the very least a multivitamin, actually pretty fucking important. The other five had not fared much better. They all reported severe body and muscle aches, itchy skin, extremely lethargic, you know they're extremely lethargic, I think it's lethargy, and debilitating dizziness. They begged to be freed from the experiment but Goldberger refused. They had volunteered to be

human subjects and now they were not allowed to back out no matter the physical pain. One prisoner began asking on a daily basis to be shot in the head with a bullet rather than be forced to continue. Others said they would rather serve a life sentence in prison than stay in this experiment any longer. By the end of the six months all of the human test subjects were too weak to do anything but lift their heads up to eat and shit in the metal bucket which they kept by their cots. And they all developed skin lesions, rashes on their hands, face, scrotums, the tell-tale sign of pellagra. As promised at the end of the six months the men were freed back into the world and given

a formal pardon from the governor for their crimes. And during the pardoning ceremony only one of the prisoners spoke. They were quoted as saying, I have been through a thousand hells. Dr. Goldberger also offered to treat the inmates free of charge until they fully recovered from pellagra, but they all refused. Obviously, none of them wanted to go near that sadist or his assistants ever again. In a local newspaper, the governor was quoted joking about how the prisoners had refused treatment and instead, quote,

went off like a lot of scared rabbits as soon as they were freed. Yeah, of course they did, you prick. One of those dudes ate an extremely healthy, balanced diet for the rest of their lives. Even though Dr. Goldberger had proven the cause of the pellagra, the public, a small amount of people who found out about this, were mostly outraged by this experiment, but not about the part where prisoners were coerced into torture for having a pardon dangled above their heads and then being forced to continue Despite being on the brink of death and sanity Instead they were outraged by the governor allowing convicted criminals to be freed

This next part has nothing to do with prison experiments preceding dr. Klickman's but it is too fucking weird not to include. Because so many of his peers in the medical field doubted his research findings and instead continued to hold fast to their belief that pellagra was an infectious disease transmitted through bodily fluids, an enraged Goldberger embarked on another experiment

to prove them wrong. This time instead of prisoners, his test subjects were himself, his wife, and 16 of his colleagues. The goal of his research to aggressively and repeatedly expose the test subjects were himself, his wife, and 16 of his colleagues. The goal of his research to aggressively and repeatedly expose the test subjects to bodily fluid from people suffering from pellagra to see if the test subjects themselves would develop pellagra. And that is a weird experiment to conduct on your wife. During the spring of 1916, once a week for eight

weeks Goldberger and his test subjects, again including his wife, gathered in his home for what they referred to as a filth party. During the filth party, Goldberger would go around the room, handing out these big, weird looking pills to each of his guests to swallow dry. And what was this congealed, waxy, discolored lump of substance that his guests were choking down? Well, that would be a pretty fun concoction of bodily fluids from various pellagra patients that Goldberger had collected fresh that morning. Before each meeting the doctor would go around town to find people suffering from severe

cases of pellagra. Once he did he got to work mining raw material from their disease-ridden bodies. He scraped scaly skin plaques and lesions off their shoulders, arms, skulls, and legs, took samples of their blood, swabbed the insides of their mouths for the buildup of mucus and saliva, also took literal buckets of their piss and shit. Then when he got home, he combed, combined all the ingredients into like this fucking witch stew, then mashed it up with some water and bread crumbs, pressed it into big pill-shaped balls, barely small enough to swallow, and voila!

It's Filth Party time! In addition to the balls of shit, puss, piss, crust and scabs, the guests of the Filth Party would also received a direct injection of the pellagra patient's blood. Although the guests often got very sick the night of the party. Yeah, they're literally eating shit. None of them ever developed pellagra from the experiments, thus proving Goldberger's hypothesis, but like at what cost. What other diseases did some of them ever developed pellagra from the experiments. Thus proving Goldberger's hypothesis, but like at what cost? What other diseases did some of them get?

Well, we don't know. Okay, now it's taken us a second to get here, but now time to meet the main man in today's Time Suck Timeline, Albert Montgomery Cligman. Born March 17th, 1916 in South Philadelphia. His parents were both Jewish immigrants, his mom from England, his dad from Ukraine. Not much is known about the early years of Albert Kligman's life except that he was a

devoted boy scout and spent many weekends of his childhood on troop field trips to the countryside where I picture him constantly trying to run experiments. Like trying to get his fellow boy scouts to do horrible shit to satisfy his random curiosities. That's good, Derek. That's real good. How do you feel after eating that slug? Spare no details. Come on, Eric, focus. If you throw it back up, I'll need you to eat it all over again before you get a dollar. How do you feel after eating nothing but your own shit for two full days? It was during these Boy Scout trips that Cligman first began to foster a love of plants, a love which would eventually lead him to conduct disturbing experiments on inmates at Homsburg Prison. And now let's look at a

another unethical prison experiments that occurred before Kligman started running his before we check back in with his and we will do that right after our first of two mid-show sponsor breaks. If you don't want to hear these ads, please sign up to be a space visitor on Patreon, get the entire catalog ad free episodes, three days early and more. Thanks for listening to those ads. And now we head to 1919. Let's talk about some, uh, nut stuff. Beginning three years after Clickman's birth from 1919 to 1922, under the direction of Dr. L. L. Stanley,

known commonly as Leo, over 500 inmates at San Quentin Prison in California underwent experimental testicular transplant surgeries. After having their own healthy testicles removed, many of the inmates had the glands of rams, goats, or boars implanted into their scrotums. Why? Well, for two reasons. Some people at the time thought that the true root of, you know, much deviant criminal behavior literally could be found in your nuts. You know, you got bad seed. You got demon balls, buddy. And if you just get rid of them, all your diabolical impulses would be gone. Also, there was a thought that some fresh balls could help restore your youth and vigor. Dr. Stanley truly thought a new set of nuts could cure everything from

pedophilia to depression. But that theory was that these new nuts needed to be, you know, human nuts. But then he had a hard time procuring enough new balls for his experimental desires. People weren't really apt at the time to sign a waiver agreeing to give their freshly deceased relatives nuts to some prisoner. A bunch of prudes. So lacking the necessary human nuttage, Dr. Stanley pivoted into animal balls. Which makes, you know, a lot less sense than human balls. He had one experiment idea in mind,

but then when he couldn't access the key ingredient for said experiment feels like he just threw his hands up was like, ah Okay. Well shit. I still want to fuck around some nuts Let's see what happens when we give guys goat balls. I mean, aren't you curious? I'm curious as hell Will they be able to create some kind of half human half animal goat boy monster? Well, I just think me animal goat boy monster? Well, I just think meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee If you're very confused right now that was a quick clip of Jim Brewer playing goat boy on Saturday Night Live many years ago When it came to these prisoners who were lucky enough to get human balls actually the testicles shoved into their ball sack came from dead inmates who had recently been hanged at San Quentin one In one case which took place on October 10th, 1919, an unnamed inmate serving life in prison received the glands of a younger inmate after that guy had been executed.

One newspaper described the triumphant experiment like this, "...all that was youthful in Thomas Bellin, a murderer who has paid the death penalty, is today restoring virology of life in the veins of a decrepit fellow prisoner. Bellin, young and strong, died October 10th on the gallows at San Quentin, California. Before his death, he gave his body to science. Prisoner Number Blank, serving a 60-year term for manslaughter, within an hour after the execution, received into his exhausted frame the interstitial gland of the dead murderer. Prisoner number blank began to show marked improvement in virility within three days after the operation.

In five days he was out of the prison hospital. He apparently stood straighter, walked faster, talked in a firmer voice, laughed and joked with the guards and his fellow prisoners and felt as he told Dr. Stanley like a much younger, stronger man. There is no record of what the test subjects themselves thought of the experiments, nor is there any surviving documentation of the prisoners consenting to the experiments,

if they ever did, and by what they thought themselves the experiments, like just commenting on how they were like walked through it, what they were told, et cetera. By 1940, Dr. Stanley had performed over 10,000 testicular implants in San Quentin. And now, how did getting goat nuts shoved into your sack not make these guys really really sick? I was wondering that. I wonder if you're wondering that. Here is

the best explanation I could find. The testicular issue, excuse me, the testicular tissue was minced into small pieces or ground into a paste. Yum. A little bit of raw nut meat paste. Man, two men don't offer that at the snack aisle at the grocery store. I mean, who wouldn't want to pick up a tube of minced nuts? This quote, testicular substance was then subcutaneously injected into the abdomen of the inmates undergoing the procedure. Other sources mentioned that in cases where whole testes were actually available, they were surgically inserted into a pouch created within the scrotum, sometimes involving splitting the vas deferens and relocating the nerve and artery to the graft area.

Now did this transplant, even though in most cases it was not a transplant and just a weird injection actually work on any level? Contrary to Dr. Stanley's claims, contrary to the claims of that one inmate we heard from, fucking definitely not. A 2019 New York Times article reported the story of a 36-year-old man without testicles who received a testicle transplant from his identical twin brother in Serbia. It was only the third known testicle transplant in the world, in world history, in the first in more than 40 years. Like an actual legit properly conducted

testicle transplant. We don't know if this Serbian's body ended up rejecting it or not. It's possible that eventually every transplant recipients body will reject the donated testicles and this occurred roughly this all occurred roughly 80 years after Dr. Stanley's bullshit. To date a baby has never been produced by donated testicles as far as anybody knows. On theory the baby would have the testicle donor's DNA, not the receiver's which is unusual. Also the human body highly likely to reject a truly donated testicle and if it didn't it would require a lifetime of immunosuppressant medication which Dr. Stanley's patients

never received. Mostly they just received a weird injection of nut paste into their stomach. Their body likely absorbed and then expelled, you know, like it did nothing positive to them. Basically, they eventually would just shit out the nut paste or the injection would lead to a nasty infection and the prisoners would eventually get really sick and possibly die and the records of that were just covered up. This is all a bunch of bunk signs. Their claims of rejuvenation, a bunch of lies and propaganda. Now let's catch back up with the terror dome. Long before Kligman, whatever step foot in Homesburg prison, the place had already garnered a reputation for being hell on earth for prisoners held there.

The living conditions, for starters, were abysmal. Sanitation was minimal, food was scarce, personal hygiene was a privilege outright denied to the majority of the inmates. Though the small cells were designed to house only one inmate at a time throughout the 1910s and 1920s, each cell regularly had three to five inmates crammed inside. Five dudes. Crammed into a six by eight foot space. That's crazy. I would fucking lose my mind being stuffed into a cell that small with four other dudes. Any four other dudes. Especially dudes likely to be pieces of shit. Prisoners at Homesburg were also denied both basic and life-saving medical treatment.

Take Holden Hubs, for example. 28-year-old former police officer who was serving a 60-day sentence for violating the dry laws. This was when American Prohibition was still in full effect. This is, I guess, back in the 30s. At the beginning of his short incarceration, Hubs had both of his legs violently broken by other inmates. They really didn't like cops, I'm guessing. He begged corrections officers for help

in treating his badly broken, super fucked up legs, but they refused. He later said, they just threw me into my cell and I pleased for a hot water bottle to bathe in, but that request was denied as well. By the time he was released 60 days later he never received any medical treatment. Both of his legs were so fucked up they had to be amputated.

In addition to straight up negligence on part of the prison wardens and cruelty, excessive discipline was also a hallmark of Homesburg throughout the first decade to the 20th century. Charles Sober, the deputy superintendent at the prison for 33 years, had inmates flogged on a daily basis when he was at work. Five days a week, roughly 50 weeks a year when he wasn't on vacation, for 33 years, dudes showed up to work and made sure other dudes got whipped.

He enlisted three prisoners who he referred to as his three musketeers to do the flogging for him in exchange for additional rations of tobacco. At night, the three musketeers would enter the cells of the newest inmates or inmates you know that Sorber just didn't care for. They would enter cells that Sorber conveniently left unlocked and would just beat him to a pulp. This according to court records was Sorber's way of welcoming newcomers to his institution and just a way of him you know exerting his authority on on people again

he didn't care for. Man, what a place to be locked up. In August of 1938 over half of Homburg prison's inmates went on a hunger strike due to the horrible quality and monotony of the food and then as a punishment for the two-week strike the 23 prisoners who led it were taken to the isolation unit, which was nicknamed the Klondike. The Klondike was quote, a narrow cell block lined with radiators and steam pipes. The windows and ventilation grills were closed and in conjunction with an August heat wave,

raised temperatures in the building to nearly 200 degrees. And I'm guessing that's at least a slight exaggeration because a human will get fucking cooked at that temperature pretty quickly. But you get the point, it was hot as hell. And it would be lethally hot for four days and four nights, the 23 inmates were submerged into total darkness of isolation and were forced to endure extreme temperatures with no food and even more dangerously.

No water. When the wardens returned to release the inmates from their isolation, four of them were dead. They had essentially truly been cooked. So while it might not have been 200 degrees, was well over 100 degrees in there. Okay let's return to Albert Kligman now. With his tuition generously covered by a prominent Russian-born conservative rabbi and friend of the family Simon Greenberg at 19 years old Kligman enrolled at Pennsylvania State University. There he would be a star athlete, captain

of the university gymnastics team, generally thought of by his classmates as charming, precocious and wildly egotistical. And we'll soon see whatever ego he had as an undergrad would continue to grow exponentially in the years to come. In 1939, Cligman received his bachelor's degree from Pennsylvania State University. He graduated as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, the oldest, one of the most prestigious academic honor societies in the U.S., which recognizes excellence in the liberal arts and sciences. His life's fantastic. He had his schooling paid for, his athletic prowess, good looks, gave him a lot of popularity. He's well on his way towards a respected and financially lucrative career. A guy blessed with so much should, I would think, have some gratitude for the wonderful life he has

and show some fucking compassion towards those born with so much less, given so much less. People who had no family friend willing to pay for their schooling. People not raised in a two-parent home that valued education. But, as is too often the case, everyone of those people who just do not seem to give a fuck about those dealt a much shittier hand in life than himself. After the completion of his bachelor's, Kligman decided to go straight into a PhD program at the University of Pennsylvania.

He'll graduate in 1942 with a doctorate in botany, which is a branch of biology that deals with the study of plants, including their structure, properties, and biochemical processes. Kligman's research specialty was mushrooms, but not the fun magic kind, unfortunately. Maybe if he'd eaten enough of those, gotten enough trips, he would have been kinder and gentler with those in his care. In the coming years, he made a name for himself as the leading expert on fun guy. He even published a handbook on mushroom culture, creatively named,

Handbook of Mushroom Culture Culture that was widely used across the nation throughout the 1950s, 60s, 70s, even 80s after its initial 1950 publication. Eventually, Klickman's expertise caught the attention of the US government and they recruited him to travel to South America to try and find plans that could hopefully fight malaria carrying mosquitoes. However, just before he was set to embark on his journey journey the trip was canceled because the FBI found out he had previously been a member of the Communist Party. And look I'm no fan of communism but also so hypocritical for the so-called land of the free. A nation

that has long prided itself on being a place where you're able to you know freely exercise your voice and how you feel about things including the government and how it should function Unless you feel it should be communist then you're free to keep your fucking mouth shut That's that's not really freedom Kligman then tried to enter both the army and the Navy but was rejected by both due to a recurring Pilot oh my gosh Clifford Pilot idol I always heard it as pillowILONIDAL, oh fuck I can't remember now. PILONIDAL CYST, PILONIDAL, something like this. PILONIDAL.

PILONIDAL CYST, which is an abscess composed of hair and skin debris that develops in the top of the ass crack right under the tailbone. Also makes you ineligible for military service apparently. And I should know how to say it I think I've always said it, Pellinado, which is wrong But I am very familiar with how the things feel these things feel because I've had several Got my first one in high school doing sit-ups sitting on hard seats would inflame it It would bleed would fucking stink right there be there be puss in the blood like a little bit of infection super sexy my ass crack Finally got bad enough. I had to go to the doctor when I was around 19. They dug it out,

sewed me back up, just a couple stitches. Then I got another one of these things, couple years later, did the same thing, dug it out, sewed me up, a couple little stitches. Then I got one that got badly infected in my early 30s and they had to perform a bigger surgery, scrape a whole bunch of tissue off my tailbone, pull some skin on one butt cheek across my ass crack onto the other butt cheek at the top of my ass crack. I had to lay on my stomach for about a week. It was very fun, very sexy. None since then, thank God. That last surgery I had seemed to have knocked it out and my butt crack has thankfully been mostly blood and pus free for the last 15 years. But enough about my bloody infected bonus butthole. At the behest of his first wife, Beatrice Troyan, who we cannot find much information about at all, not even what year they were

married, Kligman decided to return to the University of Pennsylvania to get his MD, his medical doctor's license. Because of his expertise and fun fungi at med school, Kligman decided to specialize in dermatology. And while Kligman was studying human fungus infections at UPenn, the world was going through some major shit. On September 2, 1945, World War II officially ended with the formal surrender of Japan. Excuse me, Germany had already agreed to unconditional surrender earlier that year. In December of 1946 the surviving leaders of Nazi Germany were indicted, tried by the International Military Tribunal for War Crimes, Crimes Against Humanity, and Crimes Against Peace. Held in Nuremberg, Germany, the proceedings were dubbed the Nuremberg Trials. In addition to the

original Nuremberg Trials, which were conducted jointly by the Allied Forces, on their own the US also conducted 12 more trials to prosecute second-tier Nazis. Non-government people like German industrialists, military figures, SS perpetrators and other prominent businessmen who committed crimes against humanity. The first and most famous of these subsequent cases was the US versus Karl Brandt et al better known as the doctors trial wherein 20 German physicians and three SS officials were tried for their willing involvement in Nazi human

experimentation and the Nazi euthanasia program Action T4. During his opening statement the prosecution's chief of council Brigadier General Telford Taylor stated the defendants in this case are charged with murders tortures and other atrocities committed in the name of medical science. The victims of these crimes are numbered in the hundreds of thousands. A handful only are still alive. A few of the survivors will appear in this courtroom.

But most of these miserable victims were slaughtered outright or died in the course of the tortures to which they were subjected. For the most part, they are nameless dead. To their murderers, these wretched people were not individuals at all. They came in wholesale lots and were treated worse than animals. Over the course of the war, the Nazi doctors had conducted around 30 different types of experiments on concentration camp inmates without their consent. During these medical trials, prisoners were disfigured, mutilated, tortured, and in many cases experimented on until death. One of the most notorious and horrific Nazi experiments was the high-altitude

test where camp prisoners were locked in confined low-pressure chambers that mimic conditions of being around 700,000 feet up in the air with barely any oxygen. According to one source, the Nazi doctors, quote, monitored the prisoners' physiological response as they succumbed and died in the high-altitude chambers. SS doctor Sigmund Rascher was said to dissect victims' brains while they were still alive to show that high-altitude sickness resulted from the formation of tiny air bubbles in the blood vessels of a certain part of the brain. Of 200 people subjected to these experiments, 80 died outright and the remainder were executed. In a similar experiment conducted to determine the best means to treat people for hypothermia,

the Nazi doctors forced prisoners into unbearably freezing temperatures for up to five hours at a time. According to the PBS documentary Holocaust on Trial, they placed victims into vats of icy water, either in aviator suits or naked. They took others outside in the freezing cold and strapped them down naked. As the victims writhed in pain, foamed at the mouth, and lost consciousness, the doctors measured changes in their patients' heart rate, body temperature, muscle reflexes, and other factors.

Some 80 to 100 patients perished during these experiments. In still other experiments, prisoners were sliced open, their wounds intentionally infected with harmful bacteria like streptococcus, tetanus, gas gangrene. Then to really aggravate the wound, Nazi doctors would rub wood shavings and shattered glass into the open flesh, no anesthetic. These people died in so much pain. The list of atrocities goes on and on. Prisoners were shot with poison bullets, forced to only drink seawater, artificially inseminated, castrated, sterilized, the radiation, their limbs sawed off, somebody else's limbs sewn on, their bones, muscles, nerves removed with

no anesthesia, so fucking barbaric. Some of that shit was done to children as well. Now you've allowed yourself to become a real evil motherfucker to justify doing any of that to innocent people. All of this was very familiar or very similar excuse me to what was happening with unit 731 in Japan as well. These were the types of scientific experiments the 20 Nazi physicians and three SS officials were put on trial for. Now we don't have time to get into the details of the rest of those scientific experiments but if you're interested in learning more go ahead and check out time sick episodes 296 and 297 where we dive deep into the Holocaust or check out bonus episode 13 about unit 731. On August 20th 1947 after

almost 140 days of proceedings including the testimony of 85 witnesses and the submission of almost 1,500 documents the American judges at the doctor's trial had reached their verdict. 16 of the 20 Nazi physicians were found guilty, seven of them sentenced to death. In a section of the verdict entitled permissible medical experiments, the judges also outlined a 10-point set of ethical research principles for human experimentation now known as the Nuremberg Code. It's not very long and it's pretty relevant to our subject today in proving that Dr.

Kligman should have known better than to have done what he did. So I'm going to go ahead and read the full code starting with number one, the voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential. Now this means that the person involved should have legal capacity to give consent, should be so situated as to be able to exercise free power of choice without the intervention of any element of force, fraud, deceit, duress, overreaching, or other ulterior form of constraint or coercion, and should have sufficient knowledge and comprehension of the elements of the subject matter involved as to enable him to make an understanding and enlightened decision.

This latter element requires that before the acceptance of an affirmative decision by the experimental subject, there should be made known to him or her in the nature, duration, and purpose of the experiment, the method and means by which it is to be conducted, all inconveniences and hazards reasonably to be expected, and the effects upon his health or person which may possibly come from his participation in the experiment. The duty and responsibility for ascertaining the quality of the consent rests upon each individual who initiates, directs, or engages in the experiment. It is a personal duty and responsibility which may not be delegated to another with impunity. Dr.

Kligman will fail miserably in this regard. His patients will definitely not be told what will be done to them. They will not be given the chance to make an informed decision which is obviously wildly unethical. He will delegate to others who are in no position to run medical experiments, you know, what should be done to people, etc. etc. Number two, the experiment should be such as to yield fruitful results for the good of society, unprocurable by other methods or means of study, and not random and unnecessary in nature. A lot of Dr. Clibbin's experiments, some of the worst ones, will be pretty fucking random and unnecessary. Number three, the

experiment should be so designed and based on the results of animal experimentation and a knowledge of the natural history of the disease or other problem under study that the anticipated results will justify the performance of the experiment. A lot of Dr. Kligman's experiments did not build off of knowledge gained in animal experimentation. Number four, the experiment should be so conducted as to avoid all unnecessary physical and mental suffering and injury. Big fail in this regard.

Unnecessary suffering will just be a hallmark of Dr. Kligman's experiments. Number five, no experiment should be conducted where there is an a priori reason to believe that death or disabling injury will occur, except perhaps in those experiments where the experimental physicians also serve as subjects. Another fail for Kligman. Some of his experiments were definitely going to disable their participants. Number six, the degree of risk to be taken should never exceed that determined by the humanitarian importance of the problem to be solved by the experiment. Another fail. Number seven, proper preparation

should be made in adequate facilities provided to protect the experimental subject against even remote possibilities of injury, disability, or death. Huge fail. Kligman didn't give a single fuck about adequate facilities. Number eight, the experiment should be conducted only by scientifically qualified persons. The highest degree of skill and care should be required to all stages of the experiment, of those who conduct or engage in the experiment. And another huge fail, Dr. Kligman will cut corners,

use other prisoners, people with no medical or scientific education to help conduct his experiments. Number nine, during the course of the experiment, the human subject should be at liberty to bring the experiment to an end if he has reached the physical or mental state where continuation of the experiment seems to him to be impossible. Oh, hell no. People will beg for Dr. Kligman to end the experiment and he will not.

And finally, number 10, during the course of the experiment the scientist in charge must be prepared to terminate the experiment at any stage if he has probable cause to believe in the exercise of the good faith, superior skill, and careful judgment required of him that a continuation of the experiment is likely to result in injury, disability, or death to the experimental subjects. Again, another huge fail. All that mattered to Dr. Kligman was results. He did not care at all about the health and welfare of his test subjects as you will see. While the Nuremberg Code is foundational to scientific and medical research today,

when it was first created, it was, you might be surprised to learn, largely ignored by American researchers. It was the general opinion of the American Today, when it was first created, it was, you might be surprised to learn, largely ignored by American researchers. It was the general opinion of the American medical community that the Nuremberg Code was, quote, a good code for barbarians, but an unnecessary code for ordinary physician scientists like themselves. And that comes from the book Acres of Skin. Classic us versus them thinking, right?

Oh, that's great. No, that's great. Then we figured out how to regulate? Oh that's great, no that's great that we figure out how to regulate medical experimentation, you know, for the dirty Germans and Japanese, but we don't need to worry about that shit. No, we're us. We are the good guys and if we do something, even if it might appear bad, really really bad at quick glance, it's actually definitely good because it's us and we are great. They are bad and they need rules because they are not us. For the next 20 or so years, human experiments, an explicit violation of the code, were conducted profusely across the U.S. funded by both private corporations and the U.S. military. And we'll look into some of that in a moment. For right now,

let's return to super cool guy Albert Klickman to see what he was up to around this time. In 1947 Kligman received his MD from the University of Pennsylvania and joined the dermatology faculty there as an associate researcher. Three years later Kligman completes his residency in 1950 and immediately is hired as a professor of dermatology at UPenn where he will remain on the faculty for the rest of his life. Over the years many of Kligman's former students have been interviewed about the renowned dermatologists and they all often express the same sentiment. Kligman was a hyper intellectual genius but also an attention-seeking

narcissistic showman. Dr. Isaac Willis, who was a resident at the UPenn dermatology department in the late 1960s and studied under Kligman said, Dr. Kligman was a maverick. He was different. If anybody would do things, it was Kligman. He was brilliant and very good at motivating an individual and challenging me. Dr. Paul Gross, another UPenn graduate from 1950 1950s, was quoted in the 90s saying that Dr. Kligman was a creative and original genius who should be given his own research foundation to discover new ideas and ways of doing things. But despite his high opinion of Kligman, Dr. Gross also conceded that his former mentor had some troubling practices and that his behavior as a professor and researcher were

not always on the up and up. Regarding that, he said, He told students that rules don't apply to genius, because rules just get in the way of creative minds. He thought he could do and say anything and get away with it, because he was superior to the average fellow and deserved greater freedom. As a student, I believed everything he said. Later I realized that a lot of what he said was self-serving and ridiculous.

Yeah, that's scary. The rules don't apply to genius. Spoken like a true mad scientist or like a Nazi doctor, right? I'm sure they told themselves that same kind of shit. Another former student, Dr. Bernard Ackerman said during an interview that he actually chose to complete his residency in dermatology at the University of Pennsylvania specifically so he could study under Dr. Kligman. He said, at the beginning I was a big Kligman fan. He was famous, had a lot of style and pizzazz, but another resident warned me that the fascination would wear off. It did and I completed my residency at Harvard after spending only one year at Penn. Now, let's check back in with the Terror Dome. But first, time for

today's second of two mid-show sponsor breaks. Thanks for listening to the sponsors. Now let's head to 1951, find out how Dr. Kligman gets his invite to the Terror Dome. 1951, Homesburg Prison was facing a crisis. A raging outbreak of tinea pedis. Oh my gosh. It's Clifford! Tinea pedis. Better known as athlete's foot. Maybe it was tinea pedis. Clearly I've never taken Latin and I'll always struggle with some of these. But yeah, athlete's foot. Let's just say fucking athlete's foot. Over a thousand of the 1,200 inmates have been diagnosed with a severe case of the fungal infection and the meager prison medical staff were lost regarding how to stop it from spreading. One day the prison pharmacist happened upon an article about fungal infections in humans written by none other than Dr. Albert M. Kligman of the University of Pennsylvania Medical School, a local and somebody who lived just down the road in Philly. The pharmacist called the renowned expert in all things fungus,

asked him if he would be willing to look into the issue. Kligman eagerly agreed to the request and a few days later, he appeared at Homesburg prison wide-eyed and ready to go. In a 1966 interview about his experiments, Dr. Kligman said that when he stepped inside Homesburg prison for the very first time, quote, all I saw before me were acres of skin. It was like a farmer seeing a fertile field for the first time quote, all I saw before me were acres of skin. It was like a farmer

seeing a fertile field for the first time in anthropoid colony mainly healthy under perfect control conditions. So immediately he did not see these people as people. He saw them as test subjects, as lab rats. When Kligman was called upon to treat the outbreak of athletes footed the prison it would mark the beginning of what would become 23 years of unethical exploitive human experiments. In the hundreds upon hundreds of inmates locked up at Homesburg prison Kligman saw a unique opportunity the same opportunity that has drawn medical researchers to prison populations for centuries. In another interview Kligman said that inmates were the ideal population

to experiment on because of how much control the researcher has over them. He said, quote, we know where they are, what they're doing, what they're eating, and if they're being given pills six times a day, we know they are taken. I mean, okay, fair. What happened next is murky. No one seems quite clear as to how the early experiments were conducted or when they commenced and that's exactly how Kligman probably wanted it. As he once said in an interview about his humble beginnings at Homsburg, I began to

go to the prison regularly although I had no authorization. It was years before the authorities knew I was conducting various studies on prisoner volunteers. Things were simpler then. Informed consent was unheard of. No one asked me what I was doing. It was a wonderful time. Those last two sentences, no one asked me what I was doing. It was a wonderful time. Disturbing. That could be a quote from a serial killer. There were no official contracts between the University of Pennsylvania and the prison or the city and besides Dr. Kligman's published research findings there exists no written record of his experiments at Homesburg. The city and prison administration sure as hell were not

taking notes on the matter and even though Dr. Kligman and his research staff were taking notes he destroyed all those notes in 1974 when the program was shut down. You know he did something that somebody conducting ethical experiments would never do. Motherfucker shredded and burned the evidence of all his sins. And even though there were dozens of UPenn students who assisted Dr. Kligman in his prison experiments at one point or another, and the whole dermatology department knew of them, nowadays getting one of them to talk about what Kligman did to prisoners is like pulling nails, which ironically is

one of the experiments they conducted on Homsburg inmates. Right? Clearly they were worried about being judged and they should be worried because they would be judged because what they did was disgusting. Because of so many people involved keeping quiet we have to go out what we have to go off of in terms of evidence is Dr. Kligman's published research. Communications between Dr. Kligman and companies that hired him to conduct research and the testimonies of some inmates. All that being said, this is what we do know about the humble beginnings of the Homesburg

prison experiments. They started, like Kligman said, without any real structure. It was a few years before he officially set up a research program at the prison, which he called Ivy Research Labs. It sounds so benign. Before then, Kligman just kind of came and went as he pleased, gathering up prisoners for various personal research projects with the unwritten, unofficial approval of the prison superintendent, Frederick Baldy. Over time, Kligman converted a portion of the prison's less used H-block into a

makeshift laboratory. It was cleaner than the rest of the prison, but still by no stretch the imagination was it a suitable place to be slicing people open, pouring acid on their backs, both of which were common procedures. For the first three-ish years of Kligman's research program in Homsburg from 1951 to 1954, he primarily conducted what was referred to as patch tests. William Robb, an inmate serving a life sentence for first-degree murder and a frequent participant in Kligman's studies, later described the early patch tests like this. The first patch test tested lotions, creams, skin, moisturizers, and suntan products, not yet released to the general public.

The procedure for these tests was as follows. A grid made from thick strips of white hospital tape was fixed to the upper portion of an inmate's back shoulders. The grid consisted of about 20 squares. In each one of these squares, a dab of lotion was applied of an inmate's back shoulders. The grid consisted of about 20 squares. In each one of these squares, a dab of lotion was applied and the inmate's back was exposed to different temperatures from a sun lamp. The exposure to the sun lamp lasted anywhere

from 15 to 20 minutes, after which each square was inspected for a degree of blistering or other adverse reactions. The grid was then covered with a large solid piece of tape to prevent tampering by the inmates and the inmate was returned to a cell. This test lasted about 20 days and once a day the inmate was called back over to the lab and exposed to the sun lamp. After about five days of the sun lamp there were sections of the skin that were burnt deep brown and the skin started to peel, itch, and blister. If a certain square of skin became too damaged it was covered

with a permanent piece of tape and the test continued on the rest of the grid. Another former inmate named William Ponton spoke about the first patch test he participated in. He said it, quote, nearly killed me it was so painful. I nearly went through the wall. I had a patch put on my back that covered a large area. It was a 10-day test and I wasn't allowed to shower. Despite the pain during the 40 months that he was at Homesburg, William participated in over 50 experiments, more than one a month, sometimes more than one simultaneously. In addition to the patch tests, William also ended up volunteering for over 25 different biopsy tests. Biopsy tests last anywhere from one to three months, during which each week a small spot on the prisoner's body, like her shoulder, elbow, forearm, or thigh, was injected with

an unknown substance. A few days after the injection, the prisoner would return to the lab to have the portion of skin that was injected cut out for examination. Man, this dude had so many fucking scars. Over 25 different biopsy tests. Jesus. Again, that also happened once a week for multiple weeks. As far as William Ponson recalls, he received about five bucks per biopsy test site, not per biopsy, and ten bucks for each patch test.

That's a hard way to make very little money. Five bucks back then equivalent to about 60 bucks now. Another type of experiment William Pontin recalled participating in in the early 1950s were the gauze tests. With no anesthetic whatsoever he was laid down on a metal table while quote two young doctors from the University of Pennsylvania sliced two one-inch incisions on either side of his lower back. Damn. The doctors then quote inserted gauze pads into the wounds then stitched up the incisions. Ten days later Ponton returned. The doctors opened one wound, removed the gauze pad, restitched the wound. After another 10 days Ponton was brought back to the same

procedure on the other incision. He was never told the purpose of the exercise and accepted ten dollars for his trouble. Jesus. Though that might not seem like much and it wasn't. It's equivalent to $120 today. For an inmate trying to raise bail money and during whatever pain might come with those tests seemed worth it. Which makes all this that much you know more gross. These guys were desperate willing to do almost anything for almost nothing and Dr. Clickman knew that. That's why he worked with the prison population instead of people out in the free world. You know, he talked about control and how he knew what was going on with them.

And yes, I get the allure of that. But also, I think desperation was the main reason he liked working with prisoners. Reminds me of a serial killer targeting sex workers, you know, because they know they're desperate and vulnerable. According to former Homesburg inmates who participated in the research program, money was the sole reason they chose to do so. In addition to paying bail or hiring a lawyer, they needed money to buy basic necessities from the commissary, like toothbrushes, toothpaste, washcloths, food, new underwear, new socks,

and more. As Alan Hornblum, author of Acres of Skin, Human Experiments at Homesburg, puts it, "...when you're locked up, you're in a very vulnerable and precarious situation. You'll do anything to get yourself out of there or to make conditions a bit more forgiving and moderate. The condition of prisons wherever are so bad that inmates will gravitate towards anything that ameliorates them or helps them earn money. There were other ways to make money at homes back then, but nothing paid nearly as much

as being a lab rat for Dr. Cligman. You could, for example, get a job on your cell block sweeping the floors, but as I mentioned at the start of today's episode, that would only make you between 25 and 50 cents a day. Other jobs paid about the same. So as a test subject making 5, 10, 15 bucks in a week or even in a day, you know, that was huge. Plus, as Hornblum also went on to explain, the inmates were told that the experiments were safe. He said, inmates were willing to expose

themselves to unknown substances knowing it may have a negative consequence, but they trusted the doctors. They thought they would work with principled medical professionals from a prestigious university. They were told that no harm would come to them. If something did go awry, they were told that they would be well taken care of, which was not the truth. Inmates never received medical care for the physical and sometimes psychological harm done to them after an experiment ended. They were also, importantly, never told what was being tested. Sometimes it was obvious, like bar soap, toothpaste, sunscreen, lotion, shampoo, shit like that. Other times, as we'll soon see, not so much. Soap, toothpaste, sunscreen, lotion, shampoo, shit like that. Other times as we'll soon see, not so much. Even though money was the sole reason prisoners participated in the experiments, as the prisoners themselves have repeatedly stated, Dr. Cligman liked to say that they participated because

they liked to feel loved by him. He said, Many of the prisoners, for the first time in their lives, find themselves in the role of important human beings. We say to them, you're important, we need you. Once this is established these guys will knock their brains out to please you. If the experiment does not pan out they get depressed. They become emotionally involved in the project. The capacity to

respond to love is greater than most people realize. I feel almost like a scoundrel, like Machiavellilli because of what I can do to them Almost like a scoundrel. What a true sociopathic piece of shit Dude was actively manipulating people not used to anyone ever showing them affection or caring about them That is so fucking low and he was not telling them what he was really doing to them Because if he told them the truth, he knew that many of them despite their desperation you know for money and to please him would say no. It was morally bankrupt. In addition to a few of the dermatology residents at the University within the first couple of years, Kligman started

recruiting some of the inmates themselves to assist him in the experiments. By 1955 Kligman had collected a group of about three dozen inmates who he trained to work as lab techs and doctor's assistants in the H block laboratory. In one 1966 interview about his highly successful prison research lab, that's a quote, Clickman was quoted saying, we can teach our guys to become better technicians than any woman on the outside. A prisoner technician isn't going anywhere while he's in prison. He may be a ragamuffin on the outside, but in two months we can make a highly skilled technician out of him." Why did he have to throw fucking women under the bus in that statement? And also say

ragamuffin. Two more things I don't like about this guy. But what the fuck was that about? That seemed wildly unnecessary. He's at a left field. Arrogant bastard clearly did not think much of prisoners or women. These jokers, these ragamuffins, they're not worth much in the outside world. They can't get their shit together, but they're still men. You know what I'm saying? And as men, they're gonna do such a better job than women. Come on! Even with less training. Even though they're not nearly as fun to look at,

and I don't feel the urge to pinch their bottoms or peek down their shirts when I walk by. In that same interview, Kligman described another one of the experiments he conducted in his early years at Homesburg. One that was meant to test the effectiveness of an anti-obesity quote milkshake. He said a prison is the right place for such a test. The men were confined in one room for six months. How can you do a test like this on the outside limiting a person to five grams of fat a day? We fed these men a milk like emulsion. For six long months they had to take this lousy fluid.

Now eating is one of the major pleasures of life. Suddenly you take all taste away from the men. They had all kinds of dreams, fantasies. Most of them became resigned and eventually came to like their diet. They reached a sensory vacuum. Meals meant nothing to them. But one guy couldn't take it after five months. Somewhere he got an onion and ate it. For him it was a paradisical experience after drinking that awful stuff. Well, we discovered it and refused to pay him because the onion ruined the value of his test.

Just one lousy onion deprived him of his money. He became violent. But we had to keep discipline. The man was just beside himself with rage. What a fucking dick. Couldn't still give a guy who, you know, hated your horrible meal replacement shake a few bucks after he, you know, fucking hated it so much that he decided to eat a raw onion. Thought it tastes like heaven. I mean he made it five months. He made it within a month to complete the experiment. He couldn't give him a pro rate or something. In the early 1950s, to test the treatment of scalp ringworm, aka tinea capitis, thank you, Clifford, Dr.

Kligman experimentally infected both inmates at Homesburg Prison. And how fun is this? Developmentally disabled children at mental institutions with the affliction. Oh, fuck yeah, bro. He was even worse than you thought up until now. He gave cognitively impaired children incapable of understanding the experiment, kids who had already been separated from their families and placed in asylums, ringworm. In the publication of his research, he wrote, the data reported in this paper derived from

observations of experimentally infected humans. The work was carried out at a state institution for congenital mental defectives, where tinea capitis was endemic and the inmates subject to constant opportunity for infection. The experimental circumstances were ideal and that a large number of individuals living under confined circumstances could be inoculated at will and the course of the disease minutely studied from its very onset. Biopsy material was freely available. When Dr. Kligman presented his findings to the Society for Investigative Dermatologists

later that year, instead of being admonished for taking advantage of manly handicapped children and prison inmates for the purpose of his experiment, he was praised for selecting such an ideal test group. One reviewer of his presentation and fellow member of the society wrote, we have not been alive enough to the wealth of test material that there is in penitentiaries, nailed that word again, and the administrative officers are glad to have doctors work in their institutions. It indicates that special attention is being paid to the welfare of the charges

and the inmates really enjoy it. The inmates really enjoy it. Do they? Do they really enjoy being poked, prodded, infected, sliced, tormented? I'm going to go out on a limb and say they definitely did not really enjoy it. What a blatant self-serving rationalization. Dr. Kligman too praised himself for the selection of his test group. According to one colleague of multiple decades, Dr. Kligman would brag about how he, quote, encouraged the development of ringworm by rubbing it in the abraded scalp of mentally handicapped children. Kligman would delight an audience of medical students and residents in training by telling

them, quote, these kids want attention so bad, if you hit them over the head with a hammer they would love you for it. That is the most evil sentence he's uttered so far. These kids want attention so bad they're so fucking lonely. They're so desperate for affection and approval you can hit them over the head with a fucking hammer. That's rough. You can do anything you want with these kids as long as you keep a smile on your face. Speak to them in a patronizing tone, and give them ice cream and a sticker, and tell them they did a great job and it's all over. It's the best! Oh, if I could get away with it, I'd love to do an experiment

on how much pain they're willing to endure at my hands, but still love me. Could I cut one of their arms off, but still get them to cry on my shoulder? I'd love to find out! Could I cut both of their arms off? Could I cut both their arms arms off? Could I cut both their arms and one of their legs off and then get them to actually beg me

to go ahead and cut the remaining leg off if I acted really sad and told them that if I can't cut their your last leg off I'm probably gonna cry forever? They're so fun to work with these helpless gullible motherfuckers! This guy fucking deserves a special seat in hell. In one brutal 1956 study, Dr. Kligman used both the inmates at Homesburg Prison and the children at the Woodbine and Vinland Institution for the mentally disabled as his human test subjects. He had been given $13,949 in a research grant from the National Institution of Health. That's a very specific amount by the way, like the grant was on sale, to measure the normal anatomy of the nail organ and the

pathogenesis of ringworm of the nails through the study of experimentally induced and naturally occurring infections. The study ran from September 1st 1956 to August 31st 1957. According to Clingman's research documents, 300 prisoners were used as test subjects and each of them were paid $15 for their participation The study did not list how many children were using the study Nor does it mention whether they were compensated. I doubt they were by these shady douches Probably just gave them hugs, you know here and there told them they were doing a good job Patting themselves in the back for being great doctors who made kids smile after, I don't know, ripping off their fucking fingernails. 1957

Clickman conducted a new study to examine how long it would take cognitively impaired children to recover from a severe beating when they were beaten unconscious with nothing but dinosaur bones. You love it! You missed it! You're so happy to hear that earworm again! I'm actually running an unethical experiment to find out how long I can keep a podcast going that continually tortures listeners with unnecessary song samples. 1957. What Kligman really did was conduct a new study to examine the many different means of producing experimental infection of foot ringworm. Three dozen prisoners participated in this experiment where Kligman applied quote enormous quantities of fungi to the soles of their feet then force them

to wear rubber boots with no socks for a whole week to examine how the infection spread. God I'm sure that felt great. 1958 Dr. Kligman took his mad scientist act to a new low. He inoculated 106 black prisoners between ages between the ages of 20 and 45 with a series of viruses including the wart virus, herpes simple, which causes genital and oral sores. Herpes zoster, which causes shingles. And the Vaxenia virus, which is a large double-stranded DNA virus belonging to the same genus as monkeypox and cowpox. Why only black prisoners for this one? Well, maybe he thought they'd be less likely to take legal action against him later. For being infected with STIs and other shit.

Maybe he's just super racist. Maybe both. As always, the prisoners were not informed of what they were being inoculated with, not even that it was a virus. However, many soon came to guess what had happened to them when they began to develop warts, pustules, open sores at the injection site, which for 47 of the patients, was literally on the tips of their fucking dicks. Seriously, they didn't tell these inmates that they were injecting the tips of their dicks with herpes and other shit. Clearly they placed no value at all on these people's lives. Also, if you had to infect a dick, why the tip? Right? Couldn't you infect the

shaft? Go down to the base towards the balls? Pick some spot not quite as noticeable, not quite as painful when they get a recurrence of cold sores or fucking monkey pox or whatever shingles. I don't think you get shingles on the tip of your dick, but maybe you do. It feels like they picked the tip just to be assholes or like you know part of a sick joke. According to the publication results the purpose of this experiment was to demonstrate how quote, students of human infectious disease have a much greater opportunity to gain an understanding of pathogenesis

when the disease can be experimentally reproduced in man at will. So there wasn't even a good reason for this experiment. They fucked these guys' dicks up, essentially just so some medical students could watch their dicks get fucked up. Should also be noted that the prisoners were not inoculated with one virus and that was it, but with multiple viruses at the same

time. So that's cool. You know, get some cold sores and warts on the tip of your dick. And because the purpose of the experiment was simply to infect them with the virus and not to find a treatment, none of them were offered treatment for their infections until the trial was over six months later. But then it doesn't even fucking matter because you can't you know treat herpes these war you can't you can't cure it you can't get rid of it. 1959 Dr. Albert Kligman published one of his most well-known contributions to science a research article titled the human hair cycle. In the article Kligman describes

you guessed it the human hair cycle. Although the concept of the hair growth cycle had been around since the 1920s, this article was the first to seriously examine and describe the cellular and structural changes in the human hair follicles during the middle stage of the growth cycle, which back then was very little understood. Was poorly understood. It was a better way to phrase that. Kligman was able to achieve this monumental study by using scalp biopsies taken from poorly paid prisoners.

That same year, 1959, inmates at Homesburg Prison earned a total of $73,253 by volunteering to take pills, get poison ivy, and use creams and sows. In two years, that number would more than double because in two years, the United States Army would catch wind of what Dr. Clickman and his abundance of human material, ripe and ready to be experimented on, were up to. In 1961, the US Army hired Dr. Kligman to conduct a study to measure the effects of heat and humidity on the human skin. With an initial $21,000 research grant from the military and the approval of the Pennsylvania prison system, Kligman had one of the prison cells in H block reconstructed into a special climate chamber where the temperature could be quote raised to that of an African jungle or lowered to almost zero. In 1962, so much people got tortured there, in 1962 the FDA made some serious changes to requirements

for drug manufacturers to strengthen its control over which drugs hit the US market. The changes were made in response to the Thalidomide disaster, a global fuck-up, where between 1957 and 1962 approximately 10,000 children worldwide were born with the range of severe and debilitating malformations caused by the over-the-counter drug Thalidomide. Thalidomide had been released in the late 1950s by the German pharmaceutical company Bayer Evil Incorporated. I meant to say, Camille Grunenthal. Initially advertised as a non-addictive, general-use sedative, it gained international popularity as a super effective way to treat nausea and morning sickness for pregnant women.

Despite having absolutely no evidence from clinical trials to back it up, one UK advertisement for thalidomide proclaimed the drug, quote, Can be given with complete safety to pregnant women and nursing mothers without adverse effect on mother or child. Turns out that was not true at all. Like not even fucking close to being true. Approximately 20%, one in five, of all babies whose mothers had taken thalidomide during pregnancy were born with debilitating and severe birth defects, like very severe, including short or missing arms and legs, missing parts of the ears, and deafness. There is also a chance of other problems such as missing or small eyes, paralysis of the

face, and defects in the heart, kidney, genitals, and gastrointestinal tract. Holy fuck. Missing or shrunken limbs and eyes. Defective genitals. Defective heart, kidneys, more. And deafness. Facial paralysis. On and on. And around 10,000 kids were born with some or a bunch of that. From 1951 to 1961, thalidomide was marketed and distributed in 46 different countries, except for the US. And that is thanks to the badass that was Dr. Frances Kelsey,

one of the first medical officers hired by the FDA, the Food and Drug Administration. Her job was to review new drug applications to decide whether or not they could go to market in the US. Super important job. And she had the right amount of integrity for it. One of the very first applications she was assigned to was for Thalidomide, which was already available in most European countries and some Asian nations. Despite constant pressure from Kimi Grunenthal, the drugs manufacturer,

Francis Kelsey refused to approve Thalidomide due to the total and complete lack of scientifically reliable evidence regarding its safety. The German company bombarded Dr. Kelsey with anecdotes from various distributors around the world about how stellar the drug was, but the medical officer held fast to her good decision. Anecdotal evidence is not scientific evidence. For an entire year, she was pressured to release the drug to the American public until the fateful day that quote researchers in Germany and Australia linked the litamide to clusters of rare severe birth defects. Hands and feet projecting directly from the shoulders and hips that eventually were shown to involve thousands of babies.

So big fucking shout out to Dr. Francis Kelsey. She single-handedly saved the US from what is now known as the biggest man-made medical disaster ever. Legend has it that after the drug was proven to be harmful, she sent the CEO of Kimi Grunenthal a photo of her with her pants down around her knees pointing to her exposed vagina with one hand, giving the camera a middle finger with the other. She wrote four words on this picture in a sharp with a sharpie. Suck my puss bitches.

Hail, Lucifina. Of course, that's nonsense, but you knew that. Uh, I wish you would have done that. You know, well, not really. It's kind of crazy. Although the US made it out relatively unscathed in the Thalidomide disaster, the horror of it all still prompted the government to make some serious changes to FDA regulations as they should have. The changes aka the Kefauver-Harris Amendment of 1962 aggressively tightened regulations on drug development and approval in the US. The first major change was that instead of just proving their drug is safe, the FDA now required manufacturing

companies to prove that the drug is both safe and effective through well controlled clinical trials and that new requirement really pissed off a lot of manufacturers because they now had to pay for more rigorous multi-phase expensive clinical trials in order to get their product onto the market. Not only that they also had to now prove to the FDA that their research infrastructure and statistical methods met the FDA standards, which brings us to the second major change. Instead of just conducting studies whenever they wanted, as long as they had the funds and the resources to do so, drug companies now had to register and

submit details of their proposed clinical trials before testing on humans could begin. That change gave the FDA the power to approve or reject trial proposals which imposed a new level of supervision over scientists and drug companies that had never been seen before. While the new amendment might have been a pain in the ass for the drug manufacturers, it was actually great news for Dr. Kligman who continued to work in the secretive darkness of the pterodome. According to Acres of Skin, quote, he procured more commercial and governmental contracts, initiated more experiments, recruited more inmates as test subjects, and hired more medical personnel to manage the operation's busy

schedule. As his research program continued to grow, Kligman decided he wanted to expand his studies outside of the field of dermatology. So on August 26, 1963, Dr. Albert Kligman applied to the Division of Licensing and Regulation of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, the AEC, for a by-product material license, a permit that would allow him to conduct human experiments with radioactive materials now. That's fun According to his application. Dr. Kligman sought to conduct physiological and pharma pharmacological studies on the absorption of radioactive materials through the skin by topical application intradermal injection and by

Clifford get your fucking ass over here ion to for oh my god fuck this word ion to for osis ion to for rhesus who the fuck says that word other than medical lectures and by ion to for rhesus the specific radioactive isotopes dr. Kligman intended to work with according to his application included mercury, arsenic, zirconium, sulfur, iodine, carbon, carbon, the nickel and hydrogen. The application was identified, I was just thinking to myself, as a somehow I get a job in another universe, as a medical lecture and like I understand the things academically but I can't say 87% of the words.

And I'm just in front of a bunch of students. It's just like my hell. We just be like day after day in front of a bunch of students being like, and then the, uh, God damn it! The fucking Z-Cody fucking shit! Just look at your textbook! It's the fourth word on the second line down anyway

Just constantly screaming the application also identified a man named dr Benjamin Kalznik as he supervising authority over the entire radioactive program aka the radiation protection officer According according to the application the job of the radiation protection officer was to ensure the proper storage of radioactive materials inspected periodically without any advance notice the operating conditions in all laboratories where it worked with radioisotopes is in progress and call attention to any infractions of rules and regulations. to his application for a by-product material license, in October of 1963, the AEC sent a letter to Dr. Kligman to express their concern for using a prison population as test subjects and experiments that would expose them repeatedly to radioactive material. Fair. Therefore, the letter explained, before they could move Dr. Kligman's application forward, they requested a statement from, quote, the authorities of Homsburg Prison as to their policy concerning this type of study on prisoners, as well as a statement from an official of the institution agreeing to have radioactive material on the premise,

excuse me, and a statement concerning the use of radioactive materials on prisoners at the institution. Later that month, the AEC received a response from the medical director of the entire Philadelphia prison system, Mr. Earl Tucker, who said he was writing on behalf of the Homesburg prison superintendent. And the letter read, just fucking give it to me! at Homesburg Prison and we are permitting the use of such material in testing programs involving prisoners at the institution because we have been assured by Dr. A.M. Kligman that the amounts used will be infinitesimal and the risks are essentially zero. In addition the entire program will be supervised by a committee headed by Dr. Benjamin Kalsnick who will be directly responsible to Dr. A.M. Kligman. But this was a straight-up lie. Dr. Kalsnik was not supervising shit. He didn't even know his

name was being used to give a green light to these experiments. On January 2nd 1964, Dr. Kligman is granted a by-product material license by the AEC allowing him to procure, store, and direct the use of radioactive and nuclear materials on human test subjects. There were a few stipulations to his license though. Most importantly that the by-product material shall only be used by or under the direct supervision of Benjamin Kalsnick, MD. In other words, even though the license was granted to Dr. Kligman for his research lab, the official authorized user of the nuclear material was Dr. Kalsnick, who again has no

idea what's going on. They're just forging his signature. Around that same time, Dr. Kligman got another big win. At the beginning of 1964, the United States Army awarded Dr. Albert Kligman of the University of Pennsylvania $326,840 to conduct experiments on the threshold doses in humans and evaluations of drugs in man. And that would be over 3.4 million dollars in today's money. And how much Dr. Kligman kept for himself is anyone's guess, but I would guess most of it since

most of his staff and all of his subjects are prisoners who are not being paid shit. To this day the contract is one of the largest ever awarded for the testing of chemical warfare agents on human subjects by the U.S. Army. The University of Pennsylvania was not the only institution hired by the Army during this period. From the early 1950s throughout the early 1970s the Army contracted 48 separate investigative drug chemical studies at over a dozen universities including Johns Hopkins, Baylor, Tulane, University of Washington, University of Colorado, NYU, and of course the University of Pennsylvania. However, most universities received at most one or two contracts from the Army over the 20-year period. The University of Pennsylvania and more specifically Dr. Kligman received six.

University of Pennsylvania and more specifically Dr. Kligman received six. The six contracts amounted to $650,000 for UPenn but really Dr. Kligman plus an additional $126,000 awarded directly to Dr. Kligman's private research lab Ivy Research at Homesburg Prison. Over $8 million in today's money. According to a report composed by the Army's inspector general in 1975, which was made public by the Freedom of Information Act, the purpose of these contracts awarded to the University of Pennsylvania was to determine the threshold response dose of adult human subjects to various chemical agents furnished by the Army's medical research laboratories at Edgewood. The chemical agents investigated were choking agents, nerve agents, blood agents, blister agents, vomiting agents, incapacitating agents, and toxins. The 21 progress progress reports rewarding these contracts indicated that at least 94 inmates were used in experiments. Holy shit. So now

they're just using prisoners as guinea pigs for chemical and biological weapons and not making them aware of the dangers of what they're signing up for. Early on in the 1964 Threshold Doses experiments, a small committee of officers stationed at the Edgewood Arsenal facility in Maryland spent three days at Homesburg's H block to assess the testing conditions. Edgewood was the Army's research hub for chemical warfare studies conducted on humans from 1948 all the way to 1975. According to their report the officers were not exactly psyched about you know

what they found in Dr. Kligman's research lab. Here's an excerpt from that report. Throughout the entire three-day period chemical testing was hampered by equipment such as needles, syringes, and alcohol sponges not being readily available. On the second day of testing, no medical personnel other than ourselves were present, nor did any appear or make contact with us prior to our leaving Friday afternoon. It is our opinion that in order for this program to be successful, there needs to be guidance and supervision of the testing by the contractors. This is especially important in the early stages of the

program of training of the nursing personnel and establishing standard operating procedures. Dr. James Ketchum, an accomplished psychopharmacologist stationed at Edgewood Arsenal at the time, later recalled how disgusted he was with Dr. Kligman the first time he visited H-Block. He said, quote, I was not pleased with the quality of work there. I was not later recalled how disgusted he was with Dr. Kligman the first time he visited H Block. He said, quote, I was not pleased with the quality of work there. I was not satisfied with the way he was using our initial subjects, and I expressed myself rather assertively. I was also not particularly impressed with Dr. Kligman's pharmacological skills. According to Ketchum, he instructed Kligman to put up some trailers in the prison yard and get some appropriate staff.

Ketchum also claims that he demanded Kligman use a, or excuse me, hire a pharma, I fucking hate these words, hire a psychopharmacologist. Fuck me. Since neither the senior physician nor anyone on his team from UPenn were trained in that field. Though Kligman assured the officer that he would hire a psychopharmacologist as soon as possible. That'd be a great scrabble word. How many fucking letters is that? That is 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 78, fucking 20 letters. Psychopharmacologist. He would hire one as soon as possible but he never did because the dude just did whatever he wanted regardless of laws and regulations and just never seemed to get in trouble for it. Dr. Ketchum was not the only clinical researcher from Edgewood Arsenal to file a complaint about Dr.

Kligman's conduct, behavior, and testing conditions. In a letter to Dr. Kligman, Lieutenant Colonel M. G. Badagaleri described his reports on the psychological effects of the chemicals on the inmates as quote, pure gibberish, absolutely useless. Nothing but a list of cliches seemingly pasted together without consideration of coherence in an attempt to provide a facade of competence and ability. It seems incredibly that a researcher such as yourself with apparent qualifications would attempt to palm off such shoddy and psychologically naive material. That was a big like, go fuck yourself. Yeah, he was continually violating the Nuremberg code in so many ways. While it seems Dr. Kligman's psychological reports never really improved,

he did fulfill Dr. Ketchum's orders and got rid of some of the inmate technicians and replaced them with civilian medical professionals. Additionally, he also had trailers erected in the prison yard to conduct the chemical experiments, you know, in instead of doing them in H block. Over the next decade these trailers would gather a reputation for being hell on earth. A place that chewed inmates up and spit them back out changed forever. As one inmate recalled, inmates who volunteered for the army experiments quote, came back to the population and did not remember their names. Guys would fade in and out of consciousness. They didn't seem to know anything. Who they were or where they were. Guys told me they had violent ugly

trips. Dogs as big as horses, worms like alligators. Some of the guys beat themselves up and would punch themselves in the head. Some of the guys would come back on the blocks and tell of horrific trips eaten by giant spiders living in the 13th century. Another guy said he was hung and killed. So that's fun. What the fuck were they doing to these guys? Well, one thing was probably giving them insanely huge doses of LSD because that was one of the many experiments that were being conducted at Edgewood Arsenal. Those experiments were conducted for years.

There, human subjects were given doses of LSD ranging from twice what you would find on a typical tab for recreational use to 15 times what you would normally use. I truly cannot imagine how hellish taking 15 tabs of acid would feel like. You are so sensitive to your environment, your mental state is, you know, so fragile when taking a heavy dose. These guys weren't taking it in some nice woodland setting out in the sun listening to a friend play Grateful Dead on the guitar around a campfire. They weren't surrounded by people they loved and good vibes. You know, they're being dosed inside a cheap drab prison trailer with no AC being monitored by researchers who

truly to the depths of their souls don't give a flying fuck about him. Crazy that the Edgewood Arsenal guys were frustrated with the way Dr. Kligman was conducting his experiments because when the public found out about their experiments there was a ton of outrage. In September of 1975 the medical research volunteer program was discontinued at the Edgewood Arsenal and all resident volunteers sent home. The founder and director of the program, Van Murray Sim, was called before Congress, chastised by outraged lawmakers who questioned the absence of follow-up care for the human volunteers, amongst other things. Back to Homesburg, each of the Army trailers there contained six small observation cells,

with the floors, ceiling, and walls all covered in bright white padding. The heavy door to the cell had a small rectangular peep slot and hanging from the ceiling was a surveillance camera and microphone roughly the size of a shoebox. What a fun setting for a huge acid trip. Before being taken into the cell, prisoners who volunteered for the army experiments, usually three groups of six, were stripped naked and given brief physical examinations. Then Dr. Kligman or a UPenn resident, would give the inmates a quick talking to. They were told they would be testing a new experimental drug and that

was about it. Each prisoner was then handed a dense packet of text-heavy release forms to sign. They were not given any information about what they were actually signing. They were just told that once they did, they would immediately receive $300 in payment for their participation. Big upgrade from getting five bucks now that they have military funding. But still not a lot considering what they would go through and how much funding the doctor was getting. Dr. Sigmund Weitzman, who had spent a summer working as a research assistant for the University of Pennsylvania when he was a 22-year-old, recalled years later trying to read the inmate

release forms before handing them out to the prisoners and he said I Couldn't even understand them. How could an uneducated inmate? The inmates par for the course were never told the substances they were being exposed to Oftentimes not even the research assistants themselves knew what they were given to the test subjects According to a man named Al Zababa who spent 1964 locked up in Homesburg for burglary Al Zababa, who spent 1964 locked up in Homesburg for burglary. If you asked a med tech or research assistant what they were about to make you swallow, rub on your skin, or inject you with, they would reply with some version of, I don't know, I can't tell you. After signing the forms and receiving their 300 bucks, the test subjects for the army experiments were given the mystery

drug, then locked up in a padded cell for observation. Dear God. From 1964 to 1973, the inmates at Homesburg Prison were subjected to a variety of Army-grade, mind-disabling chemical warfare agents. In his monthly reports to the Army's Medical Research Laboratories at Edgewood, Dr. Kligman described the impact these drugs had, which were referred to largely by their military code names. You know, he talked about the impacts they had on the inmates. Here's a few excerpts from his reports. Chemical Agent 282. Clifford! Chemical Agent 282.

A glycolate class chemical. Inmates described their reactions as groggy, light-headed, woozy, top-heavy, and drugged. Some claimed they had watery eyes or were cross-eyed with double vision. Two subjects said the walls of the room seemed to be moving or floated like the sides of a tent blown in the wind. A few subjects hallucinated, seeing faces or insects, and one had auditory hallucinations they heard music. That's fun.

Trapped in a padded room in a prison seeing faces and bugs. Next one. Chemical agent car 302, 386. An intermediate acting drug similar to scopolamine. Inmates suffered from lightheadedness, feeling high in unsteadiness. Their legs felt rubbery and their speech became slurred. They said the walls and ceilings drifted away. Thinking slowed and drowsiness appeared. I mean that one sounds kind of nice actually. If I was in a prison I would imagine that I would like to see the walls and ceilings drifted away. Thinking slowed and drowsiness appeared. I mean, that one sounds kind of nice actually. If I was in a prison, I would imagine that I would like to see the walls and ceiling around me drift away. Next one, chemical agent 111. Consciousness during the test appeared dull.

Several subjects had symptoms suggesting delirium. They reported dreams that were primarily visual and in color. The hallucinations occasion were frightening. Subjects had difficulty distinguishing reality from fantasy. A few subjects complained of symptoms for a period as long as six weeks after receiving the agent. That's insane. Next one, Chemical Agent 668. Heaviness of the eyes and unsteadiness were the dominant central symptoms. Subjects were drowsy, dozed more and daydream more than normal. A few visual illusions and hallucinations were reported. Occasionally, cracks or spots were interpreted as insects or faces. A few subjects reported

motion of the walls after one hour. The walls seemed to be breathing." I mean, that doesn't sound that bad. Still weird. They're doing that in a prison though. One more. Chemical Agent 666. Two of the subjects literally transformed into giant spiders made of steel, dug through the concrete floor of the trailer, and built layers deep beneath the earth's crust. Six other subjects exploded into balls of fire, and then their released spirits entered the spider lairs, quickly reemerging as actual demons. Another one of the subjects tore out his own eyes, then ripped out all of his teeth and jammed his teeth into his empty bloody eye sockets before levitating and loudly declaring himself Lord of the Locusts, before summoning the spider inmates and riding them, one foot on each, holding reins made out of burnt demon

subject flayed skin. U.S. military advisors, after bringing in a team of chaplains who were able to send the test subjects down to hell after a prolonged spiritual battle involving the death of several of the aforementioned chaplains, were very pleased with the results. Obviously that last experiment is one that only exists in my head. Coding it is experiment 666. Probably a dead giveaway. There was a bunch of bullshit. Dead giveaway. Dead giveaway.

My neighbor got big testicles because we see this door every day. Every day. We eat ribs. I never get tired of that. On October 19th, 1964, nearly a year after Dr. Kligman was granted the license to handle radioactive material, the AEC decided to give Dr. Kalsn was granted the license to handle radioactive material, the AEC decided to give Dr. Kalsnick a call to ask him how his experiments at Holmesburg Prison were going and Dr. Kalsnick was very confused and then I imagine fucking furious. He said he had absolutely no idea that radioactive experiments were happening at Holmesburg and

if they were they didn't have shit to do with him. Equally as confused as Kalsnick, theEC explained that it was uh that he was listed excuse me as the radiation protection officer and authorized user of radioactive material on Dr. Kligman's by-product license. Kalsnick told them again I have no idea what you're talking about and he requested to have his name immediately removed from that license. Didn't take long for Kalsnick to figure out what the hell had happened. He had been taken advantage of big time by Dr. Kligman. About a year earlier he'd gotten a call from an old classmate from med school, Mrs. Beatrice Troyan.

Over the phone Beatrice had asked him if he'd be willing to do one teensy tiny favor for her husband and her husband was Dr. Albert Kligman. Albert she explained wanted to conduct an experiment using radioactive materials but needed some guidance. And since Kalznik was a forerunner in experimental use of radioactive isotopes, since he already had the clearance to acquire them for his studies at Hanuman Hospital, Albert was hoping to use him as a consultant for the planning of his experiments. And excuse me, it's Hanuman Hospital.

Kalznik agreed to possibly be a consultant, not a supervisor, and Beatrice thanked him profusely, and then they hung up. Kalsnick now waited to be contacted further about the project and, you know, what sort of consultation will be needed, but he never heard anything again, not from Beatrice, definitely not from Dr. Kligman, right? The rules don't apply to Dr. Kligman. Geniuses get to do whatever they want, take advantage of whoever they want. In a follow-up letter from the, excuse me, to the AEC, which he sent immediately after this distressing phone call, he reiterated his request to be removed from Kligman's license, further emphasizing he had never signed a single document.

In December of 1964 now, the AEC contacted Dr. Kligman to notify him that his by-product license had been revoked. Because the authorized user, Dr. Kalsnick, had withdrawn his name, no person is authorized to use or supervise the use of radiopharmaceuticals. If Dr. Kligman would like to reactivate his by-product license, AEC explained, then he needed to submit a new application with a new authorized user as well as establish the new users technical qualifications to fulfill that role. Crazy he was not even threatened with any kind of legal punishment. Having military connections clearly saved his ass. Also wild the Dr. Kalsnick did not sue the ever-loving shit out of him for this. Dr. Kligman now pressed pause with whatever you know radioactive shit he was doing on inmates, but he kept going full speed ahead with other unethical experiments.

In February of 1965, Kligman conducted a study to see if applying testosterone topically to the scalp could help generate hair growth. For test subjects in this particular study, he used both inmates at the prison and residents of the Riverview Home for the Aged. Oh, that's sweet. Now he's also taking advantage of senior citizens in nursing homes. So he's taking advantage of prisoners, mentally handicapped children living in asylums, and senior citizens in nursing homes. These are the populations he preyed upon. Man, what a guy. Much to his delight, the experiment confirmed his hypothesis. Testosterone does help hair growth. If you fucking rub enough of it on the bald dome of your 98-year-old papa,

as he fucking is passed out in nursing home, you will get some hair eventually. In an article for the Journal of the American Medical Association, JAMA, JAMA, JAMA! He wrote that through this modest experiment, he'd found an indisputable demonstration of at least partial regrowth of hair in the prisoners. While JAMA did publish Kligman's report on the experiment, it alarmed them so much they felt the need to include this warning at the very beginning of the article, right under the title. Until more exhaustive

clinical experience is obtained, the potent capabilities of testosterone, which is one of the few substances well absorbed through intact skin, should deter most physicians from adding the cream to their clevard, armamentaria, salt and water retention, virilization of women and their in utero female offspring, other endocrine imbalances, testicular atrophy, prostatic hypertrophy, and stimulation of androgen-dependent prostatic carcinoma,

all possible consequences of such a therapy constitute dangerous reefs in these uncharted waters. So this prisoner got some new hair, but maybe they also got some tiny balls and a swollen prostate. July 27th, Dr. Kligman submitted a new application for a by-product material license listing himself now as the authorized user of the radioactive materials. In response to this new application the AEC requested further information on Dr. A.M. Kligman's basic and clinical radioisotope training and expertise or excuse me training and experience. In November of

1965 Dr. Kligman submitted a document to the AEC outlining his extensive training and experience in the use of radioactive materials. Literally all of his experience was fraudulently obtained. In the document he claimed to have taken a six-month formal course under Dr. Benjamin Kalsnick at Hahnemann Hospital in 1963. He's fucking lying again. And that his experience included two years of investigational use of radioisotopes at Honoman Hospital, which is another lie. Dr. Kalsnick, who was unaware at the time that Dr. Kligman was once again using his name to get

access to radioactive materials, later would dispute Kligman's claims saying, I never taught Kligman anything. Certainly not about radioactive material and never at Hahnemann. He never took any training program here of any length. But still, he doesn't sue Dr. Kligman, and Dr. Kligman gets in no legal trouble for this bullshit. Early on in 1966, Dr. Kligman and the University of Pennsylvania received 10 grand from the Dow Chemical Company now to test the effects of dioxin, a highly poisonous pesticide-slash-herbicide,

one of the key components of Agent Orange on humans, incarcerated humans. And this happened while the compound was increasingly being linked to cancer, birth defects, and fetal death. While the Environmental Protection Agency, the EPA, wanted to ban Dow Chemical from producing dioxin ever again. But dioxin was Dow Chemical's biggest moneymaker internationally, racking up billions of dollars in sales year after year around the globe. So to prove those morons down at the EPA wrong, they hired Dr. Kligman to show everybody how safe and harmless dioxin is. However, when Gerald Rowe, a high-ranking official at Dow Chemical, sent Dr. Kligman the substance to be used in the test, he warned that dioxin is, quote,

highly toxic and an oral dose of one-half to one microgram, which is one millionth of a gram, it is always fatal in laboratory animals with a typical clinical picture of severe liver and kidney injury. The seriousness of the consequences that might develop from testing with this type of compound require that we approach the matter in a highly conservative matter or highly conservative manner. Yeah, this shit is truly poison. I mean, its intended purpose is to kill shit as a pesticide and a herbicide and it's very good to addition out death. Might have killed a neighbor of mine too. When Lyndon and I

first moved to Coeur d'Alene, next door neighbor, this guy in his 60s or maybe 70, named Jim, was very, very concerned about lawn care. In a way, only old men ever seemed to be. Especially dandelions. He had a real thing about dandelions. He completely eradicated them from his lawn, but he'd seen some in my lawn. He was very worried about the dandelions in my lawn spreading back to his lawn. He really wanted me to use this shady industrial herbicide he had in this big like I think probably like a five gallon bucket, several gallons at least. Looked like it had been made 40 or 50 years earlier than it probably had. Don't remember

how he got it, but he was very proud that it was illegal. I remember him referencing Agent Orange, saying that it had dioxin in it, just like Agent Orange does. I also remember him talking shit about scientists and the EPA and how it was bullshit that you couldn't buy whatever you wanted for your lawn anymore, they're trying to control this. You know, nothing you could buy now, killed weeds like this stuff. Jim was very big on the kind of libs are destroyed America and he considered regulation you know a bunch of leftist bullshit. I did not use that

shit on my heart because it fucking scared me I thought I was gonna kill the dogs. Jim basically well I guess you know Penny is the dog we had at that time but I thought I was gonna kill her. Jim basically stopped speaking to me over the next you know few years because I wouldn't do what he wanted in certain ways and then he painfully wasted away of lung cancer. Looked like a skeleton with a thin layer of skin covering his bone towards the end of his life before he went into hospice and don't be Jim. Watchdog agencies are good. Do they make mistakes? Yes. Are they ever corrupt? Sure, I imagine so. Corruption exists in various degrees virtually everywhere and I imagine it always will. But, watchdog agencies do a lot more good than bad,

like keeping us away from powerful toxins and carcinogens like dioxin. According to the EPA's website today, dioxins are highly toxic and can cause cancer, reproductive and developmental problems, damage the immune system, and can interfere with hormones. During the initial six months of the test, per Rowe's instructions, Dr. Kligman applied a dose of 0.2 micrograms of dioxin to the foreheads, ears, forearms,

and backs of 10 inmates twice a day. Each week, Dr. Kligman gradually increased the dosage until he reached 16 micrograms twice a day. At the end of the six months, Kligman sent a letter to Rowe saying that he had yet to see any side effects of dioxin in the human test subjects. No subject develops symptoms that could be related to the treatment, therefore I am hopeful that you will extend our grant for another year so that we can carry out our original program," he wrote. Rowe agreed and Dr. Cligman received additional grant money to fund the continuation of the experiment. Over the next two years, Dr. Clligman received additional grant money to fund the continuation of the experiment. Over the next two years Dr. Kligman subjected the

inmates to daily dosages of 7,500 micrograms of dioxin, which that's how high you would get, which was 468 times the maximum authorized amounts. And again he gets in no trouble. How many of those inmates got cancer 10 or 20 years later thanks to that experiment? All of them? Most of them? Well all that was going on in May of 1966 Dr. Albert Klickman's by-product material license is renewed by the AEC. Once again allowing him to procure, store, and use radioactive materials. So that's great way to punish him. While very few people are willing to discuss their involvement with the Holmesburg Prison experiments today, or in recent years, one of the researchers,

a man named Dr. Isaac Willis, has spoken publicly. Dr. Willis was a resident at the University of Pennsylvania throughout the late 1960s and worked very closely with Dr. Kligman at Holmesburg Prison. While he was interviewed in the 1990s, Dr. Willis spoke very fondly of his time at the University of Pennsylvania Dermatology Department. He said, "'We were one of the best institutions for research. I became almost completely obsessed

with the program and my studies.' Of his former mentor and the experiments he conducted at Holmesburg Prison, Dr. Willis was conflicted. He said, "'Dr. Kligman threw out ideas that were great and stimulating, and he wanted to gather answers by whatever means possible. We took things a lot less seriously in those days. Most investigators were cavalier. We tried to use extraordinarily safe precautions but

it still does not justify what we did. I was not given adequate precautionary measures. I did not even wear gloves. I tried to be scrupulous, but I know better now years later. However, during multiple interviews, Dr. Willis defended the experiments which exposed prisoners to radioactive materials, saying that once the prisoners were injected with a radioactive isotope, they would, quote, take it out before it was absorbed. I never participated in any experiment where thymidine was left in the most, was left in for any length of time. Interestingly, although these radioactive experiments 100% did take place at Homesburg Prison and although Dr.

Kligman signed an agreement with the AEC saying that all prisoners who volunteered for radioactive tests would be told the full extent of the material they were being exposed to and the risks associated with it, no former prisoners can recall anybody saying jack shit about radioactive experiments. As Alan Hornblum argues in his groundbreaking expose on Dr. Kligman, Akecha's skin which we've referenced, and as most people nowadays believe to be the case, it is likely that quote, Kligman designed the experiments with radioactive material to so resemble familiar experiments that the test subjects were unaware that they were being injected with dangerous substances. And that tracks, right? Par for the

course with him. In July of 1966, due to the staggering number of experiments he was conducting simultaneously, Dr. Clickman catches the attention of the FDA. More specifically, he catches the attention of Dr. Francis Kelsey, that same FDA official who prevented thalidomide from entering the mainstream American medicine market. Dr. Kelsey had been doing a routine review of clinical researchers in the US when she noticed just how many experiments were going on at the pterodome. It made her wonder how accurate work could be done under mass production conditions. Under further investigation, Dr. Kelsey and the FDA found that between 1962 and 1966,

Dr. Kligman had conducted 193 studies at Homesburg Prison. They also found that of all the clinical investigators in the United States, Dr. Kligman, quote, was studying the highest number of investigational new drugs and performing tests for over 33 different drug manufacturing companies. According to some internal FDA documents, multiple scientific and methodological irregularities were also discovered in Dr. Kligman's studies. The following were the three most alarming points of concern. Dr. Kligman, a dermatologist, has been involved in a number of investigations involving fields other than his specialty. The practice of using an inmate to participate in more than one drug study at a time, for example a dermatological and an internal drug at the same

time, is the norm at Dr. Kligman's laboratory. Serious discrepancies in record-keeping and irregularities or falsification of reports found in at least four of Dr. Kligman's studies have been discovered. This guy's shady as fuck. Based on what they found on July 19th, 1966, Dr. Kligman was deemed ineligible to investigate experimental drugs, but he was never threatened with any punishments whatsoever. On that day the FDA notified the 33 drug manufacturing companies that were currently sponsoring experiments

at Homesburg Prison. That's crazy, 33 different companies. The Dr. Kligman was no longer an acceptable drug tester, writing, we have information which leads us to conclude that Albert M. Kligman, MD, President and Director of Clover Labs, Incorporated, Ivy Research Labs, Incorporated and Betro Labs, Incorporated Research Labs, Inc., and Betro Labs, Inc., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has failed to comply with the conditions applicable

to the use of investigational drugs. You are notified that Dr. Kligman and all investigators associated with the three named corporations are not eligible to receive investigational new drugs. You should recall any investigational new drugs you may have shipped to Dr. Kligman or the named corporations. But, on July 22, 1966, three days after he was deemed ineligible to receive new investigative drugs, Kligman and his attorney met with an FDA official to appeal for a less harsh punishment. What fucking punishment? They just didn't want him to continue to abuse test subjects illegally. Luckily for Kligman, he had a big wig on his side to renounce scientists with close ties

to the FDA named Dr. Donald Pillsbury. Fucking Donnie Doughboy stepping in the ring now. According to FDA files, Dr. Pillsbury argued that the, quote, results of the sudden declaration of inedibility of Dr. Kligman have been absolutely catastrophic. It has been a coup de grace to Kligman's personal, professional, and financial standing and has necessitated the sudden dismissal of several very worthy people. Who gives a fuck? It's illegal! It has also removed a highly effective morale builder at Homsburg Prison, he concluded. Right, right, right. Morale is down because the prisoners are no longer able to have radioactive experiments performed on them.

I wonder if morale dropped when Dr. Kligman was done injecting the tips of a bunch of prisoners dicks with herpes. Probably, no, please FDA, please let the doctor give my dick more sores and infections. God, it makes me so happy. Really boost my morale. Donny Doboy also went on to describe Dr. Kligman as a very imaginative and productive clinician and investigated with a worldwide reputation. On August 4, 1966, high ranking officials of the FDA agreed to visit Homesburg Prison to see what all the fuss is about and to hear the proposed changes Dr. Kligman planned to make in order to now comply better with FDA regulations and get back to work. Eleven days later, August 15th, the FDA releases a memorandum stating,

it appears that newly initiated procedures at the Homesburg Prison Research Program are adequate to satisfy our requirements. And just like that, Kligman is back doing what he did best, exploiting the fuck out of a vulnerable population. Right, what a bunch of horse shit. Some people from the big corporations with lots of money that

he was working for and or the military clearly I think strong-armed the FDA into complicity. In a later interview about how he had been disqualified from being an experimental investigator and then reinstated as an experimental investigator in such a short amount of time, Dr. Kligman said it was the prisoners fault he had been shut down in the first place and then had to build back up. He claimed that all the discrepancies and errors in his studies that the FDA had found were caused by inmate technicians he had quote wrongfully trusted to aid in his research. He actually said, I became a victim of a scam. Man, that dude took his arrogant prickness to just legendary levels. The prisoners who were being paid next to nothing to help him instead of

him you know paying a proper wage to free citizens and bring them in they were scamming him. God if anybody was scamming anybody it was clearly Dr. Kligman scamming the prisoners who he kept in the dark regarding the true nature and danger of his experiments. Dr. Kligman claiming to be scammed by prisoners is like Ghislaine Maxwell claiming to have been scammed by Jeffrey Epstein or being scammed by the underage girls that the fucking two of them were raping and helping others rape. In 1967, Kligman patents Retin-A, aka Tretinoin, a medication that could clear up acne without causing further irritation to the skin. To this day remains the most effective treatment for acne on the market.

He and the University of Pennsylvania licensed it to Johnson and Johnson and he made sure to cut all the prisoners he'd abused to develop it, you know, in on a small percentage of the royalties. Yeah right, now they didn't get shit. How much did Dr. Kligman make off this one, you know, kind of medicine that he developed? Patented? Not sure, but in 1992 the University of Pennsylvania sued both Johnson and, excuse me, sued Johnson & Johnson and Dr. Kligman for 10 million dollars in back royalties and the lawsuit was dismissed. But if the university thought that that was how much they should have gotten the

patent holder, Dr. Kligman, I mean he had to have made much more than that by 1992. Just millions and millions and millions of dollars. July of 1970, hundreds of prisoners armed with meat cleavers, bony knives, makeshift pitch forks, and table legs started a violent riot in the dining hall at Holmesburg Prison. They probably just were mad, you know, about a brief lull and inhumane radiological experiments, you know, at the prison. Their morale was low. They hadn't had their dicks infected in, you know, a brief lull and inhumane radiological experiments you know at the prison. Their morale was low they hadn't had their dicks infected in you know quite a while. 103 people were injured including 29 guards in a prison full of 1300 inmates approximately who were housed in a place built for a max capacity of 600. 90% of those 1300 men were awaiting trial or had been sentenced to less than two years. These are not hardened criminals.

This is not a prison full of murderers and serial rapists and child molesters. This is a place full of guys waiting to go to trial for shit like selling weed and property theft. Prison officials tried to blame the riot on black inmates. They were quoted in the paper calling them barbarians displaying definite racial patterns. So fucked up. Prison chaplains pushed back on that, said the riot actually occurred due to the ongoing poor conditions. A spokesman

for the Interfaith Chaplains Committee, which was composed of 14 Protestant, Roman, Catholic, and Jewish chaplains, said that the committee had repeatedly called these intolerable conditions to the attention of the city government, but added it's pleas, quote, have fallen on deaf ears. And what a place life was hell at the Terror Dome. Dr. Kligman knew that and he exploited that. And now let's get to let's get a new person's perspective on all this. Somebody not afraid to speak out about the bullshit they witnessed in the Terror Dome. In September of 1971 after completing his master's degree from Villanova University, Alan Hornblum came to Homesburg Prison to direct an adult literacy program for the inmates.

And during his very first day at the institution, Hornblum noticed something odd. Quote, Scores of men bare-chested in the oppressive heat were covered with gauze pads and adhesive tape. As they ambled between the cell blocks, gymnasium and dining hall, I wondered about the violence that had caused the multiple wounds covering their backs, shoulders, and arms. A few days later, Hornblum asked John Reeves, a guard on cell block A, what was with all the injuries that almost the entire prison population seemed to be suffering from. And Reeves explained that the prisoners had not gotten caught up in knife fights or recreation yard brawls, but in human experiments. He bluntly explained, quote, they're part of the perfume test being run by the University of Pennsylvania.

Seeing Hornblum's horrified reaction to that information, the guard attempted to explain the situation further and said, look, you and I wouldn't do it. Sell ourselves for chump change at some strange college doctors, but inmates are crazy. And this is their only way to make money in jail. Reeves didn't seem to have been able to properly assess the situation, did he? The inmates were not the problem here. The doctor and the staff were. Hornblum will go on to spend ten years as a literacy instructor in the Philadelphia prison system. And over time he will come to find out that the inmates, again unbeknownst to them, which is the most fucked up part of all this,

were being used as human guinea pigs for far worse substances in ladies perfume. In 1972, the Associated Press published a groundbreaking report on the Tuskegee study of untreated syphilis in the Negro male, a 40-year long study conducted by the U.S. Public Health Service and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where 400 black men were denied treatment for syphilis and deceived about the nature of the tests. We just covered it in episode 463 of Time Suck, so you can listen to that if you haven't already if you want to learn more. For this episode all you need to know is that the Associated Press' 1972 report sparked outcry from the horrified public and prompted a congressional hearing to be held the following year.

And at the same time the lawmakers, whistleblowers, and outraged citizens were calling for the end of human experimentation on people who did not know what the fuck was actually happening to them, Kligman's Ivy Research Lab was still going strong doing exactly that. He did not give a single fuck about backlash because he had no respect for most people or what outraged them. All that mattered was that he got to continue with his, you know, financially lucrative experiments. 1972 was actually a busy and productive year for Kligman. In the fall of that year, pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson

hired him to test out their new baby shampoo, presumably to see if it would burn the fuck out of baby eyes. Prisoners who participated in this experiment had the baby shampoo dropped into their open eyes repeatedly over a 24-hour period. they were not allowed to rinse, itch, or touch their eyes during the course of the experiment, and had to remain in H block for observation until it was over. And what were they paid for for their pain? Three dollars! Not 300, not 30, three! Three dollars for getting shampoo poured into their eyeballs, over and over for 24 hours,

in 1972. Equivalent to just over $20 today. Around the same time, Kligman was also conducting another study not at Homesburg but at the Philadelphia County Prison. Using 150 inmates aged 25 to 40, the majority of whom were black, Kligman now sought to study how staph infections developed in humans. Staph is a type of bacterium usually, sorry, actually fairly common in humans. Staph is a type of bacterium, usually, sorry, actually fairly common in humans. It can be found at any given time on the skin

or in the nose canal in about 30% of us. While it can be completely harmless, staph can also lead to infections that range from mild skin conditions to life-threatening illnesses. The most common symptoms of a staph infection are redness, swelling, pimples, abscesses, pus-filled boils, mouth and nose blisters, low blood pressure, muscle aches, fatigue, chills,

fever, diarrhea, and vomiting. If left untreated, a staph infection can also lead to sepsis, pneumonia, heart failure, stroke, septic arthritis, meningitis, and... Clifford get your ass over here and help me with this one! Osteo... Osteomyelitis, which is an infection of the bone. In his 1972 study, Kligman and his research assistants first created a controlled skin injury in the forearm of each of the participants. In the publication of his findings, Kligman did not specify what exactly the controlled skin injury was or how it was created. So who knows how they got roughed up. After sterilizing the forearm with 70% alcohol for two minutes, the site was inoculated with staph bacteria,

either by injection in a syringe or by rubbing it into the skin. The test subjects were then closely monitored as the staph infection grew and progressed. The subjects whose infections were the most severe, of which there were 41, had punched biopsies taken from their forearms during each phase of infection development. Before precautions were adopted, three of the participants became so ill they had to be pulled from the experiment and hospitalized. All of the test subjects developed lesions, boils, and blisters from the staph infection, but in his report, Kligman assures us that, quote, on the whole, the discomfort caused by these lesions was

cheerfully borne by the volunteers. Usually, we did not produce more than two infections per forum. So that's nice. The prisoners were just, you know, cheerfully enduring staph infections. That same year, Kligman married a 50-year-old woman named Mitzi Melinkoff. He was 56. Unfortunately, their union cut short by her untimely death. The date she died not listed online. Neither is her obituary or marriage announcement. Seems as if she died weeks or just maybe a few months at most into the marriage. Hopefully not from an experiment.

I imagine them finding her body covered in staph infections. Herpes sores, you know, a whole bunch of more shit. Giant puddles of shampoo covering her eyes. Dr. Cligman standing above her with a clipboard in hand, just unemotionally saying, This concludes our experiment. I had hoped she would be as strong or stronger as my prison subjects. Alas, she was nearly useless. Then he just shrugs your shoulders, walks into the kitchen, just mumbles something like, Guess I'll have to make my own sandwich now.

Just a few months later, Dr. Cligman finds and marries his third wife, home in 13 years as a junior named Lorraine, who he would spend the rest of his life with. Feels suspicious. New wife is, you know, or former wife, excuse me, is barely in the ground. He already has a third wife. I guess it was a new wife. Second wife, second new wife, barely in the ground. Lorraine had two sons from her previous marriage named Keith and Robert. Together the couple have a daughter, Gail Kligman, who is now a sociologist at UCLA, and two sons, Michael and Douglas.

Yeah, Gail is actually a professor of sociology at UCLA and an author and expert on politics, culture, and gender in central East Europe, both during the communist period and since its demise. Interestingly, she's been awarded a lot of research grants over the years and works with UCLA's Promise Institute for Human Rights. Her bio does not mention her dad. Son Michael runs a psychiatric practice for adults in Salt Lake City. His extensive bio also has no mention of his dad. And then Douglas worked in Pennsylvania as a dermatologist like his dad until he retired in 2023. And then Douglas worked in Pennsylvania as a dermatologist like his dad until he retired in 2023. And just like his brother and sister, no mention of dad in his bio. Stepsons Keith and Robert Lesnick both died in medical experiments conducted

by Albert, where the tips of their dicks were stuffed full of C4 explosives and then, you know, exploded. Rest in pieces, lots of dick pieces. No, Keith actually works as a jazz pianist and composer based in New Jersey around the Princeton area now, as far as I can tell. And finally, stepson Robert Lesnick, currently working in Palm Desert, California as a dermatologist, who does not seem to ever mention his stepdad on professional descriptions of what he does. Might not mean anything, you know, that none of them publicly mentioned Dr. Kligman as far as I can tell. Feels like maybe they don't want to be associated with him though, which would make sense.

And back to the timeline now, it's 1973. And that year, a congressional subcommittee is holding hearings titled The Quality of Healthcare Human Experimentation. One of the hearings, which took place on March 7th, was held specifically to discuss the use of prisoners as subjects of medical research. During the hearing, Alan Lawson, the director of the Prisoners' Rights

Council in Philadelphia, gave a statement to express his findings and opinions on the medical experimentation on prisoners. Much of his statement had to do with the experiments conducted by Kligman and his goons. He said, for more than the last 15 years, Dr. Albert M. Kligman, a member of the Dermatology Department of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, has been conducting experiments on our prison population.

The research has been done by Ivy Research Laboratories, Inc., a private profit-making Pennsylvania corporation founded by Dr. Kligman, who is its president and chief experimenter. Through IV research several thousand experiments have been conducted on thousands of prisoners. The experimentation has been wide ranging. They include the testing of many new drugs and cosmetics and testing of new applications for many already marketed drugs and cosmetics. These experiments have also involved the creation of various bacteriological, viral and fungal infections and skin conditions. Most of this work has been done for private industry, some for the U.S. Department of

Defense, and some is Dr. Kligman's personal brainstorming. That's cool. He's just kind of fucking around with some of the experiments. Just that, you know, just out of curiosity. Just, why not? Let's just throw some shit against the wall, see what sticks. And thousands of experiments. In June of 1973, Warden Pat Curran and Deputy Warden Robert of Homesburg Prison are stabbed to death by two

inmates inside the terror dome and a guard was wounded trying to defend them. The warden and deputy warden have been stabbed after they refused to listen to some complaints about prison conditions. During the offending inmates subsequent trials the defense team blamed the horrible conditions of Homesburg Prison for their actions. They described the institution as a quote, disgusting place likely to bring out the worst in a man. Conditions in the prison constitute cruel and inhuman punishment.

Doesn't feel like the experiments are doing a ton for prison morale, I guess. July 12th, 1974 now now as a result of the congressional hearings held the previous year the National Research Act is signed into law by President Richard Nixon and the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research is formed and this came about mostly in response to the public outcry over the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and for as much as I have shit on Nixon over the years, I gotta commend him for signing

that act into law. So good job, tricky dick. Upon its creation, the commission was charged with two major tasks, identify the basic ethical principles that should underlie the conduct of biomedical and behavioral research involving human subjects, and develop guidelines to assure that such research is conducted in accordance with those principles. Much to the surprise of the newly formed Federal Commission, in addition to university researchers, medical professionals, scientists, and big wigs and pharmaceutical companies,

the National Research Act also received some major pushback from prison inmates. During their investigation into the pre-market drug testing facility at Southern Michigan Prison, members of the commission interviewed 60 prisoners who had volunteered to be research subjects. During their interviews, 54 of the inmates expressed dismay and disapproval of the government's attempt to crack down on prison experiments. Michael Phillip, a 31-year-old inmate who had volunteered for nearly two dozen experiments in the past, said that the tests, which prisoners were paid between 50 cents and a dollar for were useful because quote they might turn up something that is good for everybody. In a newspaper interview, and that's sweet,

in a newspaper interview the inmate was also quoted as saying it's unfair I have the right to do with a do with what I want with my god damn it I have a right to do what I want with myself and you know what sometimes I think the obvious moral thing to do is to protect people who do not understand for whatever reason how to protect themselves or why they should protect themselves. Despite some pushback from prisoners in 1974,

Philadelphia bans medical testing at prisons and the research lab at Homesburg is finally officially and truly shut down forever. In the wake of Dr. Kligman's unethical human experiments in 1978, four years later, the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research will pass further regulation providing protection for prisoners, protection to prisoners, rather, from unethical research practices. Nearly two decades later, in 1995, Homesburg Prison

is officially shut down, the whole thing. Three years after that, 1998, Alan Hornblum, that journalist who taught an adult literacy course at Homesburg for 10 years, published Acres of Skin, Human Experiments at Homesburg Prison. The shocking expose is full of testimonies from dozens of former inmates,

as well as staff and students from the University of Pennsylvania, members of the FDA, and military personnel who worked with Dr. Kligman. When it came out, Horne Bloom's book sparked outrage from the public about the inhumane treatment of prisoners and prompted more prisoners from all around the U.S. to come forward and share their experiences being lab rats. Given some time to think about it, they seemed to have come to the conclusion that what happened to them was not actually a good thing, that they had been exploited and should have been protected. The following year, in 1999, the Pennsylvania House Judiciary Committee on Crimes and Corrections

gathered to hear a few former inmates' testimonies about the abuse they suffered at the hands of Dr. Kligman and his team. At 70 years old, Joseph Smith, one of the many inmates who was unknowingly exposed to warfare chemicals in army tests and dioxin and the Dow Chemical tests took the stand to tell his story and he said, During all of these experiments I never saw a doctor. Inmates who wore nurses jackets were the ones who administered the tests. They looked like they were official because they were wearing the white jackets so I didn't

question what was going on. I signed a consent form before each experiment, but I never understood what it meant. They did not explain to me before each test what they were going to do or what effects I should expect. I thought that signing the form meant that I allowed them to do the experiment on me. At the time, I just felt lucky to be doing the experiment because it meant I could earn some money. The money was the biggest reason I participated in these experiments. I wanted to get all of the money I could to send home to my mother. She was a widow and had a hard time. I also used the money to buy things at the commissary such as cigarettes, ice cream,

or candy. Sometimes my mother would send me a little bit of money when she could but really the money from the experiments was my only income. Because I am a veteran of World War II and the Korean War, I have attended the VA Hospital in Philadelphia. My other medical records regarding things such as my eyesight are there. I never saw the prison doctor while I was in Homesburg. I went out of Homesburg prison for over 30 years.

I think about these experiments and what they did to me all the time. In this time I have never really been able to keep a job because my mind drifts and anything can upset me. Before the tests, I considered myself a pretty happy person. I was talkative and friendly. Now I have bad nerves and I'm not really happy. I believe my lack of attention and bad nerves are because of the chemical test I participated in while in Homesburg prison. I can still see the places where the patch test was administered on my arms legs and back. My skin there is discolored and is sensitive to touch. My teeth started falling out in 1969 and now

I wear dentures. I believe this is because of the toothpaste test I was involved in in Homesburg. I also have glaucoma that I believe is related to the sight test that I was given while in prison. Since the test my stomach has hurt every day. How many other test subjects suffered for the rest of their lives as well? People who had lost all trust and authority figures, who didn't understand who they should take their complaints to, people who assumed they would never get justice anyway for what happened to them, so why even bother to complain? However, in the year 2000, about 300 former Homesburg study participants did sue Kligman, Penn, the city of

Philadelphia, Dow Chemical, and Johnson & Johnson for exposing them to quote infectious diseases, radioactive isotopes, and psych & Johnson for exposing them to quote infectious diseases, radioactive isotopes, and psychotic drugs such as LSD without having been given informed consent. Unfortunately, they lost the case. But only because the statute of limitations had expired, not because their case wasn't valid. But did those companies or Dr. Kligman then do the right thing and compensate them anyway? No, of course not.

They never received a dime. In 2003, Kligman, despite all he thing and compensate him anyway? No, of course not. They never received a dime. In 2003 Kligman, despite all he had done, was presented with a lifetime achievement award by the Penn College of Physicians. Right outside the window of the hall where Kligman was being honored, former Homesburg inmates, their friends, family, supporters, they protested, though the ceremony continued unperturbed by their presence. That is so fucking tone deaf. That same year when

asked about the inmates that had come forward with tales of being misled and tortured, when asked about how they had suffered, Kligman said quote, I've always offered that if anyone was ever injured in any way. Come to us and we'll take care of you. We're sorry if we did anything like that and you know what? Not one person has ever come. Man, fuck Dr. Kligman. What a prick. Why would anyone ever come to you? You would be the last person on Earth they would want to come to for more treatment. On February 2nd, 2010, Dr. Albert Kligman finally died of a heart attack at the age of 93.

He was still working as a professor emeritus for the University of Pennsylvania. After all that, that motherfucker lived a long healthy esteemed life and he was wealthy for most of it. In his New York Times obituary, chairman of Penn Dermatology Department, Dr. Stanley said of the deceased, he was innovative and very charismatic and he inspired people to do research in dermatology and to learn about disease and to not simply accept whatever the professor said. He had a dozen or two experiments going at one time. He turned Homesburg into the Kmart of human experimentation. It was a real industry. He turned Homesburg into the Kmart of human experimentation? Was that a compliment or an insult? It feels like

it like a he snuck an insult in there. As a former kid who had to do most of his back-to-school shopping at Kmart, if someone wrote that I was the Kmart of podcasting, I would definitely be very much insulted. The Times also said, Dr. Kligman maintained that the public benefited greatly from the experiments which besides retin-A led to most of the treatments used today for poison ivy. He repeatedly said that the research was within the accepted norms at the time and that no prisoner suffered long-term harm as far as he knew. Well that's convenient. He downplayed the harm he caused right up until the very end. Just rationalized, minimalized his horrors. Just like almost every serial killer does. I just keep thinking

of in so many ways he just reminds me of a serial killer. Now let's get out of this timeline. So pretty fascinating how this story is not really known, isn't it? I mean, not nearly as known as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, but maybe even more fucked up since a lot of Kligman's experiments were even more nefarious, you know, and targeted in addition towards a lot of black inmates. The majority of the pterodome's prison population was black for the duration of these experiments. Groups like cognitively impaired children who had no family watching out for them and

were intellectually incapable of understanding what was being done to them and senior citizens. Also unlike with the Tuskegee, Dr. Kligman actually gave test subjects STIs and he never got in trouble for anything he did. Instead he was financially rewarded, he was given awards by his peers. Does this story make me leery of doctors and scientists? No, it doesn't actually. Not really. It doesn't erode my overall trust in doctors because stories like these are the exceptions to the rule. They are not the rule. They're outliers.

But they also serve as reminders that a certain percentage of people are just fucking selfish and shitty. Some doctors are bad, just like some cops are bad. Like some teachers are bad. Like some teachers are bad. Like some priests and pastors are bad. Some members of every profession imaginable are bad. And that is why watchdog organizations are so incredibly fucking important. Right? It's why it's important for governments to fund them to protect their citizens. And funding has been cut this year, or there are at least ongoing efforts to cut funding for so many of these important

organizations. And that troubles me greatly. The House Appropriation Committee's proposed 2026 budget includes a near 50% cut to the Government Accountability Office's budget. Representing a reduction of roughly $400 million from current spending levels, good government groups argue it would severely hamper the GAO's ability to investigate waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government and provide oversight of the executive branch. There's also a proposal to limit the GAO's power to sue the executive branch for illegally withholding congressionally approved funds, which is troubling. A 2025 leaked budget document suggests a potential 17% decrease in the United States Food and Drug Administration's

funding from $7.2 billion in 2023 to $6.5 billion in 2026 might not sound like much. I know they still have a lot, but the proposed cuts have sparked concerns about the agency's ability to fulfill its mission of ensuring food and drug safety. The draft budget proposes shifting routine food inspections from the FDA to state control. There are concerns over whether or not states have the resources and infrastructure to handle the increased workload and responsibility. Cuts could also impact the FDA's ability to conduct foreign drug inspections, potentially affecting the safety of imported medications.

The EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency, facing significant budget cuts under the proposed 2026 budget with a 54% reduction from the fiscal year 2025 enacted levels. This would drastically reduce funding for various programs, including those focused on clean water, drinking water, and enforcement to make sure that, you know, I don't know, fucking corporations are dumping chemicals into the rivers. Recent funding cuts specifically the recession of a rescission excuse me of 1.1 billion allocated to the corporation

for public broadcasting by President Trump and Congress are expected to have a particularly devastating impact on rural public media stations and their emergency response capabilities that do things like help notify citizens of you know fucking lethal flash floods like the one in Texas recently, tornadoes, wildfires, other natural disasters. These cuts, which eliminate federal support for NPR, PBS, and their affiliates are projected to forestations in rural areas to make difficult decisions due to their heavy reliance on this funding for operations and services like emergency alerts. And I can go on and on and on. The federal government gets demonized so often.

But if not the federal government, who do you trust to make sure motherfuckers like Dr. Kligman don't get to slap some fucking herp on the dick of some dude waiting trial or serving a six-month sentence for buying weed? Who do you trust to make sure some evil pharmaceutical corporation doesn't fast track some drug like thalidomide that causes severe birth defects in one of five fetuses? Who do you trust to make sure some international conglomerate herbicide company doesn't allow us to lather ourselves up with a bunch of cancer while working out in our gardens? Do you actually think massive corporations will ever consistently put people's health

above their profits? Fuck no. Capitalism and the greed that is so often a side effect of it and always will be, and I am a fan of capitalism but it needs to be regulated, and it can be regulated by anyone or any entity that stands to make more money the less regulated it is if you want to keep ourselves and keep our children safe. If we don't want to be exploited like the Dr. Kligman's test subjects that we just covered. And that, that's all I got for this one. Sorry for all the mispronunciations. Just a wild and disturbing bit of recent history and some food for thought, you beautiful bastards. And maybe a bit more in the takeaways.

more in the takeaways. Time Shuck! Top 5 Takeaways! Number one, in the early 1950s, renowned dermatologist Dr. Albert Kligman began experimenting on inmates at Homesburg Prison, aka the Terror Dome. What started with treating athlete's foot turned into decades of brutal human trials involving everything from LSD, viruses, radiation, different kinds of acid, and even Agent Orange. Number two, the inmates at Holmesburg prison who volunteered for Kligman's tests were never told what they were being exposed to. They were simply asked to sign an almost indecipherable

consent form that was never explained to them and then ushered into the lab to make a few desperately needed dollars. Number three, Dr. Kligman's human experiments, as terrible as they were, were consistently praised by the scientific community and funded by major drug corporations as well as the U.S. military. Number four, in addition to sunscreens and shampoos, Dr. Kligman also tested radioactive isotopes, highly poisonous chemical compounds, and military-grade chemical warfare drugs on prisoners. And number five new info. On October 6, 2022, the city of Philadelphia issued a formal apology to the former inmates of Homesburg Prison who have been experimented on.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney stated, While this happened many decades ago, we know that the historical impact and trauma of this practice of medical racism has extended for generations all the way through to the present day. One of our administration's priorities is to rectify historic wrongs while we work to build a more equitable future, and to do that we must reckon with past atrocities. That is why our administration today, on behalf of the City of Philadelphia, is addressing this shameful time in Homesburg's history. Without excuse, we formally and officially extend a sincere apology to those who are

subjected to this inhumane and horrific abuse. We are also sorry it took far too long to hear these words. To the families and loved ones across generations who have been impacted by this deplorable chapter in our city's history, we are hopeful this formal apology brings you at least a small measure of closure. Recognizing the deep distrust experiments like this have created in our communities of color, we vow to continue to fight the inequities and disparities that continue to this day. Very nice sentiment. However, no prisoners have yet to receive any form of compensation for their suffering. So I guess a nice gesture, but ultimately a

pretty fucking hollow one. Time Suck Top 5 Takeaways Acres of skin inside the Terror Dome has been sucked. Thank you again to the Bad Magic Productions team for helping making Time Suck. Thanks as always to Queen of Bad Magic, Lindsay Cummins. Thanks also to Logan Keith helping publish this episode designing merch for the store at BadMagicProductions.com. Thank you to Molly Box for her research on this one. Also thanks to the All-Seeing Eyes moderating the Cult of the Curious private Facebook page

and the Mod Squad making sure Discord keeps running smooth. Thanks as well to everyone on the Time Suck subreddit and Bad Magic subreddit. And now let's head over to this week's Time Sucker updates. And let's just stick to some shit this week. I know it's been a bit heavier than normal lately so keep it light. I called a few meat sacks to send in your best fecal prank stories and some of you shitbirds responded, and Nimrod very pleased. This shit sender, this first one, wishes to remain anonymous. They sent an email into Bojangles at TimeSuckPodcast.com with the subject line of

poop revenge story. Dan, just finished listening to episode 464, The Nightcaller. Eric Edgar Cook. At the end you asked for stories about using poop as a means of revenge. Well, I have such a story. Now this wasn't me who did this. This was my roommate at the time, let's call him John. So at the time me, John, and another friend lived in an apartment three floors up. We had these neighbors downstairs who were always banging on their ceiling to get us to be quiet.

If we were having a party or just walking around too loud. As college students, we didn't appreciate this at the time. And one night, after a few beers, John and our other roommate, Dave, decided to send them a message. A dirty protest, if you will. So John took a medium-sized shit on a strategically placed pile of toilet paper on the floor of the bathroom. Rather than put the shit somewhere obvious and risk affecting other innocent bystanders in the apartment building, they hatched a scheme to put it somewhere it would only be noticed by our downstairs neighbors and ideally somewhere it wouldn't be found right away. Having chosen the perfect shit site, he and Dave went downstairs to the street.

John, the shitter, has a notoriously bad name. So Dave stepped up. With the coast clear, he took the tissue wrapped shit and lobbed it up towards our neighbor's window. It landed perfectly on their window sill. Just plopped there, looking like a half-melted bar of Snickers. It was the perfect throw. Didn't even hit the window. Just landed there without a sound. And that poop remained there for weeks, slowly desiccating. We never heard from those neighbors again. I think they moved out soon afterwards. Whether or not this was related to this act of fecal terrorism, we will never know. Hail Nimrod, three out of five stars, wouldn't change a thing, Anonymous.

Anonymous, I wish I was there to have witnessed that epic shitheef. My favorite part is hearing about the how the magical shithead, the magical turd landed on the window sill but did not hit the window. I feel like I feel like you might have witnessed an actual miracle and you should continue to believe that the turd was the last straw and the reason they moved out because it makes the story better. Thank you for sharing that shit. This next shit sender has not chosen to remain anonymous.

I admire their bravery. This is so ridiculous. Shit victim Kenny Rowan sent in a message with the subject line of, Shitting story as requested. Hello master shit sucker. I'm writing to heed the call for shitting on something as per the instructions from last episode's outro. I'm actually the victim in this case however it was so epic that I'm more impressed than I am

angry. Story goes back to my high school years. I was a totally innocent student who simply left a classroom to go to the bathroom. After I left a few of my fellow classmates had a discussion about the 80 year old substitute teacher with coke bottle glasses. They didn't think she could see past the first few desks. In order to find out if they were correct, one student boldly claimed he could take a shit in my backpack, as I was gone and she wouldn't see a thing. Well, turns out he was correct.

I came back to my desk and was informed of my little treat that was waiting for me. I called bullshit. But to my utter surprise, it wasn't bullshit. It was Brian's shit. I found a little brown nugget laying steaming in my bag. Even more impressive is that he got it in the tiny little front pocket of my backpack. I still think about this maybe once a month and it's been about 20 years. So that's my shit story. Thank you for taking the time to read it. I want to also say congrats for Bad Magic reaching over a million dollars in donations. I love the priorities of Bad Magic. Your actions say more than your words. Love all the shows. Three out of five stars would not change a thing.

Also, please, please, please look into sucking the events that led Philly to bomb a block of its own city to remove the move cult. As always, keep on sucking. Your loyal Space Wizard and Annabelle, Kenny Rowan. Well Kenny, first off, thanks for being a Space lizard and an Annabelle. Also, dear God, that might be the funniest turd story I've ever heard. And you may have the best sense of humor of anyone I've ever heard of, as far as, you know, not being just filled with rage over that guy Brian shitting in your backpack. That's fucking crazy that he did that. In a class, in front of other students, into your backpack. fucking crazy that he did that in a class in front of other students into your backpack and there was apparently such a crisp clean little turd right insane and she didn't notice I guarantee that if Brian is still with us he is

sharing that tale regularly and thanks for the topic recommendation and now for one more shit witness Isabel Furcano has also chosen to not remain anonymous with her message of a fat human shit. Dear almighty sucklord and associates, just finished listening to the nightcaller episode and was summoned at the end of the episode to bring forth the following story about shitty revenge. While I was not the shitter of the story, it will forever live in my mind as the funniest prank of all time. To set the scene my brother, older brother, and I were in middle school living with my mom and stepdad. We had two dogs and a cat. Cleaning the cat's litter box was my stepdad's job as it was his cat, but he hated cleaning

it, and it was often left for far too long between cleans. It would just get pretty gross. Like two weeks of cat shit and piss. One day, I don't remember what spurred the decision. My brother decided he needed to emphasize the importance of cleaning said litter box and he took a fat human shit in it Cut to later the day when my stepdad goes downstairs and we hear loud Exclamations of disgust as presumably my stepdad realizes what was in fact not cat shit

As punishment for his crime my brother had to clean the litter box until he went to college many years later I on the other hand was an innocent part a party and got to simply enjoy the hilarity of it all. Funny poop stories aside, I've also been wanting to write in for a while to express my appreciation for all you and the team do at Bad Magic. I've elicited the time suck since COVID when I found I needed something to listen to when I dove deep into my many crafting hobbies. I've always loved hearing your unique perspectives, especially these days, and it has brought

smiles during some mentally dark times. In particular, I recently decided to leave a career of passion due to a mental, uh, due to mental struggles and forge a new path and open a small home bakery. Your personal stories of pushing through burnout and building bad magic and a few timely inspirational sucks looking at you Dolly and Mr. Rogers gave me hope and assurance to put it in, uh, put in the work and it'll all work out so thanks for all you do and keep bringing these fresh perspectives sorry not sorry for the length this email my pension and my penchant for run-on sentences Isabel PS if this makes it onto the podcast I'd like to give a shout out to my mom who introduced me to

the pod has been my buddy at your last two stand-up tours PPS no need to keep me anonymous most everyone we know already knows this story. Isabel, I love your sense of humor. I love that you went to some shows with your mom. That's adorable. I love seeing parents hang out with the little kids. Kudos to you for choosing to chase a new business, which is always scary, and thanks for sharing that shit. I wonder if your brother thought your stepdad would not notice that one of the turds belong to the cat Like like if not, how the hell did he think he's gonna get away with that?

They try and say that somebody broke into your house stole nothing, you know, just shit in litter box snuck out on notice Do you try and blame it on you or your mom? I got a lot of questions that don't need answers Yeah, very funny. I love a good poop terrorism story. I hope many of you love these as well And now let's get on out of here. And thanks for listening to another Bad Magic Productions podcast. Be sure and rate and review this show if you haven't already. Please and thanks. Thanks to the many people who have done so recently. Please don't try and run unethical medical experiments on inmates this week. Unless they're rapists and or pedophiles convicted more than once. So you know, we know they're guilty. In that specific case,

I'm open to it. And keep on sucking. And now I have to share a little taste of one of the greatest rap songs of the 90s. A song titled, Welcome to the Terror Dome, released as a single on January 26, 1990, by Public Enemy, off of their critically acclaimed album, Fear of a Black Planet. Ranked number 176 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time in 2020. Also added to the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress in 2004. Fuck yeah bro. The whole album is fantastic. And I mean this song, come on, has Pterodome in the title. Snake-bittin', been spittin' the faith, huh!

But the rhymes keep fittin', respect's been given, how's your livin'? Now I can't protect a paid off defect. Check the record and record, in additional rec. Blades offer some intellect. Made the call, took the fall, broke the laws. Not my fault that they fallin' off. Known as fair square throughout my years. Saw a growl at the livin' cow. Black to the bone, my home is your home. Oh, that's so good!