Original Twins

The death of Blazek twins recalls the original Siamese twins. Chang and Eng.

These twins were actually born in Siam of Chinese parents, and lived between 1811 and 1874.  They were united by a mass of thoroughly normal and vitalized flesh, some ten or twelve inches in circumference, situated near the vital organs and in close proximity to the heart and lungs, and this connecting was so intimate that the one seemed to partake physically of the individuality of the other, making a dual physical existence of the most extraordinary character.

OPERATION SUGGESTED.

At one time it was proposed to cut them apart by surgical operation, but though one of the brothers was disposed to submit to this apparently dangerous experiment, the other objected to any such interference with the arrangement of nature.  Medical men were divided in their opinion as to possibility of severing the connecting tissue without ending the existence of one or both.

The life of the twins was most peculiar.  Their close connection and interdependence did not prevent them from living the life of normal human being.  They married sisters the family lining happily together.  Each become the father of nine children.

SETTLED IN SOUTH.

They were found in their native land by a Capt. Bunker, a traveler, who foresaw the possibilities in exhibiting them as curiosities.  For many years they traveled throughout Europe and Africa, as did the Blazek sister.  They finally settled down in North Carolina, purchasing a valuable tract of land in the state, where they lived comfortably with their families.

It is said they ere both intelligent and amiable, pleasing in manner, and no different than normal men in their personal and private life.

Chang and Eng, the original Siamese twins, who were born in 1811 and died in 1874.  They were joined similarly to the Blazek sisters.  Each was the father of nine children.

Chang and Eng and Family 1870 cabinet card

MANAGER SURE SIAMESE TWIN HAD SON

NEW YORK, April 6.-Whatever doubt George W Brady, Chicago radiographer, may have as to the parentage of 11-year-old Frank Blazek, it is not shared by Isaac, showman of E. Eighty ninth street.

Rosa Blazek, Frank's mother, and Josefa, the other member of the famous "Siamese Twins," died last week in Chicago of pneumonia and intestinal trouble suffered by Josefa.

Since their deaths Brady has made X-ray photographs of their bodies, as a result of which he said:  "It is extremely improbable that either woman ever underwent childbirth."

Rose, who brought the twins to this country, said yesterday: 

"I'll bet $50,000 to $10,000 a child was born to one of the sisters.  The boy in Chicago is the image of the father, who died in the world war.

"When I was in Berlin on April 19, 1910, at the Bristol Hotel, as manager for Cleo de Merode, I read the General Hospital at Prague, Bohemia, under the care of Professor Kukala, by whom they had been treated a year before from stomach trouble.

"Two days after they entered the hospital a baby was born.  The professor was not there and the child was brought into world by one of his assistants and a nurse.

"I went to Prague and made a contract with the twins while they were in bed in the hospital.

"The baby's father was a carpenter in a wax works."

Josefa, and Rosa Blazek who died here last week.  Rosa claimed to the "motherhood of

Frank Blazek" is upheld by New York Showman.