Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

Most people, I suppose, want to be remembered after they die, but not, I’d wager, by being immortalized as the Lizard Lady of Akron.  This rather gruesome case was recalled by the “Akron Beacon Journal,” on December 8, 2003:

The strange case of Lovie Herman puzzled doctors for more than a decade.

Many physicians examined the Akron native during her short, troubled life, but each diagnosis seemed to conflict with the previous one, and the treatments did little to comfort her.

The 20-year-old woman weighed less than 90 pounds even though she stood 5 feet 6 and had a hearty appetite. She suffered stomach pains, hemorrhages and occasional blackouts, and had great difficulty breathing. Her skin grew splotchy and her lips turned purple.

At one time or another, health experts suggested that the mystery illness might be tuberculosis or typhoid fever or heart trouble or a respiratory problem.

Or maybe it was something else entirely.

When Herman lost her struggle shortly after midnight on Dec. 9, 1910, the reported cause of death jolted the medical community and sent a shock wave through Northeast Ohio.

It was the stuff of nightmares.

Dr. Alex J. McIntosh, Herman's attending physician, certified that his patient had succumbed ``due to stomach trouble caused by lizards in the stomach poisoning the entire system.''

Newspaper reporters snapped to attention. Did he say lizards?

``There is absolutely no question about the lizards being found in the girl's stomach, for I have the two largest ones preserved in a bottle in my office,'' McIntosh said.

He also reported finding a batch of eggs in a tiny ball.

The green reptiles had been in her system a long time, he said. Herman's family told him that she had taken a dip in a ``cool, refreshing spring'' near Millersburg a dozen years earlier, and it must have been there that the girl accidentally swallowed tiny lizards or possibly their eggs, he said.

A few days before Herman's death, McIntosh said he had given the woman a strong dose of medicine under the assumption that she was suffering from a tapeworm. That's when, he said, she could feel the reptiles ``crawl up her throat.''

``They are each 3 ½ inches in length,'' he said. ``One lizard is as well formed as any I have ever seen. I also extracted several smaller lizards from Miss Herman's stomach, but I have kept only the two largest ones. The head, mouth and tail on both are to be plainly seen.''

The weird tale sent the local media into a feeding frenzy. Bold headlines screamed out from the front pages.

``Two Lizards In Stomach Cause Death,'' the Akron Beacon Journal reported.

``Live Lizards, For 13 Years In Girl's Stomach, Slowly Poison To Death,'' the Akron Press countered.

Lova J. Herman, known as ``Lovie'' to her family, had been sick since she was a child. She was treated at a Chicago sanitarium for suspected tuberculosis, but she wasn't cured. She then moved to Cleveland with her mother, Ellen, to be treated at Lakeside Hospital for suspected heart troubles.

McIntosh, a Cleveland physician, deduced that Herman was suffering from a parasite because of her abnormal appetite. After making the shocking discovery of the lizards, he said, he withheld food from his patient for a few days in an attempt to starve any remaining reptiles.

Then he gave her another dose of medicine.

``... Miss Herman was thought to be improving, but at midnight Thursday she died in her mother's arms just after remarking that she thought she was going to recover,'' the Akron Press reported.

Her body was transported to Akron for a funeral service at her brother Harvey Herman's home at 896 St. Clair St.

Seventeen doctors attended a postmortem exam at the house, including McIntosh, Summit County Coroner Harry S. Davidson, Dr. Clinton J. Hays of Akron, Dr. Edgar S. Menough of Cleveland and Dr. William S. Chase of Akron.

``The postmortem proved the previous diagnosis correct,'' McIntosh announced. ``The lizards had eaten almost through the walls of the stomach and a few small ones as thick as a broom straw remained.''

But he was quite alone in that professional assessment.

Other doctors harrumphed loudly at his assertions.

Davidson, who had grown up on a Jefferson County farm, had been skeptical from the start.

``We found nothing in the stomach,'' he said. ``The organ was in a congested condition, and the girl's heart was twice its normal size. The condition of her heart, I believe, was the cause of death.''

An air-breathing reptile would suffocate in the stomach and couldn't escape the gastric acids, Davidson told reporters.

``Dr. McIntosh at the postmortem failed to enlighten 16 other physicians present, except when we questioned him closely,'' he said. ``The only thing I could see was that the stomach was inflamed and congested. That could be caused by the action of the heart.''

Cuyahoga County Coroner Max A. Boesger agreed that lizards couldn't survive in a stomach for any length of time. ``Tapeworms live inside the human body because that is their natural habitat,'' he said. ``Lizards do not like being there.''

Cleveland Health Officer Clyde E. Ford flatly refused the death certificate that McIntosh had written.

``I will not accept such a certificate because I do not believe that her death was caused by poisoning produced by lizards in the stomach,'' Ford said. ``It is too absurd to discuss. It is simply impossible.''

Eli and Ellen Herman trusted their daughter's doctor, though, and voiced support for him.

``Dr. McIntosh was too interested in Lovie's recovery and showed too much kind attention during her illness to invent any mythical story,'' Ellen Herman said. ``We believe Dr. McIntosh in spite of Dr. Ford, Coroner Davidson or anyone else.''

The family may have been on the doctor's side, but medical science was not.

Confronted with allegations that his claims were false, McIntosh held a closed-door meeting at Ford's Cleveland office on Dec. 13, 1910, and completely retracted his lizard story.

The Beacon Journal buried the headline ``Lizard Story Fake'' deep inside the paper.

Today, the lizard story is regarded as an urban legend, along with similar folk tales about snakes, frogs and other frightful creatures invading the human body and wreaking havoc.

Lovie Herman's 1910 death certificate can be found on file at the Ohio Historical Society in Columbus.

The cause of death has been scribbled out.