Harold Blauer (1910 – January 8, 1953) was an American

tennis Tennis is a List of racket sports, racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles (tennis), singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles (tennis), doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket st ...

player who died as a result of injections of 450 mg 3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine (code-named EA-1298) as part of Project Artichoke, a covert

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

mind-control Mind control may refer to: Psychology and neurology * Brainwashing, the concept that the human mind can be altered or controlled by certain psychological techniques * Brain–computer interface * Hypnosis * Neuroprosthetics, the technology of cont ...

and chemical interrogation research program run by the

Office of Scientific Intelligence Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI) also known as Scientific Intelligence Division was a department of the Central Intelligence Agency. In 1963, it was incorporated into the Directorate of Science & Technology. Fictional uses of the name The ...

Tennis career

Blauer reached the round of 16 in the 1935 United States Professional Tennis Tournament, losing 3–6, 3–6, 3–6 to tennis legend (and eventual tournament champion)

Bill Tilden William Tatem Tilden II (February 10, 1893 – June 5, 1953), nicknamed "Big Bill", was an American tennis player. He was the world No. 1 amateur for six consecutive years, from 1920 to 1925, and was ranked as the world No. 1 professional by Ra ...

Death

Blauer checked into the

New York State Psychiatric Institute The New York State Psychiatric Institute, located at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, was established in 1895 as one of the first institutions in the United States ...

(NYSPI) in late 1952, seeking help for depression following a divorce. While at the facility, he was used as a test subject in experiments conducted by the Army

Chemical Corps The Chemical Corps is the branch of the United States Army tasked with defending against and using chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear ( CBRN) weapons. The Chemical Warfare Service was established on 28 June 1918, combining activit ...

. The Army had a classified agreement with the psychiatric institute that allowed them to study possible chemical warfare compounds by administering the substances to patients.$700,000 Awarded to Estate of Army Drug Test Victim
The Los Angeles Times. 06 May 1987

/ref> Between November 1952 and January 1953, Blauer was given injections of various

chemical analogue A structural analog, also known as a chemical analog or simply an analog, is a compound having a structure similar to that of another compound, but differing from it in respect to a certain component. It can differ in one or more atoms, functiona ...

s of

mescaline Mescaline, also known as mescalin or mezcalin, and in chemical terms 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine, is a natural product, naturally occurring psychedelic drug, psychedelic alkaloid, protoalkaloid of the substituted phenethylamine class, found ...

. He was first given relatively low doses of MDA ( 3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine), then DMA ( 3,4‐dimethoxyamphetamine),

MDPEA 3,4-Methylenedioxyphenethylamine, also known as 3,4-MDPEA, MDPEA, and homopiperonylamine, is a substituted phenethylamine formed by adding a methylenedioxy group to phenethylamine. It is structurally similar to MDA, but without the methyl gro ...

(3,4‐methylenedioxyphenethylamine) and DMA once again. Blauer requested to withdraw from these treatments because he got strong hallucinations from the injections. Despite this, on December 30, 1952 at 9:53 a.m., he was injected with a fatal dose of 450 milligrams (mg) of MDA. The injection caused sweating, tremors, flailing, and frothing at the mouth; after going into a coma, Blauer was pronounced dead at 12:15pm. See pp. 22–3. NYSPI has claimed that the overdose was accidental since the safe doses for these mescaline analogues were based only on a guess. Following Blauer's death, animal tests were performed in 1953 to find out the

LD50 In toxicology, the median lethal dose, LD50 (abbreviation for "lethal dose, 50%"), LC50 (lethal concentration, 50%) or LCt50 is a toxic unit that measures the lethal dose of a given substance. The value of LD50 for a substance is the dose requ ...

values for the mescaline analogues (

MDMA 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), commonly known as ecstasy (tablet form), and molly (crystal form), is an empathogen–entactogenic drug with stimulant and minor Psychedelic drug, psychedelic properties. In studies, it has been used ...

and many other compounds) before some of them were tested on people. "If you look at the timing of when that research seems to be done, they were like, 'Oh crap, we just killed someone. We need to quickly do some animal toxicology studies'," observed neuroscientist Matthew Baggott. This was done, on behalf of the Army Chemical Warfare Corps, in secrecy at the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

. Dr Maurice H. Seevers, Director of the Department of Pharmacology at Michigan University in Ann Arbor, supervised these tests. On the same day as Blauer, another NYSPI patient was injected with MDA. She was given 150 mg instead of the planned 450 mg dose of MDA, because her reaction to MDA was "so violent that the injection was stopped when it was only one-third complete." The extent of Blauer's knowledge of the experiment is unclear, and after his death the experiment was covered up by the state of

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

, the

U.S. government The Federal Government of the United States of America (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States. The U.S. federal government is composed of three distinct branches: legislative, executi ...

, and the CIA for 22 years. In 1987, a United States District Court judge awarded Blauer's estate over $700,000 in a ruling that described Blauer as a "guinea pig" whose medical records had been altered to disguise the actual cause of death.

Tennis career

Death

See also

References

Further reading