Breakthrough: the Discovery of Insulin, and the Making of a Medical Miracle by Thea Cooper and Arthur Ainsberg
Breakthrough Photo Gallery

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Frederick Grant Banting (1891-1941) and J. J. R. Macleod were jointly awarded the 1923 Nobel Prize in Physiology (Medicine) for the discovery of insulin. It was Canada’s first Nobel Prize. Banting shared his prize winnings with Charles Best. Charles Best (1899-1978) was a 22-year-old student and Banting’s assistant at the University of Toronto lab. Best went on to get his medical degree and enjoyed a long and successful career at the University of Toronto. When he was 29-years-old he replaced Macleod as Professor of Physiology. John James Rickard Macleod (1876-1935) was a professor and Director of the Physiological Laboratory at the University of Toronto. He and Banting were awarded the 1923 Nobel Prize for the discovery of insulin. Macleod shared his Nobel Prize winnings with Collip. James Bertram Collip, (1892-1965), was visiting the University of Toronto on a sabbatical from the University of Alberta when he helped the Toronto group to purify insulin for human trials. On October 31, 1920, after reading an article in a medical journal, Banting awoke in the middle of the night and scribbled twenty-five words – an idea that would lead to the discovery of insulin.
The University of Toronto lab where Banting and Best carried out their research in 1921-1922. Banting with a dog on an operating table in 1923. Banting grew attached to the dogs used as test subjects and was grateful for their contribution to the life-saving discovery. His most famous canine patient was Marjorie, who was kept alive for two months as a test subject using Banting and Best’s pancreatic extract. Frederick Madison Allen. Before insulin, Allen’s “starvation diet” offered the only effective treatment for diabetics. The diet severely restricted caloric intake, an exacting calculus individual to each patient, in order to control sugar levels. Although he is now largely forgotten, the years of 1914 to 1922 are often referred to as the “Allen era in diabetes.” He saved countless lives. Elliott Proctor Joslin. Joslin and Allen were the two most widely recognized diabetologists in the nation during the first two decades of the twentieth century. Today, Joslin Diabetes Centers are located throughout the United States as well as in Canada and Dubai. George Henry Alexander Clowes. As director of research at Eli Lilly and Company, Clowes went to hear Banting deliver a paper on their research at the 34th American Physiological Society conference in New Haven, Connecticut. Clowes helped bring Eli Lilly and Toronto together in order to mass produce insulin.
Teddy Ryder before and after insulin. Teddy Ryder was a patient of Dr. Allen’s and at age five weighed only twenty-six pounds. Banting accepted Teddy as a patient and with insulin injections, Teddy went on to live a long life. He died in 1993 at age 76. A child, identified only as "J.L." before and after insulin. Upon receiving insulin, patients improved so quickly that their recoveries were often called resurrections. Elizabeth Hughes, circa 1924. Elizabeth became one of Banting’s most famous patients. Under the Allen treatment, she was whittled down to forty-five pounds of skin and bones. Insulin saved her life. At the time of her death in 1981, she had received some 42,000 insulin injections over 58 years. Elizabeth with her parents, Antoinette Carter and Charles Evans Hughes. Charles Evans Hughes, 1922 with a wireless radio phone. While Elizabeth was to be treated by Dr. Banting, her parents would be on a ship to Brazil for Charles’s position as secretary of state. Two-way ship-to-shore communication allowed them to track Elizabeth’s treatment. It was one of the earliest official uses of this wireless communication.
In 1951, Ten thousand pounds of pancreases were required to make one pound of insulin Bottle of insulin produced by Connaught Medical Research Laboratories in Toronto, 1923. Girl injecting herself with insulin), 1930. Early insulin kit, 1920s. Insulin finishing line, 1923. Dr. George Henry Alexander Clowes, as research director of Eli Lilly and Company in Indianapolis, Indiana, recognized the importance of Banting and Best's discovery. In collaboration with Toronto, Eli Lilly helped bring insulin into large-scale production.
Copyright © 2010 Arthur Ainsberg