These haunting before-and-after pictures show how a notorious medic persuaded his patients to have a lobotomy, a horrific practice which ruined the life of John F. Kennedy's sister Rosemary.
The procedure, once believed to treat mental disorders, saw medics cutting into patients' brains while they were still conscious and severing part of the prefrontal cortex.
Taken by Walter Freeman, who specialized in lobotomy, the pictures were used to claim that the patients had recovered and in order to sell the now-discredited method.
While some of the patients look happier after the lobotomy, the photos also show how many of them suffered permanent and damaging physical transformations as a result.
This woman was described as 'the meanest woman' when she was pictured (left) in March 1942, before the lobotomy. In the second picture two weeks later she is described as 'giggling a lot' but has lost much of her hair
Decline: In this image, the female patient is seen smiling (left) six months after the lobotomy operation, but five years later (right) the now-discredited procedure has taken its toll
This woman was one of Walter Freeman's lobotomy patients. He claimed the woman weighed 85lbs in the left-hand picture, before the lobotomy, and 210lbs afterwards, in the right-hand picture three years later
Rosemary Kennedy was one of Freeman's patients, ruining her youthful good looks, leaving her incapacitated and condemning her to live in medical institutions for the rest of her life.
The third-eldest Kennedy child, Rosemary was born with cognitive disabilities in 1918, and never progressed beyond the intellectual level of a fourth grader.
Rosemary Kennedy (pictured before her lobotomy) was one of Freeman's patients, ruining her youthful good looks and condemning her to live in medical institutions for the rest of her life
While she was docile as an adolescent, Rosemary became prone to outbursts when she hit puberty and started worrying her parents when she started escaping from her boarding school at night.
When she was 23 her father Joe Kennedy secretly took her to get a lobotomy that left her incapacitated for the rest of her life. She died in a medical institution in 2005.
When asked about the family tragedy, Rose addressed her daughter's condition but refused to elaborate about the procedure.
'Rosemary's mind is gone completely,' Rose said. 'That was due to an accident, which I don't really discuss.'
Rose watched four of her nine children die early deaths - her eldest Joe Jr in World War II, sons Jack and Bobby in assassinations and daughter Kathleen in a plane crash.
Despite having no formal surgical training, Freeman performed over 3,400 lobotomies from the mid 1930s to the mid 1960s.
He boasted that he was so good at lobotomies that he could perform the debilitating procedure in only ten minutes.
The physician would take photographs of his patients before and after the lobotomy, in order to promote the notorious practice.
In one of the transformation photographs, it is stated that Freeman's female
