The Gazette, "Photo Review: Burden Neurological Institute", 28 October 1972
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TitleThe Gazette, "Photo Review: Burden Neurological Institute", 28 October 1972
ReferenceBURD/A/06/117
Date
28 October 1972
Scope and ContentJonathan Shorney on the work of the Burden Neurological Institute, with photographs of patients and E.E.G. machinery.
Extent1 press cutting
LanguageSpanish
LevelItem
Repository nameScience Museum, London
Associated people and organisationsCooper, Ray
McCallum, Cheyne
Golla, Frederick Lucien
Burden, Harold Nelson
Burden, Rosa Gladys
Crow, Henry James
Stoke Park Colony
The Burden Neurological Institute
neuroscientist, active 1970s-1980s
Ray Cooper is a retired British neuroscientist. Between 1971 and 1988, he served as Scientific Director of the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. His research at the Burden covered a variety of neuroscientific topics, including electroencephalography, brain injury, slow cortical potentials, and visual processing. He also wrote a history of the Burden’s first fifty years with his colleague Jonathan Bird, which was published in 1989.
Ray Cooper is a retired British neuroscientist. Between 1971 and 1988, he served as Scientific Director of the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. His research at the Burden covered a variety of neuroscientific topics, including electroencephalography, brain injury, slow cortical potentials, and visual processing. He also wrote a history of the Burden’s first fifty years with his colleague Jonathan Bird, which was published in 1989.
McCallum, Cheyne
(1930-1991), psychophysiologist
Cheyne McCallum was born in Gosport in 1930. He was educated in Fareham, before undertaking National Service in the Army Intelligence Corps. After a brief period in the Civil Service, he enrolled as a mature student in psychology at Bristol University, before pursuing a Ph.D. at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, under neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). In 1965, McCallum was offered a research post at the Burden, where he worked for the rest of his life.
McCallum’s research at the Burden focused on slow cortical potentials (slow changes in the electrical activity of the brain, as identified by EEG recordings, in response to external stimuli), particularly the effect of increased mental workload on individuals in charge of complex systems, such as pilots and air traffic controllers. This work also led to his close collaboration with Walter on Contingent Negative Variation (CNV, or ‘expectancy wave’) in the 1960s.
McCallum was married twice and had two children. He died following a short illness on 19 November 1991.
Cheyne McCallum was born in Gosport in 1930. He was educated in Fareham, before undertaking National Service in the Army Intelligence Corps. After a brief period in the Civil Service, he enrolled as a mature student in psychology at Bristol University, before pursuing a Ph.D. at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, under neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). In 1965, McCallum was offered a research post at the Burden, where he worked for the rest of his life.
McCallum’s research at the Burden focused on slow cortical potentials (slow changes in the electrical activity of the brain, as identified by EEG recordings, in response to external stimuli), particularly the effect of increased mental workload on individuals in charge of complex systems, such as pilots and air traffic controllers. This work also led to his close collaboration with Walter on Contingent Negative Variation (CNV, or ‘expectancy wave’) in the 1960s.
McCallum was married twice and had two children. He died following a short illness on 19 November 1991.
Golla, Frederick Lucien
(1877-1968), neuropsychiatrist
Frederick Lucien Golla was born in Fulham, London on 11 August 1877 to Italian parents Peter Alexander Evasio Golla and Alice Amelia Tingey. He was educated at Tonbridge School and Magdalen College, Oxford, before pursuing medical training at St George’s Hospital, London. He graduated in 1904 and became resident medical officer at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, Queen Square, under surgeon Victor Horsley (1857-1916) and neurologist Gordon Holmes (1876-1965), where he began to pursue research into the human nervous system.
During the First World War, Golla volunteered for field ambulance duty with the Royal Army Medical Corps in August 1914 and was invalided out of the army after contracting bronchial pneumonia in June 1915. In August 1915, he returned to the Royal Army Medical Corps and rose to the rank of captain. His wartime research on tetanus was widely celebrated, leading to his post-war promotion to consultant physician at St George’s Hospital, where he worked on nervous conduction with neurophysiologist Charles Scott Sherrington (1857-1952).
In 1923, Golla was appointed director of the Central Pathological Laboratory at the Maudsley Hospital, London. As well as controlling the educational programme of the Maudsley Hospital medical school, Golla continued to conduct research with junior colleagues. In the 1930s, he collaborated with neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977) in pioneering studies of electroencephalography (EEG, the measurement of the electrical activity of the brain), including the first detection of a cerebral tumour using the technique in 1936.
In 1939, Golla was invited to become director of the new Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. Under Golla’s direction, the Burden achieved several ‘firsts’ in British psychiatry, including the first trials of electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) in 1939 and the first leucotomy (lobotomy) in 1941. He retired from the Burden in 1959.
Golla was married twice, first to Thérèse d'Haussaire in 1908, who fatally contracted bronchial pneumonia while nursing Golla back to health in 1915, and then to Yvonne Lilly Brisco Ray in 1919. He had one daughter, Yolande Golla, who would later co-author research at the Burden Neurological Institute. Golla died of heart failure on 6 February 1968.
Frederick Lucien Golla was born in Fulham, London on 11 August 1877 to Italian parents Peter Alexander Evasio Golla and Alice Amelia Tingey. He was educated at Tonbridge School and Magdalen College, Oxford, before pursuing medical training at St George’s Hospital, London. He graduated in 1904 and became resident medical officer at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, Queen Square, under surgeon Victor Horsley (1857-1916) and neurologist Gordon Holmes (1876-1965), where he began to pursue research into the human nervous system.
During the First World War, Golla volunteered for field ambulance duty with the Royal Army Medical Corps in August 1914 and was invalided out of the army after contracting bronchial pneumonia in June 1915. In August 1915, he returned to the Royal Army Medical Corps and rose to the rank of captain. His wartime research on tetanus was widely celebrated, leading to his post-war promotion to consultant physician at St George’s Hospital, where he worked on nervous conduction with neurophysiologist Charles Scott Sherrington (1857-1952).
In 1923, Golla was appointed director of the Central Pathological Laboratory at the Maudsley Hospital, London. As well as controlling the educational programme of the Maudsley Hospital medical school, Golla continued to conduct research with junior colleagues. In the 1930s, he collaborated with neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977) in pioneering studies of electroencephalography (EEG, the measurement of the electrical activity of the brain), including the first detection of a cerebral tumour using the technique in 1936.
In 1939, Golla was invited to become director of the new Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. Under Golla’s direction, the Burden achieved several ‘firsts’ in British psychiatry, including the first trials of electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) in 1939 and the first leucotomy (lobotomy) in 1941. He retired from the Burden in 1959.
Golla was married twice, first to Thérèse d'Haussaire in 1908, who fatally contracted bronchial pneumonia while nursing Golla back to health in 1915, and then to Yvonne Lilly Brisco Ray in 1919. He had one daughter, Yolande Golla, who would later co-author research at the Burden Neurological Institute. Golla died of heart failure on 6 February 1968.
Burden, Harold Nelson
(1860-1930), philanthropist
Reverend Harold Nelson Burden was born in Hythe, Kent on 20 March 1860. After completing his theological studies in Cambridge and being ordained in Carlisle in 1888, Burden moved to East London to perform charitable work in slum areas. There, he met his first wife, Katherine Mary Garton (1856-1919), whom he married on 26 September 1888.
Shortly after the marriage, the Burdens left to work as missionaries among Ojibway communities in Uffington, near Toronto, Canada. However, following the deaths of their two young children and Katherine’s own declining health, the couple moved back to England in 1891 to take up the curacy of Shoreditch. Between 1893 and 1895, Harold served as a chaplain while studying at Cambridge University. After his graduation, the Burdens moved to Bristol, where Harold took up the role of chaplain of Horfield Prison and Katherine became superintendent of the Royal Victoria Home for Women. Shocked by the conditions in the city’s prisons and shelters, the Burdens became increasingly active on issues of poverty, alcoholism, and mental disability.
The latter became an increasing concern for the Burdens in the years that followed. Through his connections in the Home Office, the Inspectorate of Prisons and Reformatories, and the Board of Control, Harold secured a position on the Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-Minded in 1904, established to inquire into the institutional care of the mentally disabled. Here, Burden advocated for the institutional separation and rehabilitation of such individuals in newly built ‘colonies’, a view which was later enshrined in the Mental Deficiency Act of 1913.
Pre-empting these legal developments, the Burdens had already begun setting up a network of institutions for alcoholics and individuals with mental disabilities, controlled by their charitable trust, the National Institutions for Persons Requiring Care and Control (NIPRCC). The largest of these sites, the Stoke Park Colony in Bristol, was established in 1909, and the Burdens provided financial support for physicians wishing to carry out psychiatric studies of its inhabitants. Stoke Park would later become home to the Burden Neurological Institute, a pioneering neuroscientific research unit founded in 1939.
Katherine Burden died on 25 October 1919 following a stroke. The following year, Burden married a close friend, Rosa Gladys Williams (1889-1940), with whom he continued his philanthropic work over the following decade. Harold Burden died from heart disease on 15 May 1930.
Reverend Harold Nelson Burden was born in Hythe, Kent on 20 March 1860. After completing his theological studies in Cambridge and being ordained in Carlisle in 1888, Burden moved to East London to perform charitable work in slum areas. There, he met his first wife, Katherine Mary Garton (1856-1919), whom he married on 26 September 1888.
Shortly after the marriage, the Burdens left to work as missionaries among Ojibway communities in Uffington, near Toronto, Canada. However, following the deaths of their two young children and Katherine’s own declining health, the couple moved back to England in 1891 to take up the curacy of Shoreditch. Between 1893 and 1895, Harold served as a chaplain while studying at Cambridge University. After his graduation, the Burdens moved to Bristol, where Harold took up the role of chaplain of Horfield Prison and Katherine became superintendent of the Royal Victoria Home for Women. Shocked by the conditions in the city’s prisons and shelters, the Burdens became increasingly active on issues of poverty, alcoholism, and mental disability.
The latter became an increasing concern for the Burdens in the years that followed. Through his connections in the Home Office, the Inspectorate of Prisons and Reformatories, and the Board of Control, Harold secured a position on the Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-Minded in 1904, established to inquire into the institutional care of the mentally disabled. Here, Burden advocated for the institutional separation and rehabilitation of such individuals in newly built ‘colonies’, a view which was later enshrined in the Mental Deficiency Act of 1913.
Pre-empting these legal developments, the Burdens had already begun setting up a network of institutions for alcoholics and individuals with mental disabilities, controlled by their charitable trust, the National Institutions for Persons Requiring Care and Control (NIPRCC). The largest of these sites, the Stoke Park Colony in Bristol, was established in 1909, and the Burdens provided financial support for physicians wishing to carry out psychiatric studies of its inhabitants. Stoke Park would later become home to the Burden Neurological Institute, a pioneering neuroscientific research unit founded in 1939.
Katherine Burden died on 25 October 1919 following a stroke. The following year, Burden married a close friend, Rosa Gladys Williams (1889-1940), with whom he continued his philanthropic work over the following decade. Harold Burden died from heart disease on 15 May 1930.
Burden, Rosa Gladys
(1891-1940), philanthropist
Rosa Gladys Burden (née Williams) served as superintendent of the Stoke Park Colony, Bristol, around the time of the First World War. The Colony had been founded by the missionary and philanthropist couple Reverend Harold Nelson Burden (1860-1930) and Katherine Mary Burden (1856-1919) as an institution for the separation, rehabilitation, and occupational training of individuals with mental disabilities. Rosa became a close friend of the Burdens in her superintendent role, and, following Katherine’s death from a stroke in 1919, Harold and Rosa married on 12 May 1920. For the next decade, Rosa continued to support the Colony’s work and that of its charitable trust, the National Institutions for Persons Requiring Care and Control (NIPRCC).
Following Harold Burden’s death from heart disease in 1930, Rosa took over his position as Warden of the NIPRCC and expanded his sponsorship of medical research at the Stoke Park Colony. She established the Burden Research Trust in 1933, a £10,000 fund to support medical and psychiatric studies of the Colony’s inhabitants. In 1936, the Trust oversaw the building of a dedicated clinic for the study of epilepsy, with a fully-fitted operating theatre, two small wards, and several laboratories. The clinic was officially opened on 12 May 1939 as the Burden Neurological Institute, under the directorship of neuropsychiatrist Frederick Lucien Golla (1878-1968). The Institute would go on to establish itself as a pioneering neuroscientific research unit in the latter half of the twentieth-century.
Rosa Burden died shortly after the opening of the Institute, on 17 September 1940.
Rosa Gladys Burden (née Williams) served as superintendent of the Stoke Park Colony, Bristol, around the time of the First World War. The Colony had been founded by the missionary and philanthropist couple Reverend Harold Nelson Burden (1860-1930) and Katherine Mary Burden (1856-1919) as an institution for the separation, rehabilitation, and occupational training of individuals with mental disabilities. Rosa became a close friend of the Burdens in her superintendent role, and, following Katherine’s death from a stroke in 1919, Harold and Rosa married on 12 May 1920. For the next decade, Rosa continued to support the Colony’s work and that of its charitable trust, the National Institutions for Persons Requiring Care and Control (NIPRCC).
Following Harold Burden’s death from heart disease in 1930, Rosa took over his position as Warden of the NIPRCC and expanded his sponsorship of medical research at the Stoke Park Colony. She established the Burden Research Trust in 1933, a £10,000 fund to support medical and psychiatric studies of the Colony’s inhabitants. In 1936, the Trust oversaw the building of a dedicated clinic for the study of epilepsy, with a fully-fitted operating theatre, two small wards, and several laboratories. The clinic was officially opened on 12 May 1939 as the Burden Neurological Institute, under the directorship of neuropsychiatrist Frederick Lucien Golla (1878-1968). The Institute would go on to establish itself as a pioneering neuroscientific research unit in the latter half of the twentieth-century.
Rosa Burden died shortly after the opening of the Institute, on 17 September 1940.
Crow, Henry James
(1920-1987), neuropsychiatrist
Henry James (Harry) Crow was educated at Aberdeen University following a successful career in the Royal Air Force as a navigator, a role for which he received the Distinguished Flying Cross. After qualifying in medicine, Crow took up a post as neurosurgical houseman at the Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, where he developed a lifelong interest in neuropsychiatric research. In 1956, he became a consultant at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. He later became the Burden’s Clinical Director, a post which he retained until his retirement.
Crow’s clinical practice and research focused on the treatment of epilepsy and anxiety conditions. He also played a key role in developing the Burden’s EEG department alongside neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). He was a founding member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, becoming a Fellow in 1971 and later Chairman of the South Western Division.
Crow died on 10 May 1987.
Henry James (Harry) Crow was educated at Aberdeen University following a successful career in the Royal Air Force as a navigator, a role for which he received the Distinguished Flying Cross. After qualifying in medicine, Crow took up a post as neurosurgical houseman at the Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, where he developed a lifelong interest in neuropsychiatric research. In 1956, he became a consultant at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. He later became the Burden’s Clinical Director, a post which he retained until his retirement.
Crow’s clinical practice and research focused on the treatment of epilepsy and anxiety conditions. He also played a key role in developing the Burden’s EEG department alongside neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). He was a founding member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, becoming a Fellow in 1971 and later Chairman of the South Western Division.
Crow died on 10 May 1987.
Stoke Park Colony
The Stoke Park Colony was an institution for the housing, care, and treatment of individuals with mental disabilities in Bristol, England. The Colony was founded in 1909 and reconstituted as the Stoke Park Hospital in the 1950s.
The Stoke Park Colony was founded by the National Institutions for Persons Requiring Care and Control (NIPRCC), a charitable trust responsible for the funding, maintenance, and direction of a network of institutions for the care of individuals with mental disabilities in Bristol and its surrounding areas. The NIPRCC’s founder, missionary and philanthropist Reverend Harold Nelson Burden (1859-1930), played a key role in the 1904 Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-Minded and the subsequent Mental Deficiency Act of 1913, which together advocated for the institutional separation of those with mental disabilities into newly built ‘colonies’.
The Stoke Park Colony was the first such institution to be certified by the British government under the 1913 Act. Built on the site of Dower House, an eighteenth-century manor bought by Burden from the Duke of Beaufort in 1901, the Colony was held up by the NIPRCC as an exemplary site where individuals with mental disabilities could be given both medical care and occupational training, such as lessons in weaving, gardening, and carpentry. The Colony was greatly expanded between 1909 and 1917 through the buying up of surrounding land and the building of new accommodation blocks. In 1917, the Colony was granted an expanded licence for housing 1,528 ‘inmates’, making it the largest licenced institution in the country.
The Colony became a key site for neurological and psychiatric research in the following decades, with Burden encouraging physicians to visit and study its inhabitants. This research agenda was greatly expanded after Burden’s death by his wife, Rosa Gladys Burden (1889-1940), who founded the Burden Mental Research Trust in 1933. The Trust provided £10,000 to fund investigations, and later oversaw the building of a dedicated epilepsy clinic on the site in 1936. The clinic opened in 1939 as the Burden Neurological Institute, which established itself as a pioneering site of neurological, psychiatric, and neuroscientific research in the latter half of the twentieth-century.
Following the establishment of the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948, direction of the Stoke Park Colony was passed over to the Ministry of Health in the early 1950s. The Colony was reformulated as the Stoke Park Hospital, which remained open until 1997.
The Stoke Park Colony was founded by the National Institutions for Persons Requiring Care and Control (NIPRCC), a charitable trust responsible for the funding, maintenance, and direction of a network of institutions for the care of individuals with mental disabilities in Bristol and its surrounding areas. The NIPRCC’s founder, missionary and philanthropist Reverend Harold Nelson Burden (1859-1930), played a key role in the 1904 Royal Commission on the Care and Control of the Feeble-Minded and the subsequent Mental Deficiency Act of 1913, which together advocated for the institutional separation of those with mental disabilities into newly built ‘colonies’.
The Stoke Park Colony was the first such institution to be certified by the British government under the 1913 Act. Built on the site of Dower House, an eighteenth-century manor bought by Burden from the Duke of Beaufort in 1901, the Colony was held up by the NIPRCC as an exemplary site where individuals with mental disabilities could be given both medical care and occupational training, such as lessons in weaving, gardening, and carpentry. The Colony was greatly expanded between 1909 and 1917 through the buying up of surrounding land and the building of new accommodation blocks. In 1917, the Colony was granted an expanded licence for housing 1,528 ‘inmates’, making it the largest licenced institution in the country.
The Colony became a key site for neurological and psychiatric research in the following decades, with Burden encouraging physicians to visit and study its inhabitants. This research agenda was greatly expanded after Burden’s death by his wife, Rosa Gladys Burden (1889-1940), who founded the Burden Mental Research Trust in 1933. The Trust provided £10,000 to fund investigations, and later oversaw the building of a dedicated epilepsy clinic on the site in 1936. The clinic opened in 1939 as the Burden Neurological Institute, which established itself as a pioneering site of neurological, psychiatric, and neuroscientific research in the latter half of the twentieth-century.
Following the establishment of the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948, direction of the Stoke Park Colony was passed over to the Ministry of Health in the early 1950s. The Colony was reformulated as the Stoke Park Hospital, which remained open until 1997.
The Burden Neurological Institute
The Burden Neurological Institute (BNI) is an independently-funded research unit and registered charity specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. The BNI opened in 1939 at the Stoke Park Colony in Bristol, England.
The BNI was named after philanthropist Rosa Gladys Burden (1891-1939). Burden’s husband, Reverend Harold Nelson Burden (1859-1930), founded the Stoke Park Colony with his first wife Katherine Mary Burden (1856-1919) in 1909. The Colony became the first certified institution for the care of individuals with mental disorders in Britain following the passing of the 1913 Mental Deficiency Act. After Harold Burden’s death in 1930, Rosa continued his sponsorship of medical research by founding the Burden Research Trust in 1933, a £10,000 research fund to support medical and psychiatric studies of the Colony’s patients. In 1936, the Trust built a dedicated epilepsy clinic on site with a fully-fitted operating theatre, two small wards, and several laboratories. The clinic was officially opened on 12 May 1939 as the Burden Neurological Institute, under the directorship of neuropsychiatrist Frederick Lucien Golla (1878-1968).
The BNI’s work was soon disrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939. Throughout the conflict, the site was used as a neurosurgical hospital by the Emergency Medical Service (1938-1945), a state-run network of free hospital services organised by the Ministry of Health. Despite these duties, the laboratories remained open and research projects continued, such as a programme of electroencephalographic (EEG) research on war casualties who had sustained head injuries. Following the end of the war and the establishment of the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948, Golla fought to keep the BNI independent to ensure that researchers could continue to choose their own projects. The BNI did, however, provide neurophysiological services for nearby hospitals for an annual fee.
From its foundation, the BNI took a leading role in the development of neurological and psychiatric expertise in Britain. Researchers at the BNI carried out the country’s first trial of electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) in 1939, closely followed by the first prefrontal leucotomy in 1940. The BNI also established itself as a centre of innovation in engineering, cybernetics, and early robotics during the post-war years, due in great part to the work of neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). Walter’s best-known inventions, his Machina Speculatrix (small robotic tortoises designed to model the basic functions of the human brain) attracted national attention, appearing in newspapers, on television, and at the Festival of Britain in 1951.
After several years of financial uncertainty, the Trustees of the Burden estate sold the Stoke Park site to the Ministry of Health in 1968. While clinical work continued under the NHS at the newly constituted Burden Neurological Hospital, the Institute’s scientific researchers decided to remain separate, turning the BNI into a Company Limited by Guarantee in 1970. In 2000, the BNI moved its headquarters to the Rosa Burden Centre at Southmead Hospital, Bristol, following the final closure of the Stoke Park site in the late 1990s.
The BNI was named after philanthropist Rosa Gladys Burden (1891-1939). Burden’s husband, Reverend Harold Nelson Burden (1859-1930), founded the Stoke Park Colony with his first wife Katherine Mary Burden (1856-1919) in 1909. The Colony became the first certified institution for the care of individuals with mental disorders in Britain following the passing of the 1913 Mental Deficiency Act. After Harold Burden’s death in 1930, Rosa continued his sponsorship of medical research by founding the Burden Research Trust in 1933, a £10,000 research fund to support medical and psychiatric studies of the Colony’s patients. In 1936, the Trust built a dedicated epilepsy clinic on site with a fully-fitted operating theatre, two small wards, and several laboratories. The clinic was officially opened on 12 May 1939 as the Burden Neurological Institute, under the directorship of neuropsychiatrist Frederick Lucien Golla (1878-1968).
The BNI’s work was soon disrupted by the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939. Throughout the conflict, the site was used as a neurosurgical hospital by the Emergency Medical Service (1938-1945), a state-run network of free hospital services organised by the Ministry of Health. Despite these duties, the laboratories remained open and research projects continued, such as a programme of electroencephalographic (EEG) research on war casualties who had sustained head injuries. Following the end of the war and the establishment of the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948, Golla fought to keep the BNI independent to ensure that researchers could continue to choose their own projects. The BNI did, however, provide neurophysiological services for nearby hospitals for an annual fee.
From its foundation, the BNI took a leading role in the development of neurological and psychiatric expertise in Britain. Researchers at the BNI carried out the country’s first trial of electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) in 1939, closely followed by the first prefrontal leucotomy in 1940. The BNI also established itself as a centre of innovation in engineering, cybernetics, and early robotics during the post-war years, due in great part to the work of neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). Walter’s best-known inventions, his Machina Speculatrix (small robotic tortoises designed to model the basic functions of the human brain) attracted national attention, appearing in newspapers, on television, and at the Festival of Britain in 1951.
After several years of financial uncertainty, the Trustees of the Burden estate sold the Stoke Park site to the Ministry of Health in 1968. While clinical work continued under the NHS at the newly constituted Burden Neurological Hospital, the Institute’s scientific researchers decided to remain separate, turning the BNI into a Company Limited by Guarantee in 1970. In 2000, the BNI moved its headquarters to the Rosa Burden Centre at Southmead Hospital, Bristol, following the final closure of the Stoke Park site in the late 1990s.
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