The video began by explaining what the Tuskegee experiment was, which is that it was a study of the progression of syphilis in humans if left untreated. The experiment was originally funded by the Rosenwald Fund and originally it was to be used to diagnose and treat patients of syphilis, which was rampant throughout the 1920's and 30's, with arsenic. But in 1932, before treatment could reach large portions of the diagnosed population, the great depression hit and the Rosenwald Fund dried up. With so many patients identified and very few of them treated it was thought that a study of their progression would aid in finding a reliable treatment for syphilis since arsenic treatment was not very reliable and had quite a few side effects and could also lead to death itself. The experiment was originally supposed to observe black men from Macon County, Alabama for six months, instead they were observed for forty years and their bodies were autopsied after death. .
The men themselves were recruited off of plantations and in church were the doctors conducting the experiment had set up deals with the plantation owners and priests of these locations. The men in the study were told they would be compensated in forms other than medical treatment. The men were given twenty-five dollars at signing and were given burial insurance. One other selling point the doctors used was a nurse named Unis Rivers. She was part of the original treatment program as a stipulation of the Rosenwald fund, which was to have a black nurse to treat the men, and was used by the doctors after the transformation of the experiment to calm the men into compliance.
After 1947, the experiment almost came to a halt when penicillin became a widespread, readily available treatment for syphilis. In light of this the doctors of the Tuskegee experiment called all the local clinics and gave them the name of all the patients in the study and notified the clinics not to treat any of those men.