"I had ventured into Herr Tesla's workshop today. Admittedly, my expectations were quite low. I had
expected a scattered collection of baubles and scrawled notes across on the available surface;
eccentricities to match his intellect. I was however mistaken. Where I expected to find broken
and half-finished projects, I found technological marvels, easily decades ahead of their time.
Such as the device upon which I am currently recording this account. I had told him such
devices would revolutionize the scientific world, and he simply bequeathed this device to me;
a generous act I will seek to repay in the future, perhaps with a similar innovation."
For much of the 1800s, psychology was a somewhat unexplored phenomenon. Dr. Hugo Seltsam was one
of a group of psychologists that trained and worked in Leipzig, Germany under Wilhelm Wundt.
Their goal was to develop methods in their field to better understand the human mind.
Wundt’s laboratory was founded in 1879. Hugo, in the pursuit of information that would aid them
in the formulation of psychology, travelled to many locations learning about zoology and botany.
In 1881, during his travels, he met one Dr. Pamela Isley, one of the only women in the botany field
at the time. It was here that he learned to act, then observe. Bringing back the methods he’d
learned, him and the other psychologists began to conduct their own psychological experiments,
acting, then observing with their control groups. During this time, Hugo Seltsam’s experiments began
to take a dark turn. He took his experiments a step further than just psychology. He had learned
much about zoology and botany while traveling, and he tended to try experimenting on human subjects
in areas of Mendelian inheritance, as well as human experiments inspired by those conducted
on tailless mice by August Weissman in 1883. The horrors he conducted on these human subjects were
shut down by Wundt almost immediately after their discovery. Dr. Seltsam left in disgrace.
This led to him having much trouble finding work in Germany, so he travelled to America in search
of work. He arrived in late 1885, changing his last name to its English translation, Strange.
And so he became Hugo Strange, a psychologist with an exotic accent. He found his way to Gotham,
a city known for its corruption, knowing full well that opportunities would present themselves there.
Strange was not disappointed, and soon came on board at Arkham Asylum for the Criminally Insane,
working directly under Amadeus Arkham, the founder and warden.
Over the next few years, running the Asylum took its toll on Amadeus, and he eventually lost his
mind, becoming a patient within his own walls. Hugo Strange, being the foremost psychologist
present there, took on the role of facilitator and warden at Arkham. Keeping a low profile,
Strange began to use this opportunity to continue conducting his morbid experiments,
completely unfettered and unsupervised. He fired anyone who became wise. Some of those
employees also disappeared, speculated to have become subjects in his experiments.
By 1890, Hugo Strange had gained a reputation in Gotham’s high society,
being the chief medical authority on the City Council.
Over time, Hugo became disillusioned with the petty politics of the Council,
as well as the day-to-day administration of the Asylum. When Bruce Wayne returned in 1891,
all of that changed. Hugo became secretly enamored with the young heir to the Wayne empire.
He recognized in the young man a fire that was lacking in so many people in Gotham. Strange began
to study him, analyze him, observe. He approached Bruce many times intending to form a friendship,
but the young Wayne seemed to see right through Strange’s attempts to analyze him closer.
Even more fascinating to Hugo Strange was the appearance of the Bat-Man in Gotham,
followed closely by the alleged reappearance of Jack the Ripper. Hugo surmised that there was a
connection between the two, conducting his own investigations into the psychology of these two
almost mythological figures. The more he learned, the more danger he was in, unbeknownst to him.
His eyes may have been on the Bat, but the eyes of Jack the Ripper were on him all along. A lot
was about to come to light about Hugo Strange, and his life would never be the same after that.
"Today I have assumed the office of Amadeus Arkham,
and with the funding and resources necessary to further my own research.
How unfortunate my ascent came at the cost of his insanity
but perhaps now these untermensch
will actually be put to use instead of wasting resources on perpetuating their
existence."
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