From 1951 to 1974, a Philadelphia prison called Holmesburg became one of the most shocking human experimentation programs in American history.
Backed by Johnson & Johnson, Dow Chemical, and the United States Army, University of Pennsylvania dermatologist Dr. Albert Kligman used mostly Black, mostly poor incarcerated men as test subjects for over two decades, exposing them to herpes, staph bacteria, radioactive isotopes, psychoactive drugs, and dioxin, the same carcinogenic compound found in Agent Orange.
Some of these men were locked up for nothing more than minor offenses like shoplifting or disorderly conduct. Most couldn’t afford bail. And in a system where experiment pay could mean the difference between sitting in a cell and going home, refusal wasn’t really a choice.
Kligman built a celebrated career off of this research. Johnson & Johnson made millions. Retin-A, one of the most widely used skincare medications in the world, was developed directly from experiments conducted on these men. They received a dollar or two a day.
No one went to jail. The institutions that funded it never paid a dime in restitution.
