The Resurrectionist: The Lost Work of Dr. Spencer Black Page 3

  1878

  THE FAWN-CHILD

  Alphonse is growing so wonderfully, like a plant in

  the spring. What a miracle, what a machine; I am

  increasingly grateful for his healthy deliverance into

  the world.

  —Dr. Spencer Black

  Dr. Spencer Black’s career and aspirations changed after he paid a visit to a local carnival (the exact name of which remains unknown). Featured among the giants, acrobats, and other “marvels of nature” roaming the sideshows was an anatomy museum—an exhibit of strange medical artifacts and bizarre biological specimens.

  The anatomy museums, along with cabinets of curiosities, had been popular scientific novelty collections for hundreds of years; many of these grand accumulations are still available for public view. It was this show that eclipsed Black’s previous work and inspired him to study what would become one of the most bizarre and unique pursuits of any scientist, least of all one with his talents.

  These sideshows, of which I have seen many, are typically decrepit affairs leaving one with a great thirst for civility, men, and manners. The performers are often subjects of ridicule and humiliation, and they usually become patients of mine in the Ward—seeking a better life or, at the least, humanity.

  The show was primarily a showcase of well-known abnormalities with a few less-common defects of the human form. The collection included a skeleton of conjoined twins, fused at the skull; the monster-baby (a pig fetus in a jar); and the South Pacific mermaid (a monkey and trout sewn together). All the displays were easily identified by anyone familiar with science and medicine. The exception was the fawn-child, a deceased young boy displaying an orthopedic condition that had caused his knees to bend the wrong way. The bones were misshapen, and excessive hair was present over the entire surface of the skin; there were bone or calcium growths at the top of his skull, which gave the appearance of juvenile horns. The dead child was preserved in a large alcohol-filled glass jar.

  Black was convinced that the specimen held a secret to his research. He believed that the mutations were manifestations of the ancient past he had written about—evidence of a genetic code that was not completely eradicated. Some have argued that Black found answers in places where there was no need for questions. Whatever the case, the encounter with the fawn-child fueled his obsession for finding a cure for the deformation that was paramount in his work. He would never again practice conventional medicine.

  The promoter of the sideshow sold the specimen to Black for two hundred dollars, a small fortune. Black took the fawn-child home and conducted a secret but thorough dissection in the attic. Not even his family knew of his work until it was completed.

  What is interesting is that in his writings and notes, Black expressed that he was not working on a human being who had suffered from deformation. Rather, he believed the fawn-child was exhibiting a vestige of a mythological past. His approach to anatomy and medicine had changed dramatically in a rather short amount of time.

  August 14, 1878

  My dissection thus far has revealed nothing that would lead me to think this was not a relative to a satyr. I have brought a small common domestic goat (Capra domestica) up to the attic to use for comparison. My tests determine that there is indeed an animal woven into the fawn-child; however, it is not related to this particular type of goat. Discovering the relative will not be easy; the differences in size, color, and horns make it difficult to determine relationships. The fawn-child bears a resemblance to the ibex (Capra ibex), one of the more perfect goats, but its fur is like that of the cashmere goat (Capra thibetensis).

  Physiologically, the animal is human, it does not have the four chambered stomach of other ruminants; therefore, I have not found a bezoar stone either. It is human … mostly.

  I am trying to hold firm to reason and logic while I learn a lifetime of zoological science in a mere month. I am trying not to perform an injustice to the innocent creature on my table. I am fighting fatigue and sickness daily now: the anxiety of this work and knowledge is weighing heavily. My nerves are ruined, but oddly I feel vitalized and nourished at the same time. I cannot think, I cannot eat or sleep, smile or be angry; I feel nothing other than a nauseating compulsion to continue the work on the flayed creature who silently waits in the attic. With its skin peeled back and pinned in place, its organs removed and floating in jars of noxious liquid; it waits beside drawings and notes documenting its total and final destruction.

  Drawing made by Spencer Black during the early stages of dissecting the fawn-child. Philadelphia, 1878.

  In these details, the genetic deformation is illustrated more clearly, and it’s easy to see why this condition might generate such interest in the nineteenth century, or even today. In his notes on the dissection, Dr. Black writes: I positioned the body transverse and squarely on its back. I then prepared the side table and logbook for notes to record the first session of the dissection. I will continue carefully; I will make notes of everything I can think to write. I will draw the details of the animal, the sinus and the tissue as they are torn or cut. I am racing against the inevitable destruction of this animal. I must take care to document every inch, every aspect of its body. I worry, while sweat is in my eyes and my fingers tense, that I will do something wrong, that a crucial element will be missing and this puzzle will never be assembled.

  1879–1887

  THE AMERICAN CARNIVAL

  I have butchered many men. All are innocent and

  equaled when they are on the table. All are exquisite and grotesque.

  —Dr. Spencer Black

  After concluding his work on the fawn-child, Black decided to publish his findings. He believed that publishing was the only practical, bold, and useful employment of his efforts. Yet, he knew his unorthodox claims would be likely to doom both his future and his reputation as a traditional physician. Despite the risk, Black submitted his findings to the Academy of Medicine. He wrote a comprehensive article outlining his belief that the mutation present in the fawn-child demonstrated proof that the mythological creature known as the satyr was once real, as was evidenced in the body of the fawn-child specimen. The academy rejected his paper.

  Black approached twelve other universities located in cities including Chicago, Boston, New York, and London; all met his enthusiasm with rejection.

  Within a short time, the Academy of Medicine terminated all funding to Dr. Black. It was clear to his colleagues that Black no longer considered his previous endeavors to be important; he was focused exclusively on his work with the fawn-child. His reputation in the scientific community was falling quickly—he was berated in the press, heckled in the streets, and attacked in personal correspondence.

  Dr. Black’s findings are like the far-fetched and fantastic dreams of a child, not the ideas of a modern scientist.… His claims ought to be written in a novel, where the audience is more prone to delight in the hysterics derived from monsters.

  —Dr. Joab A. Holace

  The damage to Black’s reputation was irrevocable. He began accruing debts, but with no hope of professional redemption, he continued his research. As determined as ever, he believed that he would uncover the greatest anthropological discovery of all time.

  In 1880, Black joined the American Carnival. At the time, hundreds of carnivals and circuses traveled throughout the United States and the continent of Europe. The American Carnival was not one of the larger traveling shows: with just fifteen horse-drawn caravans, its size was relatively modest. Dr. Black’s Anatomical Museum would be a new addition to the carnival—an exhibit consisting of artifacts, specimens, and information that Black had collected through the years.

  Black displayed skeletons of real deformities accompanied by an analysis explaining why the bones were malformed. Some of the specimens were laid out on tables; others were displayed in cases, and smaller artifacts were hung from the rafters of the tent. To enhance the show’s entertainment value, Black was encouraged to tell stories
explaining how his specimens had descended from ancient mythological animals. An excerpt from a flier reads: “A child born without arms may be a confused body that lacked the information to produce wings, of a harpy perhaps.”

  The transition from esteemed medical prodigy to carnival sideshow host came abruptly for Dr. Black. He and his family were forced to adapt to a new lifestyle, one that was incredibly different from what they had previously been accustomed to. Traveling with a carnival was a considerable hardship, but his wife and sons adapted fairly well. We know that Elise hailed from a prosperous and educated family; she could have easily taken the children to live with her parents and siblings in Chicago. Instead, she became an integral element in the culture of the American Carnival. She was well known among other workers and was well liked, too. By assuming a matronly role as a caregiver to the other performers, she soon earned the nickname “Momma El.”

  Black’s own experience was more complicated. These two journal entries, written just four months apart, illustrate his evolving views concerning his research and the carnival lifestyle.

  September 1880

  I have devoted my efforts thus far to the fulfillment of my work, only to share it now with liars, criminals, and killers: ignorant people whose only reluctance to eat one another is that they do not care for the taste. Yes, I am in good company, indeed. I entertain the whims of this carnival. I lecture to common citizens less interested in my science than in the so-called lizard-woman from the jungle––who is really only a woman from Detroit afflicted with ichthyosis. It would be more auspicious to work alone in a laboratory, in a university; I could then speak to a dedicated audience of students.

  I know I must continue my work, despite my disdain of my audience. Without another source of subsistence I am left with only this one choice.

  * * *

  February 1881

  I can reach out through the boundaries of this country and seek out the ones who will listen as I once did. I am not confined to one state or province; I can take my work to them if they will not come to me. I will appear on their steps and knock on their doors.

  Despite an initial hesitation, Black became a phenomenally successful showman, and he soon grew to embrace the fair lifestyle. Among carnival personalities, his style of showmanship was greatly admired. Curious onlookers would flock to the traveling museum, eager to see the controversial exhibits that were contested so vehemently in local newspapers. Profits from the museum were substantial. Black had no trouble providing for his family; he even purchased a decent-sized horse-drawn caravan, the transportation mode of choice for early American carnival and circus professionals. The added mobility allowed him to travel more freely, especially in winter, when the carnival closed.

  Gregarious and outspoken, Dr. Black often challenged doubters in the audience to join him in open debate. On one such occasion, in Marris County, New York, in 1881, a minister by the name of William Cathaway Jr. criticized the show’s moral decency and blasphemous content. Cathaway was particularly upset by Black’s claim that man once existed in a form substantially different from the Old Testament’s Adam and Eve.

  This advertisement for the American Carnival highlights Dr. Black as the main attraction, but in truth he was only a small part of a much larger show. This kind of exaggeration was typical among carnival showmen and suggests that the advertisement was created by Dr. Black himself.

  As minister and scientist continued their debate, members of the audience began taking sides, and the confrontation climaxed in a brawl. Both men were arrested, but only Black was charged with inciting a riot. He was not convicted. As a result of this incident, he would spend the next few years enduring constant harassment and arrests, for local authorities believed him to be a nuisance to the common peace. Driven from towns, Black remained unaffected by the persecution. Although never convicted, he was charged with dozens of crimes: larceny, fraud, and public indecency (i.e., placing indecent objects/scenes or portrayals thereof before the public view), among many others.

  More effort has been given to prevent the occasion of listening to me than would have been required to simply stand idle while I spoke. Can a scientist truly incite this kind of fear?

  Black soon understood that no amount of intelligent scientific argument was likely to persuade his audience. He needed evidence, and he would have to create it himself. He theorized that the same reasoning used to heal or reverse a deformity could also serve to engineer a deformity; he would have to create what he thought the body (nature) had originally intended.

  Black disappeared from the public view for the next few months as he reinvented his show. He undertook his work in the secluded privacy of his carnival caravan. He started with small dead animals and grafted parts of them together, assembling his vision of what the creatures might have looked like. During the summer of 1882, with the help of his five-year-old son Alphonse, Black made frequent trips in search of small game. When the small hunting party found success, father and son would take their quarry into the caravan, nestled in a meadow forty miles north of Philadelphia, and cut the animals’ bodies into pieces. On one occasion Black assembled some of these components into a sort of doll that resembled a small harpy. The lower portion consisted of a turkey; soft feathers covered its tough and bare-skinned neck. On top was the head of a small child, which Dr. Black taken from a cadaver. He called the creature Eve.

  Eve was followed by a series of even more elaborate creations. Having knowledge of the physiological and anatomical design of living things, Black set out to engineer what he thought was intended by nature to still exist. And so in the year 1883 he built and designed a miraculous cabinet of curiosities––taxidermied replicas of a host of mythological creatures. Any human components involved in the creation of these oddities were likely exhumed from cemeteries by the doctor and Alphonse.

  Black presented his revamped museum in the spring of 1884, touring the country with Elise and their two children. Despite his continued difficulty with local police, the show was a tremendous success:

  May 9, 1883

  They were gathering in crowds like swarms of pests, murmuring and confused. Suspicious shadows cast over their faces gave an eerie countenance to all who looked upon my work and believed in what they saw. They saw the vestige of life’s history.

  The show was met by enthusiastic and oftentimes frightened or angry audiences. One review states: “It was quite a disturbing thing to see the taxidermy medley of Dr. Black. The animals appeared real, as though their eyes could have opened. All they needed was a nudge and they’d wake up.”

  Initially, the show included only a small harpy, a Cerberus (a three-headed hell hound), and an Eastern dragon. But audience sensibilities were tested when Black presented a centaur that combined a human cadaver and a dead horse. The macabre scene was simply too grotesque, and audiences protested in horror. A local Philadelphia newspaper wrote, “Dr. Black is still disgusting and lacking the decency, manners, and good sense he once had.”

  But Black was determined to persevere. He never lost his conviction that all the fantastic creatures he presented were once real. He argued it was his responsibility to science, medicine, and the world to uncover the true nature of man. According to his claims, there once lived more bizarre and unknown creatures in the world than what had been discovered. He believed mermaids once swam in the deep, minotaurs ruled in the hills of Macedonia, and sphinxes nested in the rocks of Mount St. Catherine in Egypt.

  Black claimed to have proof of these ancient species, which had been shipped to him from around the world, packed neatly in a case in his caravan. Although it was true he had received many shipments, the contents of those crates are believed to have been specimens of mutations, more oddities for his research from when he was still working in Ward C. Among the objects recovered from the museum was a large crate bearing a bill of lading. It indicated that the parcel had arrived from Constantinople; the shipper’s name was illegible. The contents of the crate were unknown,
but it was large enough to comfortably fit two adult humans. Unfortunately, even an approximate number of shipments received by Dr. Black remains unknown.

  Finally, finally it has arrived. I have waited long enough. It feels as though I waited impatiently for a longer time than it took to travel here.

  As Black’s popularity grew, increasing numbers of people came to be aware of his unique scientific views as well as those of his critics. It’s fair to say that the whole affair turned into a sport with two opposing teams. None of the mania dissuaded Black from remaining in the public eye; in fact, he would often attend social functions, dinners, and public events or political rallies (usually uninvited) specifically to discuss his position and philosophy. It was reported that at a small and exclusive dinner club in New Jersey, Black incited the hostilities of the host when he hurled a glass through a window, attempting to illustrate that God does not intend for man to fly, but man alone intends it. His actions prompted further violence, and the main dining room was destroyed as a result.

  I hear them marvel at my work—my indignant science. I hear them call out in fear of what they see. And there are some gentlemen who doubt what I tell them. They call me a liar and a charlatan or a quack. But in time the methods of science that I now employ to convince people will surely set them free—alas, this I cannot explain to the angry fools.