Pellagra Drawings

During the summer of 1919, a talented young artist, John Carroll was assigned to Dr. Joseph Goldberger's pellagra study, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Public Health. Mr. Carroll produced forty-one drawings of patients in pellagra hospitals in Spartanburg, South Carolina and Milledgeville, Georgia. The drawings are mixed media, watercolor, pen-and ink, and pencil and are on Bristol board, 14 1/2 by 19 inches. The dates of the drawings cover the relatively short period from May 18 to August 7, 1919. Clinical notes written by Dr. William F. Tanner, Dr. Goldberger's associate, accompany each painting and include the patient's name, case number and description of his or her condition.

The artist, John Carroll (1892-1959), began painting when he was eleven years old, studying at the Mark Hopkins Institute in San Francisco and later with Frank Duveneck in Cincinnati. During World War I, Carroll joined the Navy and was sent to France to make lithographs for the Navy Department. Being in his own words, "stone broke" at the time of his discharge from the Navy, he took the temporary position with Dr. Goldberger in Spartanburg and Milledgeville. John Carroll was not a career medical illustrator. He made no other such drawings but quickly gained a reputation as a talented young artist and portrait painter.

Drawing 1: Pellagra Patient, Georgia State Sanitarium, 1919

Drawing 2: Pellagra Patient, Pellagra Hospital, Spartanburg, South Carolina, 1919

Drawing 3: Pellagra Patient, Pellagra Hospital, Spartanburg, South Carolina, 1919

Drawing 4: Pellagra Patient, Georgia State Sanitarium, 1919