In 1951, Penn dermatologist Albert Kligman walked into Holmesburg Prison for the first time. In front of him were rows of overcrowded cells, filled with hundreds of men struggling through the lowest points of their lives. But Kligman didn’t see these people as people. With the sick giddiness and morbid fascination of a monster, all he saw were “acres of skin.” Using the dehumanization of incarcerated people as a tool for persuasion, Kligman was allowed by the city and the University to conduct a series of horrific dermatological experiments on Holmesburg inmates over the course of 23 years.
In 2024, survivors and their families’ pleas for restorative justice have remained largely unanswered. At an Oct. 27 panel hosted by the Jones Foundation for Returning Citizens at the Penn Carey Law School, these requests were again emphasized by survivors and their families. Although the University and the city of Philadelphia have publicly acknowledged the harmfulness of these experiments, families’ calls for direct reparations have been continuously and systematically ignored. Penn must meet their pleas, and we, as students, must amplify their voices.
Kligman’s experiments were extensive. Dubbed “Philadelphia’s lasting shame,” the experiments reached every kind of horrific level imaginable with the financial support and partnership of powerful groups including Johnson & Johnson, Dow Chemical, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the United States military. These crimes against humanity included injecting men with asbestos, exposing them to Agent Orange ingredient dioxin, and lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) experimentation—all done without informed consent. Joseph Smith, a veteran who was incarcerated on-and-off between 1956 and 1965, said the gauze wrapping inmates’ chemical-lathered arms would “eat the paint” when stuck to cell walls. Smith also described temporary blindness, painful swelling, numbness, and severe psychological trauma, including symptoms consistent with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
If this sounds like the stuff of horror films, that’s because it is. Nightmarish experiments left persistent psychological and physical damages, with survivors suffering from tooth loss, glaucoma, schizophrenia, permanent skin damage, and more. These symptoms didn’t simply traumatize survivors either: their families became deeply impacted by their psychological trauma. Adrianne Jones-Alston, whose father, Leodus Jones, was a survivor, discussed how his psychological unrest and emotional disturbance from the experiments led her to run away from home. These struggles ultimately rendered her victim to incarceration and recidivism.
Penn profited significantly from these experiments, indirectly and directly making billions of dollars. Kligman donated $15 million from personal Retin-A profits and promised to continue donating more from Renova sales. An exact number for profit is not published, and one of the demands made by family members of survivors is transparency about the exact amount gained by Penn. Demands also include a more “sincere” and “personable” apology, mandated ethics training and education about Kligman’s experiments, and financial compensation through general support and healthcare funds. As Jones-Alston powerfully stated at the recent panel, “My daddy’s skin is in those jars. Share the wealth … after all, they paid the price.”
To the University’s credit, it has publicly acknowledged the harm done by Kligman. Then Medical School Dean and current Interim Penn President Larry Jameson issued a statement for Penn Medicine that condemned Kligman’s research practices as “terribly disrespectful of individuals” and “never…morally acceptable” despite also stressing the technical legality of Kligman’s work as well as his “groundbreaking contributions” to dermatological science. In the same statement, Jameson announced that a Kligman-named position and lectureship would be renamed. Additionally, research funding would be set up for scholarships and opportunities to help urban high school students research dermatological issues, a dermatology diversity residency position, and three fellowships dedicated to research on skin disorders among patients of color.
However, a public apology is a bare minimum we should not commend, but rather expect. No perfectly-polished statement manufactured for the public eye can mend the literal scars perpetuated by Kligman and Penn. The University’s reconciliatory attempts are moves in the right direction, but even then, the fact that research funding focused on skin of color emerged after criticism as a means of redress instead of a pre-existing priority is disheartening. Additionally, it’s worth noting that this doesn’t align with the families’ demands for direct financial compensation or a more personable apology. Although community programs and research funding are impactful, financial compensation for victims’ families is the most important way Penn can recognize the humanity of those individuals. Sadly and predictably, a Penn spokesperson confirmed that the University currently has no comment on demands for restorative justice.
During the Holmesburg experiments, the social and economic vulnerability of primarily low-income and Black inmates — many of whom signed consent forms (that did not allow for knowledge of what they were being injected with) despite illiteracy — was explicitly used to paint these men as an “idle collection of humanity” and justify the torture they endured. Placed into larger context, these experiments are one horrific tale in a disturbing theme of medical exploitation of vulnerable populations in Penn’s history.
As the first formal medical school in the U.S., Penn Medicine is notorious in historical circles for the role it played in medical racism. Penn offered the southernmost medical school in the U.S. for over 100 years. According to research conducted by the Penn Slavery Project, many pro-slavery southerners (joined by fellow racist northerners) were attracted to the institution as it facilitated the lies of pseudoscience and phrenology. Until earlier this year, skulls of enslaved individuals which the infamous Dr. Samuel Morton used to support lectures on “racial difference” were kept by the University. Although the medical field has made progress, myths and false biases derived from pseudoscientific pedagogy continue today.
The dehumanization and scientific objectification of bodies has remained a prevalent issue in more recent Penn history, especially in the case of the Penn Museum’s ownership of the remains of several 1985 MOVE bombing victims, whose lives were taken by the Philadelphia Police Department’s bombing of a West Philadelphia neighborhood in a standoff with a Black liberation group. Although Penn and Princeton, which also collected these remains, returned them to family members in recent years, more remains are being uncovered, illustrating the extent of Philadelphia’s history of the dehumanization of “othered” bodies.
Addressing and meeting the demands of survivors and their families must be at the top of Penn’s priorities as an institution; after all, we know our University’s history is riddled with waiting far too long to right its wrongs. Let our financial resources be allocated to families directly, how they wish.
Kligman died standing by his decisions. Four years before his passing, notably during his time on Penn’s medical ethics committee, he told The New York Times he “still [doesn’t] see there having been anything wrong” with the experiments. Kligman rests now, but the harm he caused persists — and so with it must our efforts to redress these abominable wrongs.
ARSHIYA PANT is a College sophomore studying history and legal studies from Kansas City, Kan. Her email is arshiyap@sas.upenn.edu.
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