ELEVEN
Toronto or Bust, October 1920 to April 1921
BANTING RESOLVED TO APPROACH DR. MILLER LATER THAT SAME morning, immediately after delivering his lecture, to explain his insight. He could hardly bring himself to wait that long. He would ask Miller for the resources to test his theory: a laboratory, an operating room, several dogs, and a salary sufficient to allow him to devote himself entirely to the work.
After the lecture, Banting met with Miller and explained his idea and the way it had come to him. He was so excited that twice Miller was forced to ask him to slow down. Although the details of the experiment were not entirely worked out, Miller understood that Banting believed he had arrived at a way to isolate a pancreatic extract. Miller also understood that Banting was absolutely convinced his idea would work and that he was determined to convince Miller of the same. Miller tried to sound encouraging, but biochemistry and the problems of the metabolism were not his area of expertise, so he was not in a position to assess the idea scientifically. In any case, he could not grant Banting’s request because there were no laboratories available. The science department at Western was then in the midst of a comprehensive capital campaign and the new building was under construction. Miller and Banting sat silent for a moment, and then Miller’s expression suddenly brightened.
“You might be the luckiest man in history,” Miller said, his eyes twinkling.
“Because one of the greatest authorities on metabolism is in Toronto. I don’t know why I didn’t think of him immediately.”
“Who is it? Who?”
“Does the name J. J. R. Macleod mean anything to you?”
“No.”
“Well, it should. He wrote a textbook on diabetes—and now he’s at the university!”
“He is? I don’t remember a Macleod.”
“He wasn’t there when you were. He came a few years ago from one of the big medical schools in the United States. It was quite a coup for Toronto. If I remember right, he’s an associate dean of the medical school and head of the physiology department. He’ll have more labs than he knows what to do with! And your timing couldn’t be better because Toronto’s physiology department got a one million dollar grant not too long ago, so their laboratory facilities are top-notch.”
“Will he talk to me?”
“Why not? You’re an alumnus, and the subject will likely appeal to him since it’s in his research field. You can tell him I suggested that you call on him. There’s probably no better person on earth to advise you than Professor Macleod.”
Banting left the meeting with Miller with one thought: If his brainstorm resulted in a medical breakthrough, it would vindicate him. It would prove his worth to Ken, Edith, and all the people who declined to hire him in Toronto. It would prove that the unhappy chapter in London had not been a waste of his time and his father’s money. Whenever doubt crept in, he asked himself, “Why not me?” Hadn’t Einstein been a lowly patent clerk when he had his epiphany about relativity? Hadn’t he struggled to find a job after graduation, just as Banting had? Hadn’t he claimed that imagination was more important than knowledge? Science failed when it neglected to ask the bold questions and when it dared not challenge the historical record. In November 1919 The New York Times headlines proclaimed “Lights All Askew in the Heavens. Men of Science More or Less Agog Over Results of Eclipse Observations. Einstein Theory Triumphs.” The Times of London carried the headline “Revolution in Science. New Theory of the Universe. Newtonian Ideas Overthrown.” The stories reported on the confirmation that the solar eclipse of May 29, 1919, had borne out Einstein’s predictions, and Einstein, Banting told himself, had begun with a hunch just like his own. It was the age of big ideas. The heroes of the day were Edison, Tesla, von Zeppelin, Einstein, Curie. Would the name Banting be added to the list? He made plans to travel to Toronto.
Banting’s confidence grew with each mile of the one-hundred-twenty- five-mile trip from London to Toronto to meet the great Professor Macleod. By the time he entered Macleod’s office in early November 1920, he was filled with such zeal that his hypothesis seemed unassailable. Banting’s first impression was that Macleod was a small man in a big office. Ten years older than Banting, Macleod was distinguished looking, dressed in a Harris tweed suit. His manner was formal and reserved. He had pale, freckled skin, a slightly receding hairline of fine sandy hair, and a brushy mustache.
Macleod was predisposed to feel warm toward Banting, not just because he was an alumnus but because he was a veteran of the CAMC, which had risen with courage and alacrity to fight in Europe. Macleod had been back in Toronto only a few months after having spent the summer in Scotland, the first trip home since the war. There he had reunited with his parents and sisters and spent what were to be his last days with his brother Clement, a veteran of the RAMC and, like Banting, a recipient of the military cross. (Clement would die less than two weeks after Macleod met with Banting.)
Banting was not at all as Macleod had expected him to be. He was self-conscious and inarticulate. Nervous, he refused to take a seat. Instead he paced the length of the office, cracking his knuckles and speaking in rapid, blustering bursts and then halting in midsentence, scowling and starting again on a different tack. Banting spoke with a surgeon’s urgency rather than a researcher’s deliberate calm. The proposal he set forth—if you could call it that—was hardly well considered. Essentially, Banting swaggered into the office, chattered about the rudiments of a research project, and demanded the means to carry it out. Watching him pace in front of his desk was like watching a wild animal: fascinating but you don’t want to get too close.
“You operate on several dogs, locating the ducts connecting the pancreas to the duodenum. You tie off those ducts, closing them off completely, and close the incision. After seven weeks or so, the dog is recovered from the surgery and the acinar tissue that produces the digestive enzyme is atrophied. Then you open up the dog again and harvest the islets of Langerhans, which should contain only the secretion from the islets. Meanwhile, you’ve depancreatized another dog, rendering it diabetic. You take the harvested secretion and introduce it to the depancreatized dog, measuring the sugar in the urine and blood before and after. If the diabetic condition is relieved, then I’d say we’ve succeeded. If the dog dies, we failed.”
“I see. And how exactly do you propose to introduce the harvested secretion to the depancreatized dog?”
“You could inject it intramuscularly or intravenously. You could even transplant the ligated pancreas into the depancreatized dog, grafting it into the abdomen somehow. I haven’t worked out the particulars yet. The point is to see how long you can keep the diabetic dog alive.”
“Very interesting,” Macleod said. “You realize that it’s not entirely unpre ce dented.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean to say that work like it has been done. Perhaps you could explain to me how your idea is different than previous efforts.”
“Why?”
“Why? To show how your effort would be original and worthy of support.”
“I’m not trying to be original. I’m trying to find something that works!”
“Well, yes, but let’s start with what has been done. A review of the literature might be a good way to begin.”
“Why?”
“Why? To learn from it, of course. The study of diabetes is a rapidly advancing area of research. Some of the greatest scientific minds of our time have been applied to the problem. Aren’t you interested in their findings?”
“I’m more interested in finding a cure for diabetes than in reading about how others have tried and failed.”
Macleod almost guffawed.
“I admire your zeal, Dr. Banting, and your idea is interesting, but there is a long history of failure to prepare an extract of pancreas that contains the effective property and I think you’d do well to familiarize yourself with it.”
“But no one was using pancreases with ligated ducts!”
“That’s not precisely accurate, as you would know if you had read the history. Are you sure you won’t have a seat?”
“No, thanks.”
“You’re aware that no one has as yet shown conclusive evidence that this internal secretion actually exists. There’s a group within the research community who believe that it doesn’t.”
“So?”
“You do realize you are standing on the campus of a research university, don’t you, Dr. Banting?”
“Look, I get you. You are a researcher. An academician. I am a sawbones. Most of what I know I learned on the battlefield. One thing I learned is that I’d rather save lives than win arguments.”
“Nevertheless, you have come to an office at the University of Toronto to ask for research funding.”
“Yes, but I’m only in it for the clinical application. Lives could be lost while I’m wasting time in the medical library.”
“Dr. Banting— Won’t you please sit down?”
“I said no, thank you!”
Macleod, flummoxed and beginning to wonder if Banting had wandered over from the psychiatric ward of the Christie Street Veterans Hospital, simply watched in silence as Banting paced in front of his desk.
“I know what you’re thinking. Why should you give someone with no research background money and a lab.”
Macleod said nothing.
“Well, you just should! See here, I’m not a talker. You know it and I know it. I could stand here for another forty-five minutes and try to persuade you—not very eloquently—or you could just say yes now and save us both some time.”
For the first time, it dawned on Macleod that Banting might have anticipated starting immediately. He might even have a suitcase outside the office door and a bag of surgical instruments.
“Surely you don’t expect me to give you an answer on the basis of this brief conversation. There are procedures, Dr. Banting. You must submit a written proposal.”
Banting stopped pacing and glowered at the word “proposal.”
“How can I say yes if I don’t even know what you’re asking for? How much money? What kind of lab? How long will you need it? How many dogs? Will you require an assistant?”
“Just let me get started. You won’t regret it. I’m telling you this idea is going to work.”
Macleod suppressed a grin. If Banting wasn’t so menacing, he would be amusing. His appearance was a bit clownish—the lumbering posture, the overly large hands, the horsey facial features. Macleod found himself alternately moved to compassion and apprehension.
However Macleod felt about Banting as a man, he couldn’t help but feel a bit sorry for him as a scientist. It was commonly understood among researchers that if there were a way to prove once and for all the existence or nonexistence of this elusive substance, it would be through isolating it. Despite the ex-soldier’s blustering confidence about ligating pancreatic ducts, Macleod knew it was an extremely tricky procedure.
Macleod himself was pursuing a theory that the best solution could be found in the sea. Teleostei comprise a class of ray-finned fish including trout, bass, salmon, and tuna, and game fish such as Atlantic sailfish, swordfish, and marlin. In these fishes islet tissue is contained within one or more easily recognizable nodules. Since the islet tissue is anatomically discrete from the acinar tissue, it would be easy to harvest and there would be no danger of contaminating the islet secretion with the acinar secretion. If Macleod’s idea were proved, it would allay the most daunting impediment to developing a practicable extract for clinical use.
Macleod had begun to make plans to pursue his fish pancreas research at St. Andrews in New Brunswick during the summer of 1922. He had gone so far as to contact the captain of a commercial fishing boat, the Ve- nosta, to procure a supply of the bony fishes all through the summer. Macleod hoped to complete a paper by the following autumn, and for that purpose the negative findings that Banting’s effort would certainly produce could be useful in adding support for the fish pancreas direction.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Macleod. “Go to the medical library, do a bit of looking around in the literature, and then write me a letter telling me what you’ll need for your research.”
“And you’ll grant me the funding?”
“I will absolutely take it under consideration.”
“You mean you’ll think about it.”
“The university has entrusted me to allocate its resources judiciously and as long as it is all right with you, I intend to do so.”
“When can I expect your answer?”
“When will I receive your letter?”
Banting left in a huff, vowing never to waste another moment with J. J. R. Macleod or any of his highfalutin, tweed-wearing, backward- looking ilk.
As the weeks wore on, Banting’s high resolve was softened by financial imperative and a growing restlessness. Five months after he unearthed Edith’s engagement ring, he once again found himself seeking to reclaim something he had discarded. On March 8, 1921, he wrote to Macleod expressing his wish to work at Macleod’s lab in late May, June, and July—”if your offer . . . still holds good.” He proposed to begin work on May 15, 1921.
Despite having written the letter, Banting remained ambivalent about what to do: apply to accompany the oil expedition in the far North Country or spend the summer operating on dogs in Toronto. He learned that the expedition was to go to the Mackenzie River Valley, a pristine region populated with moose, caribou, lynx, and grizzly bear. The Northwest Territory was roughly twice the size of Ontario, covering nearly one-fifth of Canada. Of the two options, he was leaning toward the call of the wild. He was burning for adventure, and the idea of a group of men in the wilderness promised the camaraderie he had so enjoyed during the war. He decided to interview for the oil expedition, but since he’d already written a letter to Macleod, he dropped it in the post anyway. Banting decided that he would accept whichever offer came to him first.
Macleod considered Banting’s letter. He and Mary would be in Scotland for much of the period of Banting’s research effort, so granting Banting the lab would not pose much of an inconvenience to him personally. On the other hand, Macleod wondered whether it was irresponsible to allow such an unknown and apparently volatile character to have unsu- pervised access to the facilities.
Three days later, Macleod replied to Banting agreeing that he could begin his research on May 15 at the University of Toronto. When Macleod’s letter reached Banting, he was leaning so heavily toward the oil expedition that he did not reply for a month. However, when the news came that the oil expedition would not take a doctor along after all, Macleod’s offer became considerably more attractive. On April 18, 1921, Banting wrote to Macleod accepting the offer.