Joseph (J.) Garrott Allen

Joseph (J.) Garrott Allen was a research associate in the Health Division of the University of Chicago’s Metallurgical Laboratory (“Met Lab”) during the Manhattan Project. 

Allen joined the Met Lab on July 24, 1944. In the Health Division, Allen worked in radiation pathology. His main research focus involved studying the blood of hundreds of dogs who were exposed to radiation. Dogs were studied because their irradiation symptoms were similar to those observed in humans.

At the lab, he also conducting employee examinations two half-days per week. Allen worked at the Met Lab until July 1, 1946. 

Early Years

Joseph Garrott Allen was born on June 5, 1912 in Elkins, West Virginia. He initially attended Davis & Elkins College, where his father was the president, but he finished his undergraduate education at Washington University in St. Louis in 1934.

In 1938, Allen earned his MD from Harvard University. He performed his internship and residency at the University of Chicago. After residency, he became an attending physician and faculty member at the University of Chicago’s Medical School. 

Later Years

Allen returned to the University of Chicago in 1947. In her interview on the Voices of the Manhattan Project website, Floy Agnes Lee recalled being hired to work at Argonne National Laboratory, the successor of the Met Lab. Lee worked with Dr. Hermann Lisco and Dr. Allen “as a technician, just getting things prepared for them, for whatever they were doing, taking tissues.”

In 1950, Allen co-published a summary of his six-year study on the effects of irradiation in dogs in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In 1951, Allen became a professor of surgery at the University of Chicago’s Medical School. 

Allen left the University of Chicago in 1959 to become the Chair of the Department of Surgery at Stanford University’s medical school. He served as a professor of surgery at Stanford until his retirement in 1977.

On April 19, 1974, Allen was interviewed about the plutonium injection experiments at Billings Hospital in Chicago during the Manhattan Project. He was interviewed because Dr. Leon Jacobson had mentioned Allen’s name as a person who might have made the injections or knew about them. 

Besides Jacobson, Allen was the only other member of the Met Lab who also worked at Billings Hospital. He also had a top-secret clearance. Allen acknowledged reporting to Dr. Jacobson, who in turn reported to Dr. Robert Stone. According to one of the interviewers, Sidney Marks, “at no time in the interview did he indicate any knowledge of the injection of plutonium into human subjects.”

During this period, Allen published numerous articles and served on the editorial boards of a few different publications. From 1962 to 1970, Allen served was the chief editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association’s ARCHIVES. He was also on the editorial boards of Surgery, The Journal of Surgical Research, and Transfusion.

At the age of seventy-nine, Joseph (J.) Garrott Allen died on January 10, 1992 in his home on the Stanford University campus.

Medical Contributions

As a hematologist, Allen focused on blood plasma and the effects of radiation and viruses on blood. During his work on radiation, he realized that toluidine blue could be used to control bleeding in animals overexposed to radiation. In later testing with humans, Allen demonstrated that toluidine blue controlled bleeding in a variety of instances unrelated to radiation, such as childbirth. 

A major focus for Allen later in his career was the safety of blood supplies used in medicine. Allen was the person who initially observed that serum hepatitis virus in plasma could be inactivated by storing the blood at room temperature for six months.

His research led him to publish articles and make public statements about the risks of infection from commercial blood supplies, which were not heavily regulated at the time. Allen urged for the creation of incentive-based programs for national all-volunteer blood-bank programs. He also fought for increased legislation about labeling volunteer and commercial blood supplies. 

Allen also worked in HIV/AIDS research and nutritional value of intravenous plasma. 

For more information about Joseph (J.) Garrott Allen, please see the following references:

• Stanford University Obituary
• New York Times Obituary for Allen
• Department of Energy’s Office of Science and Technical Information – Interview with Allen