The case of John R. Brinkley

Discussion in 'Accreditation Discussions (RA, DETC, state approva' started by Kizmet, Jul 29, 2016.

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  1. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

  2. Neuhaus

    Neuhaus Well-Known Member

    Wikipedia says his fake MD qualified him to obtain a medical license in 8 states. So I wonder how much of a mill it really was.

    In any case, with the proliferation of Naturopaths practicing without licenses in the majority of U.S. states it seems we haven't made all that much progress.
     
  3. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    Right. Probably none at all - or worse. After all, Brinkley and his contemporary nut-bars had to find their customers without using the Internet for advertising.

    J.
     
  4. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    A quote on fake MDs in United States, from Degree Mills - The Billion-Dollar Industry That Has Sold Over a Million Fake Diplomas, by our esteemed member, Dr. John Bear and Allen Ezell (FBI ret'd).

    "Fake medical degrees are an urgent problem. It is easy to buy a medical degree from a fake school, or a counterfeit diploma in the name of a real school. Twenty-five years ago, a Congressional committee calculated that there were over 5,000 fake doctors in the United States, and there are many more now. People have died because of these fakes."

    J.
     
  5. Neuhaus

    Neuhaus Well-Known Member

    Sadly, many more have been killed by the incompetent holders of legitimate degrees.
     
  6. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    Japanese Naturapath saved my step sons grandmas life.
    She had serous liver sclerosis with kidney disease, on waiting list for liver transplant and possible kidney failure.
    This Naturapath was highly recommended so she went.
    He examined her and recommended a raw food diet. Provided some herbal remedies as well.
    She was avoiding processed and harmful foods including alcohol, shopping in organic sections of the markets and basically eating raw food diet.
    He provided some addresses of stores were she can purchase the food as the organic food was a new thing only starting in the US food stores. Wholefoods was already around do.
    Her liver with the time healed, reverted and regenerated.
    She was no longer needing a transplant.
    Also her blood pressure issues were gone and kidney functioning better.
    Decade later it was great to see her at my step sons grad school graduation and dancing on his wedding. Hope she will be made great grandma in the near future.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 30, 2016
  7. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    My guess is that the school was an absolute mill. I'm also guessing that the laws in those states were quite lax or terms poorly defined or enforcement non-existent regarding qualifications and licensure.
     
  8. Neuhaus

    Neuhaus Well-Known Member

    Medical licensing was still fairly new when he was on the scene. But he did have a license and only ran for governor after his medical license was revoked because he kept, you know, killing people.

    I'm sure it wasn't a particularly well defined licensing landscape like it is today. Also, this is a time when state approval was all that one ever really needed. As long as the state gave you the ok to run a school that was likely considered legitimate enough. I'm thinking that having the same approval process, by the same people, for a medical school as for a trade school probably led us to where we are with programmatic accreditation today.
     
  9. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    Oh, but you're missing the REAL story!

    John R. "Goat Glands" Brinkley may not have been the best surgeon around (though he was far from the worst I'm sure) but his fight with the State of Kansas and ultimately with the Federal Communications Commission led him to create a series of AM radio Border Blasters in the mid 1930s. His studio was in Del Rio Texas but his half-million watt transmitter was across the Rio in Ciudad Acuna with (legitimate) call letters XERA. The Mexican officials were willing to play ball because they were in a fight with the U.S. government about protecting broadcasting channels near the border.

    XERF claimed 500,000 watts transmitter power (meaning probably a million watts DC to the enormous, water cooled final tubes) modulated by an additional 250,000 watts of high quality audio. Just WATCH that power meter spin! This lash-up was matched only by WLW in Cincinnati Ohio.

    If it WAS matched, that is. The Mexicans looked the other way when XERF took off the wraps and shot maybe 4 million watts ERP northward. It is SAID that you couldn't touch a barbed wire fence in South Texas when XERF was opened up fully without receiving an RF burn. Paint on the southern side of Texas barns was said to fade from the blast. The signal at night reached Siberia over the Pole.

    And the programming? Why, Dr. Brinkley's own nostrums paid for old-timey Hard-shell religion and Gospel Music 24/7. Oh, yes, dear listeners, just send five dollars to so and so and receive a thousand baby chicks, healthy and ready to grow into laying hens and making money for YOU and your Family. Tired blood? Iron deficiency can cause that feeling. Just send one dollar to cover shipping and handling for your FREE SAMPLE...

    Hey, Border Radio is where Wolf Man Jack got his start, somewhat later though. I remember hearing lower powered Border Blasters in my childhood in Washington State.

    Eventually the Mexicans and the U.S resolved their differences and XERF went dark. The electric bill alone probably doomed the station, though. Later Border Blasters were limited to the usual 50,000 watts, still a big signal to be sure but nothing out of the ordinary.

    Who CARES whether Brinkley was a legitimate MD? He gave us a story that will never be repeated. May he rest in peace!
     
  10. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    I hear the rhythms of the music
    I buy the product and never use it
    I hear the talking of the dj
    Can't understand just what does he say?

    I'm on a Mexican radio
    I'm on a Mexican radio

    (Mexican Radio - Wall of Voodoo)

    Clap for the Wolfman
    He gonna rate your record high
    Clap for the Wolfman
    You gonna dig him 'til the day you die...

    (Clap for the Wolfman - The Guess Who)



    Thanks for the memories, Nosborne - and the story. :smile:


    J.
     
  11. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    Let me take you by the hand
    ​Over to the jungle band
    ​If you're too old for dancing
    ​Get yourself a monkey gland...

    (By Irving Berlin. From The Cocoanuts - Marx Brothers movie 1929)


    I knew somewhere there was a monkey-gland guy, as well as Brinkley, the goat guy. Topic is mentioned in "Accordion Crimes" by E. Annie Proulx - pretty well the best fiction I've ever read. I Googled it and the monkey-business appears to have been invented by Serge Voronoff; his story is as strange as Brinkley's.

    Here's an article on both Voronoff and Brinkley. Early Body-Hacking: When Men Got Goat Testicle Grafts to Boost Their Sex Drive | Motherboard

    I love that musical quote :smile:

    J.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 31, 2016
  12. Neuhaus

    Neuhaus Well-Known Member



    For some reason my friends and I latched onto this song while I was in high school.
     
  13. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    My boss and I latched onto this song when I was about 40 - he was around 28. It was a fair-sized hit then, in 1983, bigger in Canada than in the US. And yes, less-regulated Mexican Radio was a known concept up here in the frozen north, eh. From the Wiki:

    "In their (Wall of Voodoo members') native US, the song was a modest hit, peaking at no. 58 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.[1] It was a bigger hit in other parts of the world, peaking at no. 18 in Canada, no. 21 in New Zealand and no. 33 in Australia.It It also reached no. 64 in the UK."

    That's right, the song has its very own Wiki page, here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Radio Yeah, I think it deserves one. :smile:

    J.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 3, 2016

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