And then, there was a man named Alonzo Wire, who was for some time chief of the Hackettstown (NJ) Police Department. Mr Wire became famous for not sleeping for 20 years.
At night, he would recline on a couch in his living room, sit in the dark and allow his thoughts to wander, but he never quite fell asleep in the final decades of his life, which ended in 1910 as a result of respiratory issues.
Doctors examined him and had no explanation, even for the fact that without sleep, he was robust and otherwise healthy. He did go down to 200 lbs. from a previous high of 280.
Mr. Wire believes that his peculiar condition resulted from his being struck by lightning as a young man. However, some years passed between the bolt and the cessation of sleep, so who knows?
It's even possible that we get the term "wired" (as in, "I had to study all night, so I guzzled coffee and was really wired by 3 AM") from Mr Wire, but don't lose any sleep over it.
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