Chilling photographs show inside a disturbing experiment involving a litlte boy and his “sister” chimp who were spun on chairs and had their heads hit with spoons to compare the sound of their skulls
Chilling photos show a tiny little baby being raised alongside a chimp in a warped experiment.
One haunting image even shows the tot in floods of tears after being spun about in his chair again and again.
It is now approaching 93 years since the study was abruptly terminated in the early part of 1932 – and below we take a closer look at the disturbing tests that ultimately ended in tragedy.
The Kellogg family
It was June 26, 1931, when Winthrop Niles Kellogg and his wife Luella welcomed a fourth member to their family.
They already had a little boy called Donald but they wanted him to have a “sibling” – and this is where a baby chimpanzee called Gua came into the picture.
Being animal psychologists, they thought it would be interesting to raise Gua alongside Donald to see how “human” they could make it.
But despite their intention, it was Donald who “became more ape than human” and the experiment had to be cut short.
What happened in the experiment?
The experiment was supposed to take place over a five-year period. It started when Donald was seven months old while Gua was 10 months.
However, it only lasted nine months, and the parents began to fear the worst when little Donald began biting, crawling like a chimp and grunting when he was hungry.
This was after the comparative psychologists made Donald sleep in a similar bed to the chimp. The “brother and sister” were also spoken to in the same way and similar rules applied when it came to clothing, toys and punishments.
One haunting picture even showed Donald screaming out after his rotating chair was repeatedly spun in one alarming test.
Gunshots were fired in another experiment to see whether it would be Donald or Gua who reacted quicker.
Both the boy and chimp were even whacked on the top of their heads with spoons. This was done to determine how different their skulls sounded.
The horrifying tests took place for 12 hours a day all week long and it led to Winthrop publishing a book – The Ape and the Child: A study of environmental influence upon early behaviour.
The Kellogg couple were encouraged with Gua’s progress, especially physically, but found she struggled to keep up with Donald intellectually after he started to formulate words.
Writing about the experiment’s ending, The Psychological Review concluded: “We are told that the study was terminated on March 28, 1932, when Gua was returned to the Orange Park primate colony through a gradual rehabilitating process.
“But as for why, the Kelloggs, who are so specific on so many other points, leave the reader wondering.”
Speculating on why the tests were abruptly concluded, they added: “First, the schedule that the Kelloggs maintained for the nine months was so gruelling that they may have quit for reasons of fatigue.
“Second, they may have wanted to use the time remaining to them on leave from Indiana to prepare the book manuscript for publication.
“Third, Gua was maturing, gaining in strength and, according to Kellogg, becoming less predictable and more difficult to manage.
“It is possible that the Kelloggs feared Gua might inadvertently harm Donald.”
Tragic ending
Mum Leulla reportedly became worried her son was becoming more chimp than human, and as such the tests were stopped.
But for a time, life carried on as normal, with Winthrop earning a living by studying bottle-nose dolphins at Florida State University.
He died in the same summer as his wife in 1972 and tragically their son passed away after reportedly taking his own life just one year later aged just 43.
As for Gua, she was sent away after the experiment, but died of pneumonia aged three just one year later.