The All-American Family

The Galvins were an exceptional family, or at least that’s what Mimi Galvin liked to think. An all-American family with an Air Force father, devoted mother, 10 handsome sons and two adorable daughters. There was even a wisecracking priest as a family friend. The house on Hidden Valley Road in Colorado Springs was bursting with talented kids, gifted in music, art and sports. Was it any wonder that Don and Mimi Galvin were proud of their family?

Then, one by one, six of the Galvin boys experienced psychotic breaks. Diagnosis: schizophrenia. The boys went from college and promising jobs to state mental hospitals and jail; from handsome, talented young men to obese, barely functioning men, their medication at times being worse than the disease.

As tragic as schizophrenia was to the Galvins personally, the sheer number of schizophrenic sons was a boon to medical researchers. Research into a disease that was frustratingly hard to pin down and rife with scientific squabbling over the cause – biology? Environment? Genetics? – finally took a significant step forward thanks to the genetic material provided by the Galvins.

Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker is not only an engrossing history of the research and treatment of schizophrenia but also a fascinating story of a family with a dark secret behind the All-American façade.