About this item
Phineas Gage was truly a man with a hole in his head. Phineas, a railroad construction foreman, was blasting rock near Cavendish, Vermont, in 1848 when a thirteen-pound iron rod was shot through his brain. Miraculously, he survived to live another eleven years and become a textbook case in brain science. At the time, Phineas Gage seemed to completely recover from his accident. He could walk, talk, work, and travel, but he was changed. Gage "was no longer Gage," said his Vermont doctor, meaning that the old Phineas was dependable and well liked, and the new Phineas was crude and unpredictable. His case astonished doctors in his day and still fascinates doctors today. What happened and what didn’t happen inside the brain of Phineas Gage will tell you a lot about how your brain works and how you act human.
About the Author
John Fleischman writes science for the American Society for Cell Biology, books for kids and others, and articles for the "Harvard Health Letter" and "Air & Space Smithsonian." He was a science writer at Harvard Medical School, a science broadcaster at Boston's WGBH (public radio) , and a senior editor for "Yankee" and "Ohio" magazines.
Fleischman's latest non-fiction book for older children is "Black & White Airmen: Their True History," published in 2007 by Houghton-Mifflin Children's Books of Boston. Named a 2008 "Orbis Pictus Honor Book for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children" by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) , "Airmen" also won the 2008 Carter G. Woodson Middle Level Book Award from the National Council for the Social Studies. Says Fleischman, "'Black & White Airmen' is about flying, WWII, segregation, and friendship. And it has a happy ending."
His first non-fiction book for older kids, "Phineas Gage: A Gruesome But True Story About Brain Science," was an American Library Association "Notable Children's Book" and "Best Book for Young Adults" in 2003. It was also named an "Orbis Pictus Honor Book" by the NCTE in 2003. The paperback was picked for a list of "2007 Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults" at the ALA winter meeting. Fleischman was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in 2006 to work on his third nonfiction book for older kids about animals that have won the Nobel Prize in Medicine. (You thought only people won them? )
