“TORONTO DOCTORS ON TRACK OF DIABETES CURE” declared the front-page headline of the March 22, 1922, edition of the Toronto Daily Star. Accompanying it was a composite image of four men based at the University of Toronto whose work on pancreatic extracts showed promising results: Frederick Banting, Charles Best, James Collip, and John Macleod. The first major story about the development of insulin celebrated their achievements but glossed over the drama behind the scenes.
The scoop was courtesy of reporter Roy Greenaway, who had followed the story over the previous two months through a combination of persistence and playing ball with members of the research team. The story was timed to coincide with the release that day of the March 1922 edition of the Canadian Medical Association Journal, which included a paper prepared by the team detailing its progress. “The Star article was simply intended to provide in layman’s language a correct interpretation of the technical paper in the medical journal,” Greenaway explained in his book The News Game. “Great care was taken in connection with it, so that there should be no exaggeration and no false hopes raised.” His precautions included running drafts by the team to ensure accuracy.
“A message of hope to sufferers from diabetes goes out authentically today from the medical research laboratories of the University of Toronto,” Greenaway’s Star story began. “The fact remains that one of the most important discoveries in modern medical research has been made at the university here. It is not a cure for diabetes, its authors state. Within six months, however, their discovery will be used on a large scale, they hope, to prolong life quite considerably at least. There will be no secrecy, as from the beginning. The medical profession will know all the facts.”
The Quest, 1958, directed by Stanley Jackson. (NFB)
Greenaway’s piece spotlighted Banting’s background and military service during the First World War. Asked when the public could expect to seek treatment, Banting cautioned that, due to an inadequate supply of extract, it would be at least three to six months before any additional patients could be treated. Macleod, who supervised the research, summed up the team’s progress by noting they’d been impressed with the results so far. He promised that “we are going to hurry the investigation to completion, so that every detail of the proper method of preparation and administration may be published soon.”
What the scoop glossed over was the rocky professional relationships and research setbacks that the team had experienced over the winter of 1922. The pressure involved in the work to alleviate the suffering of diabetics affected everyone, deepening their insecurities and paranoia — especially in the case of the temperamental Banting.
Convinced that Macleod wanted to steal credit for his discoveries, Banting insisted that the extract he and Best had worked on since the summer of 1921 be used for the first human trial. Its failure placed pressure on Collip to come up with a better version. Greenaway had heard about the research via his personal physician, George W. Ross, who was the son of a former Ontario premier and a Banting ally. Soon after Thompson’s first shots, Greenaway met Best in the lab where testing on dogs was performed. Best joked “you won’t like the perfume” when the reporter was overcome by the combined scents of decaying organs and dog poop. Best took him to meet Macleod, who was appalled by the thought of releasing any results, as he worried they would raise false hopes or attract the wrath of anti-vivisectionists.
On January 14, the Toronto Star Weekly published one of the first newspaper stories about the team’s work. Macleod urged readers not to get their hopes up, although he did say they were working toward the “hope that some day we may be able to help on a little bit.” Banting was livid; he felt the story was distorted as it barely mentioned him, and it deepened his hatred of Macleod, although Macleod was trying to protect the project.
Meanwhile, Collip worked on improving the extract. Historian Michael Bliss notes that Collip, who was known for his formulating skills, was “part chef, part brewer, part wizard, and, to his critics, part ‘messer.’” He was speedy but tended not to duplicate his recipes and left few records.
Clockwise from top left: Frederick Banting, Charles Best, James Collip, and John Macleod. From the March 26, 1922, edition of Toronto Star Weekly.
At some point between January 17 and 24, Collip and Banting had a physical altercation in the labs. As accounts vary and weren’t written until years later, what exactly happened is a matter of conjecture. It appears that Collip visited Banting and Best in their lab and told them that he wasn’t going to share the latest extract formulation (which may or may not have had Macleod’s blessing) and that he was contemplating leaving the research team and patenting the process on his own. Banting threatened to beat up Collip and had to be restrained by Best. A colleague later drew a cartoon showing Banting sitting on Collip and titled “The Discovery of Insulin.”
Whatever happened, a team meeting was held on January 25. There are accounts of Collip showing up with a bruised eye and Banting appearing dishevelled. Accusations flew: Banting, for example, believed that Thompson’s chart listed “Macleod’s serum” as the treatment in another attempt to steal credit. Connaught Laboratories director J.G. Fitzgerald, whose facilities assisted with extract production, suggested that Macleod’s name had been used in case anything went wrong, as Banting lacked official standing at the university. All parties agreed that no extract could be patented without Connaught’s involvement and that research policy could not be changed without a meeting involving Banting, Best, Collip, Fitzgerald, and Macleod.
By the time the Star and CMAJ pieces were published on March 22, research had hit major roadblocks. Despite Collip’s initial success and the installation of new equipment in the university’s medical building, he was unable to produce any more useable pancreatic extract, forcing the suspension of human trials. Collip’s efforts were further hampered by both a family flu outbreak and his deteriorating relations with Banting, which may have provoked further physical confrontations. Collip’s lone surviving comment about the production issues indicated that “great difficulties were encountered chiefly because the conditions of time and temperature which were adhered to in the original method could not be obtained in a large scale process with the facilities then at hand.”
Banting spent nearly all of March 1922 in a drunken self-pitying haze, sometimes stealing alcohol from the lab. Amid everything else, he had put down the most successful canine test subject, Marjorie, only to discover during an autopsy that not all of her pancreatic tissue had been removed, which cast doubt on why she had survived for so long. He considered moving on, possibly into cancer research. He ignored phone calls and telegrams and rarely visited campus. He was involved in an on-again, off-again romantic relationship. At the end of the month, Best confronted Banting and declared that he would also quit if Banting left. This shook Banting out of his stupor, and the two resumed work on producing an effective extract.
Dr. James B. Collip: Co-discover of Insulin (Ontario Heritage Trust)
The extract soon received the name “insulin,” based on its source from the islets of Langerhans within the pancreas. It was publicly revealed in a reported delivered by Macleod at the May 3 meeting of the American Association of Physicians, where he received a standing ovation. By mid-May, insulin production successfully resumed. The revived trials included the first use of insulin in the United States, when Banting provided a dosage to a doctor treating the son of an Eastman Kodak executive in Rochester. The month ended with an agreement with Eli Lilly and Company to produce insulin on a larger scale. Collip’s allocated time on the project was up; he returned to the University of Alberta, and Best replaced him as production head.
The team’s efforts were rewarded with the 1923 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, though this was not without controversy: it was awarded to Banting and Macleod, but the former split his prize money with Best and the latter with Collip. While Banting had mended his relationship with Collip, his hatred for Macleod never disappeared. When Macleod left U of T in 1928, Banting refused to attend his farewell dinner. Legend has it he requested that an empty seat be set for him at the dinner table.
Greenaway felt that, although Banting later protested about how the press had treated him, he wanted as much publicity as possible. Though the two fell out personally, Banting continued to send medical stories to him via intermediaries. “Banting was a genius,’ Greenaway reflected, “but the kind of person with whom I preferred not to live.”
Sources: Banting: A Biography by Michael Bliss (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1992); The Discovery of Insulin by Michael Bliss (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1982); Breakthrough: Banting, Best, and the Race to Save Millions of Diabetics by Thea Cooper and Arthur Ainsburg (Toronto: Viking Canada, 2010); The News Game by Roy Greenaway (Toronto: Clarke, Irwin & Company, 1966); Diabetes: The Biography by Robert Tattersall (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2009); the March 1922 edition of the Canadian Medical Association Journal; the March 22, 1922, edition of the Toronto Daily Star; and the January 14, 1922, edition of the Toronto Star Weekly.