WEBVTT - Part One: The Bastard Who Invented The Lobotomy 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:05.720 What's not a morning person? My me? I'm Robert Evans 0:00:05.720 --> 0:00:08.039 hosted Behind the Bastards, the show where we talk about 0:00:08.080 --> 0:00:12.080 the worst people in history, and I introduced the show badly. Uh. 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:16.599 Today we have an unusual morning recording at an ungodly hour. 0:00:17.040 --> 0:00:22.880 What is it, Sophie. I feel like I'm the first 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:25.360 person who's ever been awake this early, aside from my 0:00:25.400 --> 0:00:28.680 guest today, of course, Mr Daniel ban Kirk. Hello, thanks 0:00:28.680 --> 0:00:31.200 for having me back. How are you doing, Daniel? I'm great, 0:00:31.240 --> 0:00:36.479 my man, I'm wonderful. Daniel. Go ahead, no, no, oh, 0:00:36.520 --> 0:00:38.479 I'll just say I've I've been up for two hours, 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:43.720 so I feel it's very impressive. Do you do you 0:00:43.800 --> 0:00:47.680 like mornings? I do not, But I've recently found out 0:00:47.760 --> 0:00:50.160 that I am able to get so many more things 0:00:50.240 --> 0:00:52.800 done the earlier I get up, which would seem to 0:00:52.800 --> 0:00:55.400 be very simple math, but nothing that I had personally 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:59.720 made any efforts to experience until recently in my life. 0:00:59.760 --> 0:01:03.640 So I would say, on average nowadays, I'm up around 0:01:03.840 --> 0:01:09.360 before eight, maybe sometimes six thirty. But I am not 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:12.280 a morning person. I hate sunrises. I love sunset. Robert 0:01:12.280 --> 0:01:16.360 would say six, that's the middle of the night. Well, 0:01:17.360 --> 0:01:21.080 that is when I went to bed last night, they're 0:01:21.120 --> 0:01:24.960 about maybe five. Well, I appreciate you making this effort. Then, man, 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:29.720 that's crazy. My sleep schedule is still funked up from 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:35.120 the flight. Sure, now, Daniel, we've we've established that that 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:38.920 you're sort of ambivalent towards mornings, leaning towards not liking them. 0:01:39.440 --> 0:01:41.400 How do you feel about brains? How do you feel 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:45.440 about your brain? I feel pretty good about it. H Yeah, 0:01:45.440 --> 0:01:47.680 it's it's held up pretty well. My memory is still 0:01:47.760 --> 0:01:50.880 very good, and I haven't gotten to the point where 0:01:50.880 --> 0:01:52.720 I have to have a calendar. I would say I 0:01:52.800 --> 0:01:54.880 use it for about fifty of my stuff. I should 0:01:54.880 --> 0:01:57.160 be using it for a lot more, but mine's held 0:01:57.240 --> 0:02:01.240 up so far. I think well, I think most people 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:05.480 like their brain, except for the moments when they hate them. Um. 0:02:05.560 --> 0:02:07.760 And I think that probably for the listeners of the 0:02:07.920 --> 0:02:12.400 show is statistically have spent like about fifty of their 0:02:12.440 --> 0:02:15.080 waking hours not liking their brain. Because this is a 0:02:15.120 --> 0:02:19.840 show for depressed people who like to hear about terrible things. Um. 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:22.560 As a general rule, that's our that's our demo, isn't it, Sophie. 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:31.440 I hope not. And I screwed up so I mean 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:35.079 me too. Maybe I'm describing the author of the show 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:38.639 and it's it's uh, it's primary cast more than the listeners. 0:02:38.639 --> 0:02:40.600 I hope the listeners are happy, but I'm making an 0:02:40.600 --> 0:02:44.840 assumption here either way, you're here for them. As of 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:48.359 a two thousand seventeen study, but the Journal of Psychiatric Services, 0:02:48.440 --> 0:02:52.440 more than eight million Americans suffer from severe psychological distress. 0:02:52.720 --> 0:02:57.000 Now this is a blanket term for quote, feelings of sadness, worthlessness, 0:02:57.040 --> 0:03:00.480 restlessness that are hazardous enough to impair physical well being. 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:04.080 That sounds pretty familiar to me, um, And that number 0:03:04.120 --> 0:03:08.760 doesn't include all the Americans struggling with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, psychosis, depression, 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:11.960 and a whole galaxy of other brain based thing of 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:14.520 the jigs to deal with. And as some extent, it's 0:03:14.560 --> 0:03:17.240 always been this way. Huge chunks of people have always 0:03:17.280 --> 0:03:21.359 had brains that don't let them comfortably interface with mainstream society. Now, 0:03:21.440 --> 0:03:24.600 we're not great at helping people with mental illnesses in 0:03:24.639 --> 0:03:28.000 two thousand nineteen, but a few decades ago we were 0:03:28.080 --> 0:03:30.000 much worse at it. And today we're going to talk 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:33.200 about the man who was perhaps the very very worst 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:38.720 of all at it. So you know, the name Walter 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:44.760 Jackson Freeman. The second I do now he invented lobotomies, 0:03:44.760 --> 0:03:51.480 and that's who we're talking about today. They're just they're like, well, 0:03:51.520 --> 0:03:54.400 we'll just remove it. Yep, We'll just we'll just we'll 0:03:54.440 --> 0:03:57.119 just scramble it up a little bit. Actually, yeah, oh, 0:03:57.240 --> 0:04:00.720 you yell too much. We'll remove it. Oh you had 0:04:00.760 --> 0:04:04.760 an unwanted pregnancy. We'll remove it, and not just the 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:08.360 pregnancy part. No, actually we will keep the pregnancy, but 0:04:08.400 --> 0:04:12.720 we'll scramble that brain up. Yeah. And I've heard, well, 0:04:12.720 --> 0:04:14.240 I'm sure we'll touch on some of them, but I've 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:17.000 just heard horror stories of like, well, we had a 0:04:17.080 --> 0:04:21.080 sister and then she just wouldn't stop arguing with our parents, 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:24.760 so she went away. She liked boys, so we stuck 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:32.920 a needle in a brain. Oh what a time it was. Yeah, Okay, man, 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:35.760 I am going to bunker down for this. Yeah. My 0:04:35.839 --> 0:04:37.839 dog is a registered therapy dog if you need to 0:04:37.839 --> 0:04:42.200 pat her. Okay, great, awesome? Is she registered lobotomist, Sophie, 0:04:42.200 --> 0:04:45.120 Because I feel like there's a lot of money in that. No, 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:48.960 but we'll look into it. We'll look into it. Walter 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:51.880 Jackson Freeme in the second was born on November four 0:04:53.720 --> 0:04:57.960 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His father, Walter the First, was also 0:04:58.000 --> 0:05:00.479 a doctor, but not a very good one. He hated 0:05:00.520 --> 0:05:03.359 the work, and he did it only grudgingly. He was 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:06.400 like an ear nose and throat doctor, and it was 0:05:06.400 --> 0:05:08.920 said that his ideal world would have been one in 0:05:08.960 --> 0:05:11.640 which people didn't have ears, noses, or throats, so he 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:15.159 wouldn't have to work. His son took that one next level. 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:19.000 Then you want things just removed that you don't want 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:25.800 to deal with that. That's what I'm gonna do, Dad, now. 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:30.600 Walter Jackson the seconds h grandfather, Keen Freeman, was one 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:33.000 of the most celebrated physicians of his age and was 0:05:33.040 --> 0:05:35.280 like the first doctor who did a bunch of important things. 0:05:35.279 --> 0:05:40.520 He was a legitimate, like trailblazing medical motherfucker. So Walter 0:05:40.640 --> 0:05:42.839 Freeman the Second was a sick child, which was not 0:05:42.920 --> 0:05:45.240 unusual in an error where the average fist fight came 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:48.440 with a better pragnosis than the average surgery. He developed 0:05:48.440 --> 0:05:51.000 in large lymph nodes when he was fourteen months old, 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:53.960 which his grandfather had to cut out. The surgery worked, 0:05:53.960 --> 0:05:56.719 but it permanently paralyzed some of the muscles in Walter's 0:05:56.760 --> 0:06:00.240 shoulder and head. Uh. Walter the second also underwent tons 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:04.880 selectomy and suffered from diphtheria, scarlet fever, the measles, whooping cough, 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:07.440 the mumps, and pink eye. I don't want to say 0:06:07.440 --> 0:06:09.960 that God definitely one of this baby dead, but I 0:06:09.960 --> 0:06:15.160 think the evidence speaks for itself. M Yeah, they tried. Yeah, 0:06:15.200 --> 0:06:19.520 he did his best. Young Walter's first memory was of 0:06:19.560 --> 0:06:21.800 the head of a pickaxe breaking through the wall of 0:06:21.839 --> 0:06:24.440 his nursery as the result of a home demolition that 0:06:24.520 --> 0:06:26.920 got a little sloppy. Which is a pretty pretty badass 0:06:26.960 --> 0:06:31.679 first memory. You gotta give it. Oh, yeah for sure. Also, uh, 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:33.560 not too far off of an analogy of what he 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:37.280 would later do to people's own lives, and not too 0:06:37.320 --> 0:06:39.920 far off from a great scene in The Shining, which 0:06:39.920 --> 0:06:42.680 starred Jack Nicholson, who was also in One Flew Over 0:06:42.680 --> 0:06:45.919 the Cuckoo's Nest movie about a lobotomy. Oh that was 0:06:45.960 --> 0:06:48.520 a good not We tied a lot of things together. 0:06:51.279 --> 0:06:55.440 U now. The wonderful biography of Walter the Lobotomist notes 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:58.320 that he also nursed a lifelong fear of horses, but 0:06:58.480 --> 0:07:01.080 never knew why. That doesn't come up again I just 0:07:01.120 --> 0:07:04.320 think it's interesting people are terrified of something for no 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:07.640 reason and they can't let it go. Well, I'm also 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:09.400 afraid of horses. Okay, well that's not what we're talking 0:07:09.400 --> 0:07:11.040 about today. All right, Well you need to put that in. 0:07:12.160 --> 0:07:15.640 You need that needs to go in the book. Are 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:19.520 you scared of anything on like an existential level that 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:22.080 that makes no sense to you? I don't. Well that's 0:07:22.120 --> 0:07:23.880 but if you're scared of it, doesn't it make sense 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:28.360 to you? So not always? I don't know. I'm I'm 0:07:28.480 --> 0:07:32.720 very afraid of prison. Okay, that makes total sense. Yeah, 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:34.640 that's what. But what it makes sense to me? But 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.320 it is like, yeah, when I just think about not 0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:41.800 being able to get out of somewhere that destined to 0:07:42.240 --> 0:07:43.960 like you know, like they're like, oh, we decide. I 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:45.920 don't know. I don't like it. Bothers me. That shows 0:07:45.960 --> 0:07:49.320 sixty days in Have you watched that? No? That sounds 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:53.600 like a fucking nightmare. Though. It's like they embed civilians 0:07:53.960 --> 0:07:57.400 into like a prison system. The only person that knows 0:07:58.160 --> 0:08:01.720 they're not an actual prisoner is the warden, and then 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:04.480 the camera crew sets up as though they're doing a 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:07.080 documentary in the prison, but they used that to do, 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:09.480 like their confessional talking head moments. So they interview a 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:11.480 lot of prisoners, but none of them assumed, well, one 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:13.840 of us isn't actually even supposed to be here, and 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:17.720 their jobs to like last sixty days, and quite a 0:08:17.720 --> 0:08:21.080 few of them end up just getting beaten up. Yeah, 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:25.040 that makes sense. One was bad at his cover story 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:26.240 of what he was supposed to be in there for. 0:08:26.400 --> 0:08:28.600 So once you just start lying to other prisoners, they 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:32.040 assume you must be a pedophile, and that's why you're like, 0:08:32.200 --> 0:08:35.480 no fun intended kg about what you got in there for. 0:08:36.040 --> 0:08:39.040 And that didn't end well for that guy either. Once 0:08:39.120 --> 0:08:41.120 everybody was like, oh, you're a pedophile, he's like no, no, no, 0:08:41.120 --> 0:08:43.840 no no, And then they don't care about that. That's 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:49.360 what they think, So you get beat up there. I 0:08:49.360 --> 0:08:52.559 don't know if there is any cash price. I'm trying 0:08:52.600 --> 0:08:54.520 to think, like you would have to have to be 0:08:55.040 --> 0:08:57.360 I would only do it for enough money that I 0:08:57.400 --> 0:08:59.720 would be able to buy a cabin in the woods, 0:08:59.760 --> 0:09:01.920 Like would have to give me cabin in the woods 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:04.720 money in order to like do that fucking thing. But 0:09:04.920 --> 0:09:07.560 that sounds like the worst. That's like it would have 0:09:07.600 --> 0:09:12.960 to be nice woods and so you for like you 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:16.920 would do it. Five hundred is going to be the 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:19.080 low end of that ship. I'm talking a nice cabin. 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:22.240 See one time I went when I toured Alcatraz, they 0:09:22.320 --> 0:09:25.559 let us go into the solitary confinement and they're like, 0:09:25.559 --> 0:09:27.880 anybody want to check it out? And then I thought, 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:29.640 you know what, lean in on your fear. So I 0:09:29.679 --> 0:09:32.840 went in and the guys shut the door. They're like, 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:34.920 I don't know what you call it. Probably a park 0:09:35.040 --> 0:09:37.360 ranger at this point because of what Alcatraz is, and 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:40.560 then the tour guide whatever, and uh then he pretended 0:09:40.600 --> 0:09:42.920 that the door was stuck and he couldn't get me out. 0:09:43.440 --> 0:09:47.200 And I did not enjoy those few very short moments 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:50.240 that felt like very long hours. See I would I 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:52.080 would live in Alcatraz if it could just be my 0:09:52.160 --> 0:09:55.120 house and I had a sack of rifles and an 0:09:55.120 --> 0:09:58.280 Internet connection. Um, that would be fun. I could take 0:09:58.320 --> 0:10:02.520 pot shots at Silicon Valley would be satisfying. I would 0:10:02.559 --> 0:10:09.240 sign up for that podcast. Mm hm, welcome back to 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:14.720 Robert on the Rock. It's another episode. Okay, we should 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:17.000 probably get back to the podcast. We were talking he 0:10:17.080 --> 0:10:20.120 scared of horses. Now, when Walter was a small child, 0:10:20.240 --> 0:10:23.080 his family moved to an area near Rittenhouse Square, a 0:10:23.200 --> 0:10:26.199 once fancy but now slummy neighborhood. Uh and this is 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:29.600 again in Philadelphia now. Freeman would later recall it as 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:33.640 a rather dingy place where nursemaid's wheeled baby carriages and gossiped. 0:10:34.520 --> 0:10:36.680 Walter's family was quite well off, and he came up 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:39.040 with maids and cooks and nanny's to attend to his 0:10:39.160 --> 0:10:42.359 and his parents every whim. He was not overly adventurous 0:10:42.400 --> 0:10:45.040 as a child, and later wrote of himself on the whole, 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:48.600 I think I was a sensitive, imaginative boy, docile, shut 0:10:48.640 --> 0:10:51.680 in a bit, and full of questions. His parents nicknamed 0:10:51.760 --> 0:10:54.560 him Little Walter Why Why, And the growing boy was 0:10:54.600 --> 0:10:58.160 particularly intrigued by the family business medicine. He had a 0:10:58.160 --> 0:11:01.280 good relationship with his grandfather, but almost no real friends. 0:11:01.559 --> 0:11:03.880 The only boy he played with regularly was his younger 0:11:03.920 --> 0:11:07.760 cousin Morris. The book The Lobotomist describes their friendship as 0:11:07.800 --> 0:11:11.199 basically identical to a Calvin and hobb strip. Walter and 0:11:11.240 --> 0:11:14.160 Morris nursed a mutual contempt for girls and made grand 0:11:14.200 --> 0:11:17.120 plans for the Society for the Prevention of Useless Girls 0:11:17.280 --> 0:11:20.240 spugs for short. Disdaining the company of other children, they 0:11:20.280 --> 0:11:23.360 set up another exclusive secret society, just two members strong, 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:26.400 which they called the wal Risk Club. Yeah, that's like 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:30.520 the fucking Calvin and Hobbs strip. Yeah, and they got 0:11:30.520 --> 0:11:35.719 a Transmorguar fire. Wasn't that one of the things through times? Yeah? 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:37.720 So did I. It's kind of a bummer if you 0:11:37.760 --> 0:11:40.160 imagine this is what happened to Calvin when he grew up. 0:11:40.360 --> 0:11:43.200 I'm not doing that. Don't do that. Don't do That'll 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:45.280 be more Hobbs. I could see Hobbs getting into this 0:11:45.360 --> 0:11:50.640 line of work, but definitely not scrambling brains now. Walter 0:11:50.800 --> 0:11:52.960 was a good student. He excelled in Latin and Greek, 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:55.440 and he won prizes for his scholastics. He was never 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:57.559 any good at sports, nor did he grow any more 0:11:57.559 --> 0:12:00.520 adept with the opposite sex. As he blossomed into a teenager, 0:12:00.880 --> 0:12:03.880 he found girls bothersome and later wrote, I think I 0:12:03.960 --> 0:12:06.960 actively disliked girls until I went to college. This is 0:12:06.960 --> 0:12:09.480 all going to make so much sense later, This is 0:12:09.520 --> 0:12:15.920 all going to make so much sense immediately. Um. Walter 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:18.600 Freeman was the oldest of six siblings, all but two 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:20.800 of whom were boys. He did not get along well 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:23.319 with him, nor did he particularly care for his parents. 0:12:23.559 --> 0:12:26.600 Walter would later note repeatedly that he never loved his mother. 0:12:26.800 --> 0:12:28.720 He was only a little closer to his father, who 0:12:28.800 --> 0:12:31.200 took him and his brothers on regular hiking, fishing, and 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:34.800 camping trips. The elder Walter hated his medical practice and 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:38.880 considered the outdoors his only refuge. He was a weird dude. Once, 0:12:38.880 --> 0:12:41.680 when Walter the Second was caught skipping school, his father 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:47.920 punished him by whipping himself in front of the truant officer. Wait, WHOA, Yeah, 0:12:48.040 --> 0:12:51.680 the dad whipped himself or he had Walter the Second, No, 0:12:51.840 --> 0:12:54.680 he whipped the dad whipped himself in front of the 0:12:54.720 --> 0:13:00.360 truant officer to myself by skipping school. Yeah, and he 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:05.040 did it in front of the cop. WHOA, Like that's 0:13:05.040 --> 0:13:08.480 that's so fucked up. It takes like you really have 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:12.600 to process that ship because the layers fucking up the 0:13:12.679 --> 0:13:16.439 kid's head, you know that. Like I'm a truant officer. 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:20.720 Imagine that guy. He's like, Hey, well buddy, I just 0:13:20.800 --> 0:13:23.320 want kids to go to school. Why are we doing this? 0:13:23.440 --> 0:13:25.920 All you gotta do is sign the sheet man. All 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:28.199 you gotta do is sign the sheet that I told 0:13:28.200 --> 0:13:31.240 you he wasn't at school put me down. Why did 0:13:31.240 --> 0:13:33.680 you bring a whip to this meeting? You? You don't 0:13:33.760 --> 0:13:37.880 need to do this. No one's asking you to do this, sir. 0:13:37.960 --> 0:13:39.520 I just wanted to know. I'm also gonna have to 0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:42.360 write you up for right for whipping yourself because I 0:13:42.400 --> 0:13:46.120 have to document that I witnessed this. He missed a 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:50.040 day of school. This isn't really a whipping situation. I 0:13:50.120 --> 0:13:52.040 wondered what you meant when you were like, cool, I'll 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:57.440 bring my whip. H Yeah, I have trouble getting my 0:13:57.440 --> 0:14:01.080 head around. What kind of man does that? Oh? I know? 0:14:01.679 --> 0:14:04.240 And then I'm sure the truan officer was like I 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:06.760 wanted the kid to leave, and then just like in 0:14:07.120 --> 0:14:09.320 Will Farrell and he's bonding down, the dad was like, 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:14.640 let the boy watch. I feel that's horrific. That's a 0:14:14.720 --> 0:14:20.600 mind fuck. Yeah, that's a galaxy level mind fuck. Oh boy. 0:14:20.920 --> 0:14:23.040 I bet that true an officer felt bad for that. 0:14:23.080 --> 0:14:24.840 I bet in the future he was like, you know what, 0:14:25.160 --> 0:14:27.280 you need to stop skipping school, but we're not going 0:14:27.320 --> 0:14:31.920 to tell your dad any officer. Let everyone's skip. Yeah, 0:14:32.040 --> 0:14:34.080 he was like, I'm not going through that again. I 0:14:34.120 --> 0:14:39.640 am not doing that again. So uh as is probably 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:43.360 not a surprise hearing that Walter's father was no less 0:14:43.400 --> 0:14:45.640 awkward when it came to talking to his young adults 0:14:45.680 --> 0:14:49.560 song about sex. Years later, Walter recalled, I had been 0:14:49.600 --> 0:14:52.120 showing interest in the external anatomy of my young girl 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:55.320 cousins with the aid of his ancient textbooks on anatomy 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:59.960 and gynecology illustrated with woodcuts. He dilated upon internal anatomy, reproduction, 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:02.840 and especially venereal disease, threatening to have me followed or 0:15:03.320 --> 0:15:06.120 even tempted by operatives who would report to him. I 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:09.200 was thoroughly uncomfortable, but remained a virgin. He never alluded 0:15:09.240 --> 0:15:13.280 to it again. So if you're a young parent out 0:15:13.280 --> 0:15:15.640 there looking to stop your kid from fucking too early, 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:18.240 this is one way to keep them a virgin for 0:15:18.280 --> 0:15:21.040 a very long time. Yeah, or watch a racer head 0:15:21.440 --> 0:15:24.640 but yeah, or watch your racer head. Yeah. But okay, 0:15:24.720 --> 0:15:28.320 So he he got way into his He said, straight up, 0:15:28.360 --> 0:15:32.560 I was really into my female cousins anatomy. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:15:32.640 --> 0:15:35.840 he well, you know, you know that's that's fucked up. 0:15:36.280 --> 0:15:38.480 I think in an earlier age in which boys and 0:15:38.520 --> 0:15:41.360 girls did not socialize. Like you run into stories like 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:43.960 that a lot in the early nineteen hundreds just because 0:15:44.000 --> 0:15:47.000 like you weren't hanging out with any other girls, So 0:15:47.080 --> 0:15:49.320 like that's when people would have that. Really it's it's 0:15:49.360 --> 0:15:52.200 messed up and a symptom of some unhealthy things in 0:15:52.240 --> 0:15:55.120 the culture. But I'm not gonna say that that right, 0:15:55.120 --> 0:15:57.280 there is evidence that Walter was weird from the beginning. 0:15:57.320 --> 0:15:59.560 Maybe they were the only girls he spent any time around. 0:15:59.760 --> 0:16:01.640 And I guess so when you stay at yeah anime, 0:16:01.800 --> 0:16:04.560 to me, it's like he makes me feel like I 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:07.800 guess I in tone that he's more preoccupied, Like it's 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:10.320 okay to wonder what's under their clothes, but don't start 0:16:10.360 --> 0:16:13.480 wondering what's under their skin. I think that was just 0:16:13.600 --> 0:16:16.840 sort of, um a euphemism they used because again, nobody 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:20.440 had good vocabulary to talk about like bodies back then, 0:16:20.840 --> 0:16:23.800 because everyone was fucked up, and you know, it was 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:28.080 an even less healthy time. There was no feveral summer 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:31.920 or Midwestern boy autumn at which I'm currently a part of. 0:16:32.320 --> 0:16:36.880 Oh yeah, that's yeah. Midwestern boy autumn is good. Uh, 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:42.320 Southeastern boy late summer slash early fall, which really doesn't 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:46.800 get going until November. Um, get a lot of them. 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:50.440 I like slutty people, April showers. That's my favorite time 0:16:50.480 --> 0:16:55.960 of year. Slutty people, April showers. Um, there has to 0:16:55.960 --> 0:16:58.480 be a porn star named April Showers, right of course. 0:16:58.480 --> 0:17:01.960 Oh yeah, no, there's like they're okay, I hope, So 0:17:02.720 --> 0:17:05.520 we're putting in the universe. If there isn't, I also 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:08.199 called DIBs. If any of us get into porn, I 0:17:08.240 --> 0:17:13.240 mean we're that's gonna be the sequel podcast to this one. 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:18.880 Robert Evans makes a porno. Um, it is not going 0:17:18.920 --> 0:17:24.280 to be popular. Uh. Back to Walter freemanow So, Walter 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:27.520 graduated from high school when he was just sixteen years old. Uh. 0:17:27.640 --> 0:17:30.720 He immediately started attending classes at Yale UM. He was 0:17:30.760 --> 0:17:33.959 academically excellent, but completely miserable. He was too young an 0:17:33.960 --> 0:17:36.200 immature to get up to any kind of animal house 0:17:36.240 --> 0:17:39.320 type bonding shenanigans with his fellow young men, and his 0:17:39.440 --> 0:17:42.840 utter disdain for women made most kinds of socialization impossible. 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:45.440 It turns out it's not great to be in college 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:49.200 at age sixteen. Not not the best time to do that. Uh. 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:51.359 He briefly worked for the Yale Daily News. But was 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:54.480 let go after he spilled a bunch of alphabetized subscriber 0:17:54.560 --> 0:17:56.840 cards in front of his editor. He joined the swim 0:17:56.840 --> 0:17:59.200 team at one point, but refused to practice when anyone 0:17:59.280 --> 0:18:00.960 was around. He want people to see him with his 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:05.000 shirt off. Um, so he's You get a feel for 0:18:05.080 --> 0:18:08.480 the kind of young man Walter Freeman was not a 0:18:08.560 --> 0:18:13.600 comfortable one. Um now, and in fairness, knowing about his dad, 0:18:13.640 --> 0:18:19.080 how could he possibly have been right? His initial degree 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:21.920 program was engineering, but this track was disrupted at the 0:18:22.000 --> 0:18:23.760 end of his junior year when he ate a bad 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:27.040 batch of raw clams and caught typhoid fever. He spent 0:18:27.119 --> 0:18:29.200 months laid up with this, in an assortment of other 0:18:29.240 --> 0:18:31.840 ailments that took up the entirety of his first semester 0:18:31.960 --> 0:18:34.600 senior year at Yale. The long months he spent at 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:37.320 hospitals and sick beds helped Walter realize that he wanted 0:18:37.400 --> 0:18:42.560 something different out of life, a career in medicine. M now. 0:18:42.640 --> 0:18:45.680 He'd initially not wanted to go down that road, do 0:18:45.840 --> 0:18:47.720 largely to the fact that his father had told him 0:18:47.720 --> 0:18:49.800 it was a terrible life. Don't be a fucking doctor. 0:18:50.000 --> 0:18:56.280 As he whips himself. Uh, this isn't about you. I'm 0:18:56.280 --> 0:18:59.440 whipping myself because someone else left a muffin out on 0:18:59.480 --> 0:19:02.720 the counter. This is they're whipping. But I needed to 0:19:02.720 --> 0:19:05.679 talk to you. Also, he's third generations to his dad. 0:19:05.680 --> 0:19:09.040 Probably was forced into it by his dad. Yeah, and 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:11.479 so he maybe this was his one thing where he 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:13.679 was trying to be like, you don't do what you 0:19:13.800 --> 0:19:15.280 don't have. You don't have to do this, and it 0:19:15.320 --> 0:19:19.159 didn't matter. I feel like he's saying, you don't have 0:19:19.200 --> 0:19:21.399 to do this while everybody looks at him whipping himself 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:27.359 and it's like, you really don't have to do this. So, uh, Walter, 0:19:28.119 --> 0:19:31.560 seeing his dad was a miserable, fucked up person, Walter 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:34.480 instead looked towards his grandfather as a role model and 0:19:34.600 --> 0:19:37.240 enrolled in summer classes at the University of Chicago to 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:40.400 catch up on medical school before or to catch up 0:19:40.400 --> 0:19:43.920 on like medicine and science related classes before starting medical 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:46.520 school the next year. He excelled in this as well, 0:19:46.680 --> 0:19:49.520 and attempted to rebuild his health by walking thirty minutes 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:52.600 to and from campus every day carrying a heavy box 0:19:52.680 --> 0:19:55.680 of bones. I don't know where you could just get 0:19:55.720 --> 0:19:58.080 bones back then. Yeah, he just decided he needed. He 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:00.439 wanted to like get healthy, and a way to do 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:03.199 it was to carry around a lot of bones. And 0:20:03.240 --> 0:20:07.320 because he's a person, a rock isn't good enough. Yeah, 0:20:07.560 --> 0:20:09.800 there were more bones than rocks back then. There were 0:20:09.840 --> 0:20:13.359 just people dying left and right. So he stopped H. 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:17.520 Holmes's place and picked up what years this that doesn't 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:19.840 check out? Actually I think it might check out this 0:20:20.000 --> 0:20:22.480 late late eighteen nineties. I don't remember exactly when H. 0:20:22.320 --> 0:20:27.919 Jones was. No, he would have been. He would have been. 0:20:27.920 --> 0:20:30.679 He was born in nive so, but there would have 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:32.360 been there would have been a lot of bones laying 0:20:32.400 --> 0:20:36.680 around in the early nine hundred bone heavy period. World 0:20:36.760 --> 0:20:41.520 War One was on a shiploads of bones. Now. Yeah, 0:20:41.600 --> 0:20:44.080 so he excelled in his classes, and he was getting better, 0:20:44.359 --> 0:20:46.600 you know, healthier thanks to his bone box. But in 0:20:46.640 --> 0:20:49.000 spite of all this, he he got sick again very 0:20:49.080 --> 0:20:52.440 quickly and was soon bedridden. He later recalled I wrote 0:20:52.440 --> 0:20:55.879 home saying, I guess God didn't want me to study medicine. 0:20:56.080 --> 0:20:58.920 In reply, I received a stern admonition not to think 0:20:59.000 --> 0:21:01.240 that way, much less to mention it. Wait, Robert, he 0:21:01.280 --> 0:21:04.399 got sick again, Yeah, he kept he was very sick. 0:21:04.480 --> 0:21:07.520 He was a sick, sick young man. Oh man, this 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:10.719 is You're right. Mother Nature was trying to kill him. 0:21:10.800 --> 0:21:14.800 God was definitely trying to stop him from being He's 0:21:14.840 --> 0:21:19.040 a fighter. He's a fighter. He is a persistent son 0:21:19.040 --> 0:21:21.439 of a bit. He shouldn't have been let it go. 0:21:21.640 --> 0:21:23.879 He should not have been somebody should have walked in 0:21:23.920 --> 0:21:26.119 whipping themselves and been like, this is so that you 0:21:26.160 --> 0:21:29.760 can let it go, Just go. Yeah, that's I think 0:21:29.800 --> 0:21:32.400 that we have to land on the conclusion that if 0:21:32.440 --> 0:21:35.520 only there'd been more whipping in his childhood, he would 0:21:35.560 --> 0:21:37.920 have turned out better. Can I ask you a foreshadowing 0:21:38.000 --> 0:21:41.000 question that I don't expect you to answer yet because 0:21:41.000 --> 0:21:42.560 I don't know that we should even if you can. 0:21:43.000 --> 0:21:46.400 But much like we all wonder, like what purpose does 0:21:46.520 --> 0:21:51.320 mosquitoes provide? Like what uh, what did they give us 0:21:51.359 --> 0:21:53.840 in the long run or whatever other than just bad stuff, 0:21:54.640 --> 0:21:56.800 I would love to know by the end of this episode, 0:21:56.840 --> 0:21:59.800 I already hate him. If at some point you're gonna 0:21:59.800 --> 0:22:02.280 be like, well, actually, because of the lobotomy, we now 0:22:02.400 --> 0:22:05.199 have this positive thing in our world, and I'm anxious 0:22:05.240 --> 0:22:08.480 to see if if that comes about at all. Yes, 0:22:08.760 --> 0:22:11.719 he was actually this is getting ahead a little bit. 0:22:12.080 --> 0:22:13.439 He doesn't want to do that to you. I'm just 0:22:13.480 --> 0:22:14.919 that's what's already in my had I'm like, yeah, I 0:22:14.960 --> 0:22:18.040