Halloween blackout of '57 spurs creation of portable pacemakerby
Lorna Benson, Minnesota Public Radio Fifty years ago a massive
Halloween blackout disrupted power across a highly populated
section of Minnesota and western Wisconsin. People from St.
Cloud to Faribault, the Twin Cities and Eau Claire had no
electricity for up to three hours. For most, the outage was
simply inconvenient. But for a few young heart patients
connected to pacemakers it was life-threatening. The blackout
did spur the creation the first portable, battery-powered
pacemaker. Minneapolis, Minn. — At the University of Minnesota
hospital 50 years ago, surgeons had recently started using
pacemakers to help children recover from heart surgery. The
devices plugged into a wall socket, so when the power went out
in patients' rooms, their pacemakers stopped working too. It's
hard to piece together exactly what it was like at the hospital
during the blackout. But what can be gleaned from old newspaper
accounts paints a frenzied picture, according