 I was dust and I was inside with huge boulders, just bombarding, but I could feel, could feel with my eyes. These strange images and sensations are part of the experience of the drug called LSD. But this scene shows LSD as it looks and sounds far from the glare of the headlines in serious medical research. LSD, the subject of a senate investigation, the same drug that has been condemned as a social menace, as a source of delusions and aberrations, of kicks that often end in disaster. To science, it is all this, but also something more, an uncharted tract on that farthest of all frontiers, the human mind. Here is Dr. Stanley F. Yolas, Assistant Surgeon General of the United States and Director of the National Institute of Mental Health. LSD, it must be pointed out, is an extremely potent drug. 100 micrograms, which is an infinitesimal amount, really. It's roughly one-thirty millionth of an ounce can affect very, very startling changes in an individual. And so it is, from the public health point of view, a dangerous drug. On the other hand, it's because, again, of its potency. It's an important drug in terms of research into the treatment of mental and emotional disorders. And for that reason, I would encourage as much controlled investigation by responsible investigators of the effects, the chemistry, the uses of LSD as a drug. This woman is one of the principals in a controlled scientific investigation of LSD. She is Mrs. William McGinnis, a Baltimore housewife in her late forties. A former art teacher with a son at college, a married daughter, and a grandchild, a month-old girl whom she hasn't yet seen. Because at this moment, in October 1965, she is a patient at a state mental hospital in Maryland. This man is also one of the subjects. He is Arthur King, 33, father of three boys, and in October 1965, a patient in the Alcoholics Ward of the same hospital. King and Mrs. McGinnis are among some 500 people who have been treated with LSD for emotional disorders in research projects sponsored by a federal agency, the National Institute of Mental Health. Their experience, extraordinary as it is, bears little resemblance to the headlong adventures and misadventures reported in recent headlines. It was undertaken not for kicks, but in search of the help they desperately needed. It took place in a modest white frame building called Cottage 13. In this broadcast, we will follow the quest and the trial of Arthur King and Peg McGinnis, the experiment and how it affected their lives. We will follow it with the open-minded but questioning attitude that reporters must assume toward a subject like the hazardous, provocative drug called LSD. CBS reports, LSD, the Spring Grove Experiment with Charles Corralt. LSD, lysergic acid diethylamide, a chemical compound, an accident of research. It resulted from a Swiss chemist's experiments during the 30s with medicines derived from a plant fungus. It proved easy to make, incredibly potent. A single ounce contains 300,000 doses, each dose drastic in its effects. In these pictures and this music, researchers have tried to reproduce the eerie effects of LSD. This is an excerpt from a psychological research film. This fantastic imagery forms merging into other forms, boundaries dissolving. This is a crude facsimile of the experience described as psychedelic, mind-altering, which turns the senses inside out. Sounds may be seen and colors heard. Words, ideas may be felt. Science has its own descriptions. LSD, it suggests, alters the chemistry of cells in the brain. Alters it in a way that exposes the mind to shattering impressions or to guidance. Memory can be pried open, buried feelings released. With LSD, some psychiatrists say they can reach and perhaps restore disordered minds. This is a mental institution, Spring Grove State Hospital in Baltimore. It is one of four places in the country where research on LSD treatment continues under federal sponsorship. Continues in spite of the cut-off of supplies by the one licensed manufacturer. The project is limited, experimental. Of the 2,500 patients in Spring Grove at any one time, only six or eight are being treated with LSD. Not as a cure in itself, but as a tool of psychotherapy and only after weeks of testing, briefing, consultation. It begins like this. When were you admitted to the hospital? It was about five weeks ago. What type of admission was it? It was not voluntary. I was committed. And who actually brought you to the hospital? My husband, six policemen and three police cars. In the autumn of 1965, Mrs. Peg McGinnis is being screened for possible LSD therapy after a severe mental breakdown. She has progressed just far enough to understand her own symptoms. About four years ago, as I recall, something seemed different in my life. And I'd been happily married and always busy and productive. And I was teaching school. I had two teenage kids. And something seemed empty. I couldn't put my finger on it. And so I discussed it with my husband who was very, is very busy and was very busy. And so he didn't take much account of it. And I said, I felt he was ignoring me. And I was dramatic and said I would leave him if he didn't pay more attention to me. And I just think remember this, it was around October. So he said, all right, I will try to pay more attention to you. And then in February that year, I left him the first time. It was just a gesture. I took off and it was real dramatic. I went to Hagerstown, which wasn't far. And I was gone a couple of days. And I called him and he said, please come back. And I said, well, I don't feel important in your life anymore. And I'm talking with other ladies my age. It seems a lot of them felt this way, even though I was very busy, plenty doing. And I didn't think it was sickness. As a matter of fact, when I was admitted over here, I didn't think it was sickness. I thought he was sick when I was well. Well, all that kept on for about a year and a half, maybe even two years, often times of feeling that there was something wrong with my life. Things weren't turning out the way I'd expected. I don't mean fairy book stuff, but really, I felt odd and kind of empty. And so my husband said, well, then I decided, well, if he's different from me, there must be somebody else. And so he said, well, if you think there's somebody else, and of course he declared there wasn't anyone else, if you think there's somebody else, come up with something. Of course, I thought that his meeting was one girl or several girls. The first delusion that I had was one time when I followed up a license number from a car. And I went to this particular house, and my daughter was with me. And it was a little neighborhood with all the little square houses and the flowers. And this one address was very morbid-looking, grass up high, windows and blinds drawn. And I thought, aha, rendezvous, and here I am. And no one answered. The door was ajar, but no one answered. And I thought, well, it must be something other than just having affair. There must be some illegal mess that is involved in it. So there's a lot to go into to tell you about the police. But the thing that really climaxed it was that there was a bank robbery in Maryland. And it just happened to be in the area where my husband works. I was sure it was he. And I was terribly concerned there was going to do something worse. So finally, I went to the FBI. And I talked to a very important person there. And he took me seriously. Well, I was convinced. And he took me so seriously that he called the agent in Maryland. And they dragged me. Not dragged, but they arranged to have him go up. And he had to take a lot of test. And he came through with flying colors because he wasn't involved. And the person out there had been so very nice to me. And was most sympathetic and concerned because I was suffering so. He called me to tell me that my husband wasn't involved. They cleared him. And I said, he conned you. Peg, do you have any trouble sleeping? Well, I sleep fine now. But before this summer when I was sick, I didn't sleep all summer. I was sure my husband was gassing me. He was coming in through the attic or the water faucet or something. And I slept outside all along. I slept in the car on rainy nights. And I didn't sleep one night through all summer long. By that time, we'd gone to a marriage counselor. The marriage counselor had suggested that we both be examined by psychiatrists. I was still working on my proof positive that my husband was ill and needed help. Then in working on that, I stumbled across family snapshots. I'm still working. Oh, this will do it. And it appeared to me that there were images in there in the family snapshots. Some pornographic images. Some other ones that seemed very contrived of my husband under my foot and real corny. Well, anyhow, and this was going to be the proof positive. When I had these, I called a psychiatrist and made an appointment for my husband, thinking he was indeed ill. Here was the final proof. And because he saved me from his terrible fate. So we went to a psychiatrist. And the psychiatrist talked to me about 15 minutes and talked to my husband. And then he handed my husband the papers for me. And along came three police cars and six policemen and my husband. And I wasn't, I didn't panic. I thought, well that fool, just look what he's doing. And I knew they'd come for me. And I insisted, please show me the papers. And all I saw was the first sentence and it said that I was insane. Shot. And I was. At the same time that Peg McGinnis is starting her course in October 1965, Arthur King is also being interviewed at Spring Grove to see if LSD might help him. Otz, as he is usually called, is a college dropout who twice got to the eve of final exams and then got drunk instead. He also drank his way through the service, a succession of jobs and a series of half-hearted cures with no results but a growing sense of defeat. I was living with my family, my wife and three children in South Baltimore. I'd been drinking quite heavily right before I came into the hospital. I went to the family doctor and he gave me some pills and he asked me to go home and take them and just relax. I told him I was afraid to go home. I didn't want to go home and I wasn't going to go home and he said why and I couldn't explain why. Is there anything in your mind associated with those couple weeks just before you came to the hospital? I've been drinking on and off for years. Nothing special was kind of happening in that case? When you want to drink, you can always find an excuse. It's either too hot or too cold. If you have to, you start an argument with your wife and then go storming out of the house but you can always find an excuse. It's too wet. You just dream up excuses. Now, about when you were a kid, what was it like around the house? What was it like with your mother and father? Well, we got along very well. My father was just a regular hard working individual. He didn't smoke, he didn't drink. My mother was approximately the same way although I did see her smoke once or twice and occasionally she took a mixed drink. Was she the kind you could get close to? Well, she and I were very close. As a rule, she didn't get along too well with the neighbors. There seemed to be a lot of arguments with the neighbors but within the household we got along very well. Well, your own description of getting along with your mother, would you say it was real good or in the middle? I would say it was real good. How do you get along with your wife when you're drinking heavy? Well, she would argue with me at first and then she gave up on that and once she locked me out and I broke the door down, she threatened maybe to leave or something like that. That didn't faze me, I didn't care. It's not that I didn't care for her, it's just that she wanted to leave, I just told her there was a door, go ahead and leave. But she stuck by me and she hasn't left. Do you consider yourself an alcoholic? Yes, sir, definitely. It's caused me a lot of trouble in the past and it's hurt a lot of things that I wanted to do and didn't complete. Just dropping out of school the way I did or messing up in the service or maybe losing a job for no apparent reason even though I was doing well on it and that seems to repeat over and over and at this point I feel that I haven't really accomplished anything and I'd like to start over. I want to take all nine blocks and make this design. The week's long process of preparing for LSD therapy includes a battery of psychological tests. Partly this is one more check to screen out patients so severely disturbed that they could not be reached and controlled while under the potent effects of the drug. What reminds me of can-can dancers? Primarily it is to provide a basis for measuring the impact of LSD scientifically. This is part one in a before and after record of intelligence and emotions. I like living. The first thing that comes to my mind... Right. A mother should let go. The only trouble is time. I wish time would go faster. Men are hard to understand. I suffer less now than before. What's the main theme of the book of Genesis? The creation of the earth, the world. Who wrote Faust? Gertha. What is ethnology? Ethnology is the study of the meaning of words. There is no passing or flunking this test. The question that really interests some researchers is this. Will Ott's IQ score change after he has had LSD? They've been struck by the fact that in many cases there is a notable improvement, a greater facility to remember or to reason. But why they cannot be sure? It may be the drug, it may be the psychotherapy that is the basic part of the treatment at Spring Grove. Okay, Peg, let's try to put together what we know now. The situation was like in childhood. Psychotherapy, the talking cure derived from Freud, the patient freely associating ideas, dreams, memories under the guidance of the therapist until underlying conflicts are identified, brought to the surface and faced directly. The therapist is Dr. Sanford Unger, a psychologist trained in the treatment of mental disorders. Vowed to be strong and not to need. And this was your image. Now, think back to the time when you're married now to Willie and I guess Cammie and Bill are born. Okay. What did you think of yourself? First word comes first. First word is fake. Not consciously. That's the first word that came up. Now, do you feel you felt this back then? I may have. I don't remember that I felt that way. So it may be that I feel that we're now knowing that I was afraid and it was papered off. I thought I used to call you faker. Just remembered it. I was little. I should spell it F-A-K-I-R. It's my favorite faker he wrote in a book once. What was fake? I don't know. Because I didn't... The person I created. That was fake. The perfect world. Yeah, sure. The storybook family. Yeah. I got to play a game now. No hell. It's hard to make like real. It's reality good. Is it? Well, I don't think the question of reality being good or bad. Why is it hurt? Why is it hurt to look and face something that... To feel it. Without any of the contrivances. Tell me more about what you're thinking. It's ugly. I don't know. I'm saying what I honestly think right this minute. Reality is without beauty. Is it? No, this is what I feel. My relationship with other people is not a close one. As we've discussed before, it's more of a loner type of thing. And yet I like people. I want to be around people. I want to be a part of them. But I don't feel deeply towards them. I try, but I don't. Has there ever been anyone you have felt deeply close to? Certainly my children. My wife. But you still... You do feel then not apart from them, not alone? I feel a part of them, but maybe I don't always show them as much affection as I should. I make the attempt, but... It doesn't come off. It doesn't... All right, that's it. And it leaves you again with this sense of isolation. Right. That's it, exactly. Actually, I'll be going over everything that may possibly be surprising, frightening, or in some way or other, make it difficult for you during the LSD day so that you'll know about it. So you won't surprise you in this sense. It won't frighten you. You'll know it's not unusual or unnatural. It takes 15 hours of this intensive probing, an hour or two a day, before Peg will be ready to confront her own problems, the fears she has carried since childhood, under the different flight, the strange dimension of LSD. There may be moments when you feel as if your own boundaries are dissolving, as if somehow you're merging into the universe. Is it like dying? This is not like dying, but you may feel, in fact, that my God, I'm dying. Oh, I've felt that before. Well, if you feel this way, die, Peg. Yeah. You're not dying. But we're not afraid of that. I've felt it before. If you feel that you are dying, also know you'll feel reborn.