Anani Kaike  

March 25, 2019. 

For decades Puerto Ricans were subjected to the medical experiments of Dr. Cornelius P. Rhoads and other Frankenstein like “doctors”. He was not brought to justice for his evil actions and in fact was promoted and allowed to continue “medical work”. This history is usually not taught in school. The fact that the United States has Puerto Rico as a colony (under the euphemism – territory) is not even known to many. The name Pedro Albizu Campos is again not even known to many. Albizu Campos was a genius. He was a freedom fighter. He knew eight languages. Although he had only learned to read at the age of 11, he still completed all eight grades in four and a half years. Puerto  Rico’s history has been intentionally obscurred from the general US public and it is by all costs kept out of school curriculums. The Harvard library, a library that contains thousands of books and writings, the university Don Pedro was an alumni from, did not as of 1975 contain a single book on him.

In 1931 after attending Harvard, Cornelius Rhoads moved to Puerto Rico. His view of Puerto Ricans is clear in the following letter excerpt from him.

“It would be ideal, except for the Porto Ricans – they are beyond doubt the dirtiest, laziest, most degenerate and thievish race of men to ever inhabit this sphere. It makes you sick to inhabit the same island with them. They are even lower than the Italians. What the island needs is not public health work, but a tidal wave or something to totally exterminate the entire population. It might then be livable. I have done my best to further the process of extermination by killing of eight and transplanting cancer into several more. . . . The latter has not resulted in any fatalities so far… The matter of consideration for the patients’ welfare plays no role here. All physicians take delight in the abuse and torture of the unfortunate subjects.” 

Rhoads later said his letter was “as a joke” with his colleagues and a “fantastic and playful composition written entirely for my own diversion and intended as a parody on supposed attitudes of some American minds in Porto Rico.“ The letter was written in anger after he found his car tires slashed. He then signed the letter ‘sincerely’ as if it was a normal letter to a friend. This letter also shows that Rhoads was not the only doctor who was experimenting on and killing their Puerto Rican patients. All of the patients, into whom Rhoads transplanted cancer, died shortly there after. This letter is an interesting statement coming from a descendant of the people who were so lazy and amoral that they kidnapped Africans to work their plantations. Indeed, he descendended from the same people who stole the entire country of what became the United States from Indigenous people, including Hawaii, Puerto Rico, as well as other islands. You get an idea of these people’s backward mentality, when you see that these are the same people who thought that bathing would “let the devil into your body”, as taught by their churches. Talk about thievish, lazy and dirty people!

Don Pedro Albizu Campos got copies of Rhoads’s letter and made it public, sending copies to the ACLU, newspapers, embassies and the Vatican. The letter was translated into Spanish as well. Don Pedro then wrote his own letter condemning Rhoads and calling him out as one of the main instigators of the plot to exterminate and experiment on Puerto Ricans. Here is an excerpt of Albizu Campos’s letter:

“The mercantile monopoly is backed by the financial monopoly … The United States have mortgaged the country to their own financial interests. The military intervention destroyed agriculture. It changed the country into a huge sugar plantation. . . .Evidently, submissive people coming under the North American empire, under the shadow of its flag, are taken ill and die. The facts confirm absolutely a system of extermination. It [the Rockefeller Foundation] has in fact been working out a plan to exterminate our people by inoculating patients unfortunate enough to go to them with virus of incurable diseases such as cancer.”

In the letter Albizu Campos also stated that Rhoads and his country (the US) were trying  to exterminate the native population the same way they had done to Native Americans and Native Hawaiians, who were killed and displaced by the US.

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Rhoads may have killed as many as 250 Puerto Rican patients. There were several fake investigations that found him not guilty of what he had confessed to in his letter. Rhoads also experimented using radiation as a cancer treatment in Puerto Rico. The Rockefeller Institute, which funded him, was complicit in the experiments and helped fix his reputation in the US. There was also a rumor that there was another letter even worse than the first one. Many say that the Rockefeller Institute destroyed the letter before Albizu Campos could get a copy. In 1933 Rhoads was promoted by the Rockefeller Institute from researcher to hematologist. He was featured on the cover of ‘Time Magazine’ for “his work as a “great” cancer doctor”. In 1940 he was promoted again to the ‘Director of the Memorial Hospital for Cancer Research’. In 1941 he began to study using radiation as a treatment for leukemia. During WWII he began to establish chemical weapons laboratories in Maryland, Utah and Panama. After WWII he began testing mustard gas as a cancer treatment. He again experimented on Puerto Ricans with the gas, which caused large blisters on skin and in the lungs. Rhoads continued experiments with radiation until his death in 1959. A new investigation was conducted in 2002, however the hospital he had been director of said, ‘that it did not matter what he did, because he had been dead for so many years’. In 2003 a major award was stripped from him posthumously.

Rhoads Medical experiments were not the only ones. For years Puerto Ricans were subjected to sterilization, mostly without their knowledge or consent. At the highest point more than one-third of the population had been sterilized. 6% of women and girls 15 to 20 had been sterilized by 1950 and 35% of women 20 to 49 had also been sterilized by the same year.  Between 1956 and 1966, 3,000 men were sterilized, this is even less well known. Some US funded hospitals were sterilizing 50 women per day. A typical medical student in the 1950’s would be instructed to tell any woman who had 2 children or more to be sterilized, this was the common racist policy. More than 90% of women by 1965 who gave birth in hospitals were sterilized after the birth, many times they were sterilized without their knowledge. The goal was to have 0% population growth by 1980. This was also to get more women to enter the workforce and make their sugar profits higher with the extra workers. This is not an abstract history to me, it is my family history.

Widespread sterilization was instigated by Harry Laughlin and more actively by Clarence Gamble, and to a lesser extent Dr. Claude Fess, in the 1920’s and 30’s when the sterilization began. Laughlin served as an inspiration to Hitler. He thought that all “socially inadequate” peoples in the US which included in their minds basically the entire population of Puerto Rico, should be sterilized. In 1936 Law 116 was passed to make forced sterilization of Puerto Rican women legal. More than 1,000 women were sterilized a year just in the Hospital Municipal de Barcenoleta. In the end 20,000 women were irreversibly sterilized in one town alone. The mass sterilization of Puerto Ricans was the biggest event of sterilization ever before and ever since.

While the American Sugar companies profited, using Borinquen as a giant sugar field, the people were not only being subjected to medical experiments and sterilization but people were also starving. Everyone, especially children and old people, were routinely dying. Juan Gonzales describes in his book “Harvest of Empire: A History of Latinos in America”, the anger many people were feeling in the 1930’s. “The 1930’s were the most turbulent in Puerto Rico’s modern history…Depression turned the island into a social inferno even more wretched than Haiti today”. By 1930, 40% of the land in Puerto Rico was owned by ASR (American Sugar Refinery) also known as ‘Domino Sugar’ and  American banking interests. These same banks also owned the entire railroad system. The United Fruit Company also owned a large percentage of the land in Puerto Rico, (they also owned 75 % of land in Guatemala at the same time). The army, at the same time, was occupying 13% of the best agricultural land for naval bases, including huge bases in Aguadilla, Salinas and outside of San Juan.  2% of the population owned 80% of the land by 1925, 70% of the population did not own any land and many were living on land that the sugar company allowed them to “occupy”. This history is astoundingly similar to what Indigenous People of this country, who were “allowed” to live on restricted areas of their own lands, were subject to.

In 1935 Franklin Roosevelt’s son was appointed by him as the new governor of Puerto Rico, (talk about a ‘conflict on interest’). Albizu Campos learned of a plan that Roosevelt had to get his assistant secretary of Navy to help Albert Fall and then Governor Carlos Chardon to strip Puerto Rico of all the natural resources it had. This was called the Plan Chardon. Albizu Campos also discovered that Carlos Chardon was in charge of the Puerto Rico Reconstruction Administration (PRRA) in an attempt to Americanize the ideas and staff of the University. Albizu Campos then held a meeting saying that they wanted to turn the university into “an American propaganda institution. They declared Don Pedro “Student Enemy Number One”

FBI agents followed him 24 hours a day starting in 1935. They would also interrogate anyone who he met with, spoke to or sent him letters. They would steal his mail from the post office allowing through only some letters. This surveillance continued for 30 years. The FBI eventually had 20,000 pages of surveillance they had conducted on him. In 1936 Don Pedro was arrested for the first time and charged with sedition and other ridiculous charges. A jury of five Americans and seven Puerto Ricans found him not guilty,  with the verdict 7 to 5. Judge Robert Cooper did not like the verdict so he called for a new trial and jury. This new jury was made up of two Puerto Ricans and ten Americans. This time he was found guilty. Albizu Campos later said “the Americans knew what they were doing – they needed me off this island right away. Six more months in 1936, and we’d have gotten our independence.” In 1943 Don Pedro became very sick and spent four years in and out of the hospital, many say this is where the radiation poisoning started.

In 1938 two Puerto Rican Nationalists killed Police Chief Francis E. Riggs after the Rio Piedras Massacre. The Rio Piedras massacre occurred when to police officers saw a “suspicious vehicle. Two nationalists were inside. There was an argument with the officers and both nationalist were shot. Three nationalists standing nearby were also shot. A woman named Isolina Rondon testified that she had heard the police saying “Don’t leave them alive”. Her testimony was omitted and ignored. The two nationalists who killed the police chief, Elias Beauchamp and Hiram Rosado were arrested then killed without trail at the police station later that day.

In 1948, the same year Don Pedro was released from prison in Florida, Law 53,  Ley de la Mordaza (The Muzzle Law) as it was commonly referred to, was passed. It was almost a word for word translation from the US Section 2 anti – Communist Smith Act, except with some additions. This made it illegal to display or own a Puerto Rican flag, even in your own home. It also made speech and writings against the United States illegal. (So much for “free speech”). Any gathering of people known to support independence or publishing and sharing articles that supported the fight for independence was also illegal, as was singing revolutionary songs. The police were allowed to stop anyone, search any home and seize any property if they thought the person was a Nationalist. If accused and found guilty of breaking this law, the person would be fined 10,000 dollars or sentenced to 10 years in prison, sometimes both. This law was supported by future governor, Munoz Marin. All schools, mail, police, civil services, armed forces, trade agreements and media were also under US control and supervision.

In October of 1950 Albizu Campos held a meeting in Fajardo, after he escaped an attempted arrest, he called for the revolution to start. Nationalists in San Juan, Ponce, Mayaguez, Naranjito, Arecibo, Utuado and Jayuya revolted. One of the most famous is the Utuado Uprising. Munoz Marin ordered the National Guard to stop the uprising. The military came armed with machine guns and P-47 Thunderbolt War Plains, a kind of military aircraft. Munoz Marin declared Martial Law in Puerto Rico and the military and National Guard attacked the Nationalists in various towns. Jayuya was even bombed. More than 20 nationalists were killed in Utuado alone.

Don Pedro was arrested a second time after returning to San Juan, where his home and the Nationalist headquarters were. He and some other Nationalists took refuge for more than a day, until the police tear gassed the house. Albizu Campos fell unconscious from the gas and was then dragged out of the house by the National Guard. He was then arrested again. He was imprisoned at La Princesa for 25 years, where he was subjected to radiation poisoning. Officials from the prison and a doctor claimed that he was mentally ill and all of the symptoms, which included radiation burns, sores and swelling on his legs all were in his head. At one point Albizu Campos could actually see the radiation rays and would wrap himself in wet towels to provide some relief from the burns. Shortly before his death Albizu Campos’s legs turned black and purple. His arms were covered with black sores and he suffered from constant headaches. He was subjected to this for 5 years. Finally a Cuban doctor came to Puerto Rico and concluded that all his symptoms were due to radiation poisoning, something that everyone already knew. The prison argued that all of these symptoms were in his head and refused to let the doctor take Albizu Campos go to Cuba for treatment. This same treatment happened to more than 20,000 other Puerto Ricans. A few months before he died, after he had suffered a stroke and did not receive medical treatment for 2 full days, Munoz Marin pardoned him on November 1964. He died on April of 1965. More 100,000 people filed past his coffin and more than 75,000 people were part of his funeral procession, he is buried in the Santa Maria Magdalena de Pazzis cemetery in Old San Juan.

On October 30, 1950 the uprisings continued. There was an attack on La Fortaleza, the governer’s mansion, and the US federal courthouse. Three nationalists died and one police officer was wounded. One nationalist, Domingo Hiraldo Resto, after being shot several times, pleaded with the police to stop shooting, they answered with machine gun fire until they were sure he was dead.

Oscar Collazo also attempted to assassinate Harry Truman on November 1 of 1950. Collazo and another Nationalist named Griselio Torresola arrived in Washington DC. The following day, November 1, they arrived where Truman was living while the Whitehouse was under renovation. Both wounded 3 police and guards, one died. The gunfight lasted only 40 seconds. Torresola was within 30 feet of Truman when he was shot by the guard he had just shot, both Torresola and the guard who shot him died. Collazo was imprisoned and sentenced to death, even though he never killed anyone. His sentence was later commuted to life by Truman. Collazo later said he had nothing against Truman and that he was, “symbol of the system. You don’t attack the man, you attack the system.” Collazo was then pardoned alongside Lolita Lebron, Rafael Cancel Miranda and Irvin Flores. He had served 29 years in prision by the time of his pardon. His wife, Rosa also spent 8 months in jail for being part of the plan to assassinate Truman. Not long before Oscar was scheduled to be executed, Rosa gathered 100,000 letters against his execution and his sentence was then commuted. He died in 1994 at the age of 80 in San Juan. Oscar was quoted saying “It would not be justice to Griselio if we merely remembered him for his ability with weapons. We must remember the brave and expert guerrilla of the mountains of Jayuya as the patriot who never had doubts when his country called him to completion of his duty.“

The day before, on October 31, 1950, 15 Police Officers and 25 National Guardsmen surrounded Salon Boricua, in Santurce’s Barrio Obrero (the same place songwriter Tite Curet Alonso grew up), believing there were many Nationalists inside. In reality there was one man, a Nationalist and barber named Vidal Santiago Diaz, who also happened to be Albizu Campos’s barber. Vidal was armed with several guns and some Molotov cocktails, while the Police and National Guard were armed with machine guns, rifles, grenades and revolvers. A three-hour gunfight ensued. Vidal was shot five times, one of those times in the head, a staircase and part of the roof also collapsed on him. Three bystanders were also wounded, one of them a child. The Policemen assuming him dead dragged him out of his shop, then discovered he was alive. He was hospitalized and survived the brutal attack. After partially recovering from his injuries he was charged with “intent to commit murder”, a ridiculous charge when he was the one the police had the intent to kill. He was sentenced to 17 years in prison. He was imprisoned for 2 years, then was pardoned by Munoz Marin. His head wound never healed properly, he also lost several fingers. He later died in 1982 at the age of 72 in Mayaguez.

The last large armed action of the Puerto Rican Nationalist party was when young nationalists Lolita Lebron, Irvin Flores, Rafael Cancel Miranda (who is 88 years old and still struggles for Puerto Rico and other Latin American countries’ independence) and Andres Figueroa Cordero shot 5 senators at the US House of Representatives in 1954. Lolita had been communicating with Albizu Campos while he was imprisoned and they had been speaking of an armed action right in America. Lolita unfurled a Puerto Rican flag, shouted “Viva Puerto Rico Libre”, (Long Live Free Puerto Rico) then she and the other Nationalists opened fire. Thirty shots were fired and five senators were wounded. Lolita was arrested and shouted “I did not come to kill anyone, I came to die for Puerto Rico.” They were all sentenced to very long prison terms and were all later pardoned by Jimmy Carter. Lolita was sentenced to 15 to 60 years in prison, (the other three were sentenced to 20 to 75 years in prison). After her brother testified against her, she was sentenced to another 6 years in prison. After the deaths of her mother, son and daughter while she was imprisoned and spending 25 years there, she was pardoned in 1979. Lolita was arrested again, in 2003, after she and a group of protestors “tresspassed onto navy property” in Vieques and spent 2 months in prison. She died on August 1, 2010 at the age of 90. Andres Figueroa died after being pardoned by Jimmy Carter after he was diagnosed with terminal cancer. He went to Cuba for cancer treatment and Fidel Castro visited him in the hospital. He died in March of 1979, he was 54. Irvin Flores died in 1994 in Puerto Rico after a surgery for a brain tumor and spending 3 months in a coma. Rafael Cancel Miranda was the only of the four that was imprisoned at Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary. His family in San Fransisco, CA would visit, but his children were not allowed to see him. He could only see his wife, however only through glass for several minutes. One time she waited 3 days to see him and was only allowed an hour with him. He was also not allowed to speak Spanish with anyone who visited him or talked to him by phone, making it hard for his family to communicate with him. He was asked in a recent interview why there was a lack of unity, to which he answered: “Colonialism itself. Colonialism creates frustration and confusion. It’s difficult to defeat because it is a creation of the very same colonial system that divides us. Sometimes they install people within the movement to divide us. Sometimes there is frustration, but we should never get frustrated because we are fighting for something worthwhile.”

The horrific medical experiments of Cornelius Rhoads are rarely heard of, in fact for many years Rhoads was seen an amazing cancer doctor, his treatment of Puerto Ricans ignored. If we forget what happened to our people, we are saying that the sacrifice that Don Pedro made doesn’t matter, we are saying Lolita that doesn’t matter. We need to remember this history and always invoke the ancestors to bring upon justice from the world of the ancestors. We cannot let this history be hidden from us. We need to bring it forward so that their story is never forgotten. If we do not teach the future generations about Albizu Campos and Lolita and Oscar Collazo then we are saying that they struggled so hard so that their own people could forget them. Keep our history alive, do not forget our history.

“Those who do not respect the ashes of their elders are the true corpses.”- Pedro Albizu Campos.

I dedicate this article to: Don Pedro Albizu Campos, Lolita Lebron, Irvin Flores, Oscar Collazo, Andres Figueroa Cordero, Griselio Torresola, Elias Beauchamp, Hiram Rosado, Vidal Santiago Diaz and all of the many Puerto Rican freedom fighters who fought for Borinquen’s freedom. May they continue to bring justice from the world of the ancestors and continue the struggle that they sacrificed so much for.

“Viva Puerto Rico Libre”

Note: We do not support Amazon.com due to their invasive spy technologies and collaboration with ICE. All of the links I have provided are for Barnes and Noble.

Suggested reading:

barnesandnoble.com/War Against All Puerto Ricans Nelson A Denis

barnesandnoble.com.Harvest of empire, Juan Gonzalez

War against all puerto ricans: Nelson Denis: Website.