Breast augmentation
The modern prosthetic breast was invented in 1961, by the American plastic surgeons Thomas Cronin and Frank Gerow, and manufactured by the Dow Corning Corporation; in due course, the first augmentation mammoplasty was performed in 1962. There are five generations of medical device technology for the breast-implant models filled with silicone gel; each generation of breast prosthesis is defined by common model-manufacturing techniques.
Timmie Jean Lindsey
At the time, she was 29 years old and the divorced mother of six children. Hoping to have a large tattoo removed from her chest, she visited a plastic surgeon at the Jefferson Davis Hospital in Houston. The surgeon, Frank Gerow, was one of a group working on the concept of breast implants, and was looking for patients to volunteer for the surgery. She told them she was more interested in having them work on her ears, and the surgeons agreed to do that procedure as well. The procedure went forward under the direction of Gerow and his colleague Thomas Cronin, and was deemed a success at the time. Lindsey kept fairly quiet about her breast enlargement for many years - one boyfriend never knew for example. It was only decades later that she told many of her friends and family about it.