[Who was Mr. McBean and what resulted from his death?].

Authors present a historical overview of multiple myeloma. The first well-known case of multiple myeloma was that of Mr. McBean described in 1846, 1847, and 1850 by John Darlympe, Henry Bence Jones, and William MacIntyre. The term multiple myeloma dates from 1873, and was introduced by von Rusitzky. In 1889, Otto Kahler published the case report about Dr. Loos, his patient with multiple myeloma. In 1895, Marschalkó described the essential characteristics of plasma cells. Authors present other interesting early cases of multiple myeloma and diagnostic advances in this disease.