Memories from André Gravel, a Patient at the Radium Institute

Memories from André Gravel, citizen of Mercier-Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, who received treatment at the Institute in the 1950s:

There, right across the street, that’s the library. As I remember it that building used to be the Radium Institute.

At one point I had a wart on the chest and one on my left leg. One was pigmented and one was vascular, the doctor told me. I was a child back then, 10 or 12 years old, so that was probably around 1955. I have no precise memory of it; I didn’t document it in any way.

The doctor told me I needed to go to the Radium Institute to get those removed.  

‘The Radium Institute.’ As a child the name sounded strange to me. I knew it had something to do with atomic energy. So there I went. I don’t remember if I was with my mother or if I came alone. I don’t have any memory about that.  

But I do remember walking into the Institute right here on the corner of Ontario Street, and there was no nuclear reactor or anything like that. They just burnt the warts with an electric arc.

They’d get a needle close to the leg and the electrical arc would go ‘zzzzz’ and then it’d smell like burning hair, and the wart would get burnt. That’s how they removed the warts on my leg and chest. 

I have no memory of the pain, just the noise it made and the smell. Then they sent me home. I don’t remember being afraid. That’s my memory of the Radium Institute.