Narcotics
Topics from the archives of the Mad Science Museum related to narcotics. Arranged in descending chronological order.
Electrified Sheep
& Elephants on Acid
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Categories
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Elephants on Acid (1962)
 What happens if you give an elephant LSD? On Friday August 3, 1962, a group of Oklahoma City researchers decided to find out. |
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Cocaine was the first local anesthetic used in medicine. Its use brought many benefits by allowing surgeons to avoid having to rely on more dangerous general anesthetics. Nevertheless, occasionally patients had bad reactions to the drug. In an effort to find out why this was the case, the Nebraska proctologist Edwin Katskee gave himself a large injection of cocaine on the night of 25 November 1936. He then recorded the clinical course of his symptoms in notes written on the wall of his office. As it turned out, the amount of cocaine he gave himself was so large it proved fatal. The media described his note-filled wall as his "death diary". |