10 Incredible Things Mankind Has Managed To Lose

Charles Whitman was the deeply troubled individual who climbed up a clock tower on 1st August 1966 and proceeded to shoot at passers-by with a rifle. He killed a total of 16 people and wounded many more, for reasons he himself did not understand, before being shot dead by police.

Whitman left notes asking that his brain be studied to find out why he committed such acts of senseless violence, and an autopsy on his brain found a 'pea-sized' tumour which may have made his impulses impossible to control.

Whitman's grey matter was kept as part of a huge collection of preserved brains at the Austin State Hospital before the University of Texas eagerly took them off the hospital's hands. The brains stayed there for years during which someone really should have taken better care of them.

In the mid-1990s, researchers decided to take another look at Whitman's defective brain, but couldn't find it in the university. It's possible it was thrown out after beginning to deteriorate, or was simply mislabelled or went missing during transfer. So the brain of a spree killer, which could shed important light on the interaction between physical ailments and violent behaviour, disappeared into the mists of time.