John Money

Obituary: John Money

Saturday July 15, 2006
By Arnold Pickmere

Sexologist, psychologist. Died aged 85.

John Money, a New Zealand-born sexologist who has died in the United States, has been described as a man who health professionals and patients admired intensely. Or disliked strongly.

Born in Morrinsville in the Waikato of Brethren parents, Money was a long-time friend of author Janet Frame and a patron of the arts.

He gained a double MA from Victoria University, then worked at Otago University. He went to the United States in 1947 to study for a PhD in psychology at Harvard.

His fame came as director of the Psychohormonal Research Unit at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, and he authored some 40 books on sexology.

The Baltimore Sun this week said Money did groundbreaking research, developing hormonal treatment to improve self-control of sex offenders.

And researched the little explored topic of infants born with ambiguous sex organs. Dr Gregory K. Lehne, protege of Money and assistant professor of medical psychology at Hopkins called him a "genius".

"He taught us that gender is much more significant than having two sexes," he said.

"He identified what it means to be male and what it means to be female, and what it means to be in between."

Such praise however is likely to remain overshadowed by a case which attracted worldwide attention.

It involved a sex-change operation for a twin boy.

One of Dr Money's approaches in the 1960s was labelled a "nurture versus nature" concept.

It involved a notion that for a young child there could be a two-year gap, a "gender gate".

During that time if the gender of the young child was nurtured by the parents as that gender, then it could be that its behavioural characteristics and not its physical ones (nature) would decide whether it was male or female.

In 1965 Janet Reimer gave birth to twins boys, Brian and Bruce.

At seven months the Canadian boys were sent to the local hospital for circumcision. In an accident with equipment Bruce's penis was entirely burned off.

Under Money's guidance Bruce had an operation which removed all his male parts and created an artificial vulva.

His parents brought him up as Brenda, hoping it was a solution.

It became for years a celebrated case.

The eventual outcome was tragic. Brenda, who preferred boys' games and activities and had trouble at school, was told at about 14 of her past. She chose to begin reverting to a boy, David, which included stopping taking the hormones which encouraged breasts to appear.

In adulthood he married a woman who had three children by another relationship. Eventually this marriage ended. After his twin brother died David committed committed suicide in 2004 aged 38

Money, who once sought publicity, refused to speak publicly on the subject.

Money is survived by a brother Don in Wellington and a sister Joy in Canada.