Don't Fall For It. Ben Carlson
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The radio show he produced was basically the WebMD of the early twentieth century. People would write in questions about their illness or injury, which Brinkley would read aloud on his show. Prescriptions were then given on air, which listeners could then go buy from the more than 500 drugstores he developed relationships with all over the country.[17]
No self-respecting doctor would hand out prescriptions without first examining the patient and making a diagnosis, but Brinkley wasn’t trying to appeal to reason: he was trying to appeal to people’s worst fears. Snake oil salesmen had always targeted people’s emotions, and Brinkley was no different. Now he had the ability to do so on a massive scale. This entailed not only promoting his goat gland operation, but an entire line-up of healthcare products and services.
The Kansas State Medical Board eventually revoked his medical license on the grounds of “gross immorality and unprofessional conduct.” The Kansas City Star proclaimed: “The superquack of Milford is finished.”[18]
Narrator: He was not finished.
The Placebo Effect
Morris Fishbein, an actual physician with morals who worked with the AMA, had made it his life’s work to take down hucksters and quacks, and the man at the top of his list was John Brinkley. Fishbein knew Brinkley’s ruse couldn’t last forever. The goat gland procedure was completely fabricated. There wasn’t an ounce of scientific or biological proof it could work.
The question you’re probably asking yourself is this: How the hell did it actually work for those farmers who went through this painful procedure? It could have been due to the placebo effect, but the true answer is likely simple regression to the mean. Most sick people tend to get better. In fact, it’s estimated that four out of every five physical ailments will heal themselves.[19] So even the biggest quack in the world could “heal” most patients through the passage of time or dumb luck. Unfortunately, it was those patients who came to Brinkley in dire need of treatment who suffered the most.
The Kansas Medical Board proved that at least 42 people Brinkley treated (some of whom were not sick before he treated them) had died after undergoing one of his operations or medicine programs. This number is significantly higher than almost any serial killer in history. At least six of those people had undergone the goat gland transplant. Not only was Brinkley performing medical procedures with no scientific reasoning behind them, but he would often treat patients while drunk. One patient claimed that instead of stitching him up after a prostate operation, Brinkley used a piece of rubber from a boot heel to patch him up.[20] The worst part about these statistics is they occurred at the midpoint of his career. He was far from completing his medical reign of terror.
Fishbein finally put together enough evidence to bring Brinkley to trial. It was during this trial that the prosecution used Brinkley’s own autobiography against him. Consistent with his personality, Brinkley’s autobiography was filled with lies and fabricated stories. Even though he never graduated from medical school, Brinkley gave the date of his graduation in the book. The prosecution pointed out Brinkley was actually in jail on that date. In his writings Brinkley compared himself to Martin Luther, Galileo, and Jesus Christ. The lies and deceit finally caught up with him. After practicing medicine in Texas and Mexico, even going so far as starting a radio show south of the border (since he was barred from broadcasting in the US), he was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1941. The malpractice lawsuits finally caught up with him and he died a year later.[21]
Correlation Does Not Imply Causation
People often have a difficult time understanding the idea that correlation does not imply causation. Just because women were getting pregnant after their husbands received goat testicle implants does not mean that’s what caused them to bear children. The world is full of examples of two things that appear to be related because they move in concert with one another, merely by chance. The number of films actor Nicolas Cage appeared in is highly correlated with the number of people who drown in a swimming pool each year. The divorce rate in the state of Maine neatly tracks the annual consumption of margarine.[22]
There’s an old saying that the data will tell you anything if you torture it long enough. Investor David Leinweber once ran a test to show how data can be manipulated. He found that the production of butter in Bangladesh could have been used to predict how well the US stock market would perform between 1983 and 1993. When butter production was up 1%, the S&P 500 would be up 2% the following year. And if butter production was down 10%, the S&P 500 would fall 20%. This relationship has no basis in reality but I’m guessing if you showed enough people the backtest, some of them would begin to believe they’d found a foolproof system to beat the stock market.[23]
Brinkley’s client list was said to include former Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan and the 28th President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson. Actor Buster Keaton even mentioned Brinkley and the goat testicle transplant in one of his movies in the 1920s. A US Senator from Colorado named Wesley Staley went so far as to say, “I wear goat glands and am proud of it,” in his public defense of Brinkley. A US Senator seriously said this out loud. To other people.[24]
Unfortunately, there will always be charismatic charlatans like Brinkley around to take advantage of human nature. Certain people have the ability to convince others they can make the impossible become routine. Brinkley became fabulously wealthy from his practice and it was a boon for the town of Milford. Brinkley paid for a new hospital and put in sidewalks, a new post office, and a sewage system. He even bought new uniforms for the Little League team, who were aptly named the Brinkley Goats.[25]
Not long after having his license revoked for practicing medicine in the state of Kansas, Brinkley decided to try his hand at politics by running for governor. The campaign was marked by all sorts of outlandish promises he couldn’t possibly keep – every county would have its own lake, free books, and free healthcare for all. The campaign was ridiculous from the word go and somehow, he still almost won![26] Being active in charitable causes, politics, or the local community are all wonderful ways to get people off your scent when bilking unsuspecting victims in a financial scam.
Fear and greed lend a hand in every financial mishap, and Brinkley’s tale is no different. The man himself was driven by greed and an inner desire to prove his critics wrong. It’s estimated Brinkley was bringing in more than $1 million a year during the Great Depression. This was an astronomical sum back then but even more outlandish when you consider average wages across the country were dropping like a rock, falling around 40% in 1932 alone.[27] To satiate his greed, Brinkley preyed on the fears of other (mostly) men who were ashamed of their lack of sexual prowess, the sick and injured who were in search of a miracle, and the uneducated who didn’t know any better and simply trusted someone who sounded like they knew what they were talking about. Even his wife Minnie was under his spell until the very end. She outlived her husband by nearly 40 years and claimed until her dying day that successful goat gland procedures were still being performed in secret all around the world.[28]
Same as It Ever Was
It’s easy to look back now at how gullible people in the early twentieth century were when it came to the charms of quacks and snake oil salesmen. That is until you realize those same techniques still work today. Just think of all the scams available for those looking to lose weight, improve their finances, and hold on to their youth. The AMA spent years trying to discredit Brinkley, but he had the power of persuasion, a medium of communication to the masses, and a sales technique that would have allowed him to sell water to a whale.
Healthcare has improved by leaps and bounds since Brinkley began his reign of terror on the Midwest, but that doesn’t mean there will always be a unique procedure to solve all your ills. The same is true in all facets of life. The world is a complicated, dynamic place that doesn’t always lend itself to easy solutions. There’s