Table Of ContentTHE DEVELOPMENT OF BRAIN BANKS
IN THE UK c.1970–c.2010
The transcript of a Witness Seminar held by the History
of Modern Biomedicine Research Group, Queen Mary
University of London, on 12 November 2013
Edited by C Overy and E M Tansey
Volume 53 2015
©The Trustee of the Wellcome Trust, London, 2015
First published by Queen Mary University of London, 2015
The History of Modern Biomedicine Research Group is funded by the Wellcome Trust, which is
a registered charity, no. 210183.
ISBN 978 1 91019 5024
All volumes are freely available online at www.histmodbiomed.org
Please cite as: Overy C, Tansey E M. (eds) (2015) The Development of Brain Banks in the UK
c.1970 – c.2010. Wellcome Witnesses to Contemporary Medicine, vol. 53. London: Queen
Mary University of London.
CONTENTS
What is a Witness Seminar? v
Acknowledgements
E M Tansey and C Overy vii
Illustrations and credits ix
Abbreviations xi
Introduction
James Ironside xiii
Transcript
Edited by C Overy and E M Tansey 1
Appendix 1
Brain Banking Timeline 85
Appendix 2
The MRC Sudden Death and Tissue Bank 89
Biographical notes 91
References 99
Index 105
Witness Seminars: Meetings and Publications 113
WHAT IS A WITNESS SEMINAR?
The Witness Seminar is a specialized form of oral history, where several
individuals associated with a particular set of circumstances or events are invited
to meet together to discuss, debate, and agree or disagree about their memories.
The meeting is recorded, transcribed, and edited for publication.
This format was first devised and used by the Wellcome Trust’s History of
Twentieth Century Medicine Group in 1993 to address issues associated with
the discovery of monoclonal antibodies. We developed this approach after
holding a conventional seminar, given by a medical historian, on the discovery
of interferon. Many members of the invited audience were scientists or others
involved in that work, and the detailed and revealing discussion session
afterwards alerted us to the importance of recording ‘communal’ eyewitness
testimonies. We learned that the Institute for Contemporary British History
held meetings to examine modern political, diplomatic, and economic history,
which they called Witness Seminars, and this seemed a suitable title for us to
use also.
The unexpected success of our first Witness Seminar, as assessed by the
willingness of the participants to attend, speak frankly, agree and disagree, and
also by many requests for its transcript, encouraged us to develop the Witness
Seminar model into a full programme, and since then more than 50 meetings
have been held and published on a wide array of biomedical topics.1 These
seminars have proved an ideal way to bring together clinicians, scientists, and
others interested in contemporary medical history to share their memories. We
are not seeking a consensus, but are providing the opportunity to hear an array
of voices, many little known, of individuals who were ‘there at the time’ and
thus able to question, ratify, or disagree with others’ accounts – a form of open
peer-review. The material records of the meeting also create archival sources for
present and future use.
The History of Twentieth Century Medicine Group became a part of the
Wellcome Trust’s Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL in October
2000 and remained so until September 2010. It has been part of the School
of History, Queen Mary University of London, since October 2010, as the
History of Modern Biomedicine Research Group, which the Wellcome Trust
1 See pages 113–18 for a full list of Witness Seminars held, details of the published volumes and other
related publications.
v
funds principally under a Strategic Award entitled ‘The Makers of Modern
Biomedicine’. The Witness Seminar format continues to be a major part of that
programme, although now the subjects are largely focused on areas of strategic
importance to the Wellcome Trust, including the neurosciences, clinical
genetics, and medical technology.2
Once an appropriate topic has been agreed, usually after discussion with
a specialist adviser, suitable participants are identified and invited. As the
organization of the Seminar progresses and the participants’ list is compiled, a
flexible outline plan for the meeting is devised, with assistance from the meeting’s
designated chairman/moderator. Each participant is sent an attendance list and
a copy of this programme before the meeting. Seminars last for about four
hours; occasionally full-day meetings have been held. After each meeting the
raw transcript is sent to every participant, each of whom is asked to check his or
her own contribution and to provide brief biographical details for an appendix.
The editors incorporate participants’ minor corrections and turn the transcript
into readable text, with footnotes, appendices, a glossary, and a bibliography.
Extensive research and liaison with the participants is conducted to produce
the final script, which is then sent to every contributor for approval and to
assign copyright to the Wellcome Trust. Copies of the original, and edited,
transcripts and additional correspondence generated by the editorial process are
all deposited with the records of each meeting in the Wellcome Library, London
(archival reference GC/253) and are available for study.
For all our volumes, we hope that, even if the precise details of the more
technical sections are not clear to the non-specialist, the sense and significance
of the events will be understandable to all readers. Our aim is that the volumes
inform those with a general interest in the history of modern medicine and
medical science; provide historians with new insights, fresh material for study,
and further themes for research; and emphasize to the participants that their
own working lives are of proper and necessary concern to historians.
2 See our group’s website at www.histmodbiomed.org
vi
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The topic of ‘the development of brain banks in the UK’ came about as a
result of a discussion with Professor Paul Francis at the British Neuroscience
Association meeting in April 2013 and we are very grateful to him for his
help in the planning of this meeting. We thank Professor Hugh Perry for his
excellent chairing of the occasion and Professor James Ironside for writing the
introduction to the volume. Our gratitude also goes to Dr Joanna Jenkinson
for providing material for the Appendices; the Wellcome Library, London, for
permission to use photographs from the meeting; and the MRC for permission
to reproduce Figure 19.
As with all our meetings, we depend a great deal on Wellcome Trust staff to
ensure their smooth running: the Audiovisual Department, Catering, Reception,
Security, and Wellcome Images. We are also grateful to Mr Akio Morishima for
the design and production of this volume; the indexer Ms Liza Furnival; Mrs
Sarah Beanland and Ms Fiona Plowman for proof reading; Mrs Debra Gee for
transcribing the seminar; Ms Emma Jones for assisting with running the seminar
and Mr Adam Wilkinson who assisted in the organization and running of the
meeting. Finally, we thank the Wellcome Trust for supporting this programme.
Tilli Tansey
Caroline Overy
School of History, Queen Mary University of London
vii
ILLUSTRATIONS AND CREDITS*
Figure A Professor James Ironside, reproduced with
his permission xvi
Figure 1 Professor Tilli Tansey 3
Figure 2 Professor Hugh Perry 5
Figure 3 Participants at the Witness Seminar 7
Figure 4 Professor Peter Lantos 10
Figure 5 Professor Margaret Esiri 11
Figure 6 Professor Gavin Reynolds 13
Figure 7 Professor Carol Brayne 14
Figure 8 Professor David Mann 16
Figure 9 Professor Paul Francis 20
Figure 10 Professor Seth Love 30
Figure 11 Ms Brenda Nally 32
Figure 12 Ms Karen Shaw, Professor Peter Lantos, and
Professor Carol Brayne 36
Figure 13 Dr Djordje Gveric 40
Figure 14 Dr Joanna Jenkinson 41
Figure 15 Dr Joanna Jenkinson, Professor Paul Francis, and
Dr Catherine Moody 44
Figure 16 Dr Joanna Jenkinson, Professor Paul Francis,
Dr Catherine Moody, Professor Margaret Esiri,
Professor David Mann, Ms Brenda Nally, and
Ms Karen Shaw 49
* Unless otherwise stated, all photographs were taken by Thomas Farnetti, Wellcome Trust, and
reproduced courtesy of the Wellcome Library, London.
ix
Figure 17 Dr Djordje Gveric, Professor Seth Love, and
Professor Peter Lantos 55
Figure 18 Dr Catherine Moody 56
Figure 19 Diagram of the proposed Brain Bank Network.
Reproduced with permission from the Medical
Research Council 58
Figure 20 Professor Hugh Perry 61
Figure 21 Ms Karen Shaw 69
Figure 22 Professor David Mann 72
Figure 23 Professor Carol Brayne and Dr Djordje Gveric 77
Figure 24 Professor Gavin Reynolds 81
Table 1 Outline Programme for ‘The Development of Brain
Banks in the UK c.1970–c.2010’ Witness Seminar 4
