Foreword

History is written by the victors. Although the vanquished may offer explanations, excuses or speculative essays on what it would have been like had they won, such efforts rarely depict reality. Often a victory is described by someone who was remote from the battle, a historian distant in time, with no passion and scars from the conflict. Pierre Band is not that kind of historian. He was fully engaged in the extraordinary turbulence that permeated the early years of medical oncology.

Surgery for cancer had existed for many hundreds of years, although anesthesia only appeared in the 1840s. Ovariectomy was introduced for breast cancer in the 1890s and castration for prostate cancer in the 1940s. Radiotherapy for cancer began in the early 1900s. Nitrogen mustards were explored as cancer drugs in the 1940s, under cover of wartime secrecy. The excitement really began in the late 1940s, when aminopterin was shown to induce temporary remissions in children with acute leukemia. Acute leukemia of children then became the first target of opportunity for scientists and doctors who were not surgeons. Principles of cancer chemotherapy were unraveled and chemotherapy began to be used in solid tumors immediately post-surgery and then before surgery, within the setting of rigorous clinical trials.

Dr. Band unfolds this fascinating story with the familiarly of a participant, drawing upon his correspondence and interviews with most of the main characters, and imbued with the excitement of this dynamic and revolutionary tale. The story of how a new discipline in medicine came about, bringing the promise of eventual triumph over cancer is among the great tales of the twentieth century.

This book tells that story. It is a record of struggle and triumph that sets the record straight. May it inspire young minds to pursue new quests to finish the task and open new vistas for improving the human condition.