The Oregon State Hospital Poison Tragedy: When Breakfast Became a Death Sentence

Forty-seven people died in minutes after eating scrambled eggs laced with rat poison at a mental hospital in 1942.

A Morning That Turned Deadly

November 18, 1942 started like any other day at the Oregon State Hospital in Salem, Oregon. Patients lined up for breakfast, expecting their usual meal of scrambled eggs. Within minutes of taking their first bites, the dining hall transformed into a scene that would haunt the institution for decades.

The eggs tasted wrong – some patients complained they were too salty, others said they had a soapy flavor. Those who noticed the strange taste stopped eating immediately. The patients who continued eating began experiencing violent symptoms within five minutes.

Patients collapsed to the floor, writhing in agony as severe stomach cramps seized their bodies. Blood poured from their mouths as they vomited. Their lips turned blue, and many struggled to breathe as paralysis crept through their limbs. Some died within an hour, while others suffered for several more hours before succumbing to the poison.

The Scale of the Disaster

By midnight, thirty-two people had died. By four in the morning, the death toll reached forty. Eventually, forty-seven patients would lose their lives – forty men and seven women ranging in age from eighteen to eighty years old. Officially, 263 patients fell ill, though newspapers reported that over 400 people were affected.

The hospital’s tiny morgue, designed to hold only two or three bodies, quickly overflowed. Staff members wrapped the dead in sheets and lined them up in hallways and the chapel. Dr. William L. Lidbeck, a pathologist living on the hospital grounds, was among the first to respond to the crisis.

The tragedy could have claimed more lives. The hospital housed approximately 2,700 patients at the time – more than five times the number it treats today. One staff member, Nurse Allie Wassell, took a single bite of the eggs when dinner trays arrived at her ward. The taste was so obviously wrong that she refused to let any of her patients eat them. She became ill but survived, and her quick thinking saved many lives.

The Investigation Begins

Governor Charles A. Sprague immediately called the incident “mass murder.” With World War II raging and fears of sabotage running high, especially on the West Coast, officials worried that enemies had deliberately poisoned the food supply.

The eggs had come from federal surplus commodities distributed by the U.S. government. They were part of a 36,000-pound shipment that had been divided between state institutions, schools, and other programs throughout Oregon and Washington. Most of the shipment had already been consumed elsewhere without any problems.

Investigators from the Army, American Medical Association, and Food and Drug Administration rushed to the hospital. They performed autopsies on six patients and collected samples of the poisoned eggs from victims’ stomach contents and their plates.

In a test, researchers fed bits of the cooked eggs to laboratory rats. The animals died within minutes. Within twenty-two hours, officials identified the poison as sodium fluoride – a white substance commonly used in rat and cockroach poison that could easily be mistaken for flour, baking powder, or powdered milk.

The Truth Emerges

The investigation revealed a tragic accident born from understaffing and poor safety procedures. Oregon ranked second-to-last in the nation for staff-to-patient ratios at state institutions in 1939. The war had made the situation worse, with many employees drafted into military service. The hospital averaged just one staff member for every 10.4 patients.

On the morning of November 18th, assistant cook Abraham McKillop was preparing scrambled eggs for the patients. Needing powdered milk for the recipe, he sent a patient named George Nosen to the basement storeroom to retrieve it. This violated Rule 8, established at the hospital in 1908, which forbade giving keys to patients.

Twenty-seven-year-old Nosen had admitted himself to the hospital as a paranoid schizophrenic. He had been assigned to kitchen work detail, washing dishes and cleaning floors. The basement contained two storerooms located just eleven feet apart, both opened by the same key. Nosen entered the wrong room and brought back approximately six pounds of sodium fluoride instead of powdered milk.

McKillop mixed the white powder into the scrambled eggs without realizing the deadly mistake. When patients began falling ill and dying, McKillop and head cook Mary O’Hare quickly retraced Nosen’s steps and discovered what had happened. Terrified of the consequences, they remained silent for five days before finally confessing under intense questioning from investigators.

The Aftermath

Both cooks were arrested – McKillop was charged with involuntary manslaughter, and O’Hare was charged as an accessory after the fact. However, a grand jury ultimately dismissed all charges, ruling the incident a tragic accident. George Nosen was never charged with any crime.

The poisoning had far-reaching consequences beyond the hospital walls. It contributed to the passage of poison labeling laws and major reforms in food safety regulations. Mental hospitals across the country increased their staffing and improved their funding as a result of the tragedy.

For George Nosen, the incident became a lifelong burden. Fellow patients blamed him for the deaths and treated him as a pariah. He made two brief attempts to live outside the institution, but both failed. He spent the rest of his life at the Oregon State Hospital, where other patients constantly reminded him of his role in the tragedy. In 1983, forty-one years after the poisoning, Nosen died of heart disease following a fight with another patient.

McKillop died in 1946 after a long illness. His obituary noted that he had worked at the state hospital for eleven years. No obituary could be found for Mary O’Hare.

The Forgotten Victims

The forty-seven people who died ranged from teenagers to elderly patients, all seeking treatment for mental health conditions at a time when such care was primitive and often cruel.

Thirteen of the victims’ cremated remains have never been claimed and still rest at the hospital. Their names are preserved in historical records: Cecil Barkell, Marion O. Bates, Albert Beal, James Beasley, and forty-three others whose lives were cut short by a terrible accident.

The Oregon State Hospital continues to operate today, though most patient care now takes place in a new wing built in 2011. Part of the original facility serves as the Museum of Mental Health, where visitors can learn about the history of mental health treatment and the tragic events of November 18, 1942.

The museum displays exhibits about the poisoning incident, including photographs of the original dining room and kitchen. A large stainless steel vat with giant ladles hangs nearby, similar to what would have been used to mix and serve the fatal scrambled eggs that morning over eighty years ago.

Modern safety procedures ensure that such an accident could never happen again. Patients who work in food services today must obtain food handler cards and receive extensive safety training. Supervisors maintain constant visual contact with patient workers, and dangerous chemicals are banned from anywhere near kitchen areas.

The tragedy at Oregon State Hospital demonstrates how quickly routine can turn to disaster, and how a single moment of confusion can change hundreds of lives forever.

Sources: Offbeat Oregon, Willamette Heritage Center, Puzzle Box Horror, Statesman Journal

NOTE: Some of this content may have been created with assistance from AI tools, but it has been reviewed, edited, narrated, produced, and approved by Darren Marlar, creator and host of Weird Darkness — who, despite popular conspiracy theories, is not an AI voice.