A TICKING HEAD

Evening Star, Issue 22954, 11 May 1938, Page 9

A TICKING HEAD

AUDIBLE TWO FEET AWAY ' DOCTORS BAFFLED. LONDON, April 29. Edward Franklyu, a 19-year-old Coventry motor mechanic, has a head that ticks like a clock. Except when he talks he can’t help ticking. His case has hallled medical experts. Specialists from local hospitals have spent several evening sessions listening to him, bat so far have been unable to cure him or to explain why he ticks with such regularity. Mr Franklyn’s tick, of which he is rather proud, is not one of those thin, weak ticks, but a. loud, determined, tinny tick, which sounds as if he had swallowed a cheap alarm clock. It can be heard distinctly 2ft away. His workmates sometimes clamp a piece of radiator hosepipe to his ear to amplify the tick. It then sounds as loud as a grandfather clock. “ I first noticed it when I returned from a holiday at Falmouth about 18 months ago,” he said. “My doctor said it would wear off, but it didn’t, so he sent me to a specialist. He has been just as mystified. It stops when I talk,” he added, “but a fellow cannot keep on talking all day and night.” “ The most embarrassing part, ’ ho went on, “is when I am sitting in a bus or a cinema. People seem to think I am either playing a joke on them or else carrying a time bomh about with me. They edge away and even change their seats.”