EMPIRE OF SKULLS

America’s embrace of a novel brain science that shaped the young nation.

The contours and curves of the human skull can reveal the mental makeup of a person, according to the 19th-century pseudoscience known as phrenology. Stob, a professor of communication at Vanderbilt University, casts a spell with his humorous, witty storytelling and cinematic descriptions of a bygone era that is sometimes racist and foolish, yet intent on the power to improve oneself. Believers—including P.T. Barnum, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Walt Whitman—also bought into the notion that science and self-measurement can be empowering. The brain has many organs, with 37 attributes that could be numerically measured, including conscientiousness, destructiveness, secretiveness, benevolence, and amativeness (sex drive). The “empire of skulls” was built by the Fowler family, who understood that flattery, combined with spectacle, made for devoted audiences. The history of phrenology encompasses ghost stories, sex scandals, gruesome pirate slayings, grave robbing, and even octagonal architecture. From the 1830s to the Civil War, phrenology was the right science at the right time for an adolescent nation that needed grounding, Stob argues. It fell out of favor by the late-19th century, with the rise of Darwinism, the scientific method, and a visit by none other than Mark Twain, whose skepticism was increasingly shared by a nation scarred by the brutalities of war. Far from a remote tidbit of history, phrenology brain maps are often referenced in popular culture, and its focus on measuring the human body in order to boost health is evident in the contemporary popularity of fitness trackers, DNA testing, high-tech scales and body scans.

A fascinating tale of a nation gripped and shaped by a science/health fad that resonates today.