<p>Nowadays defibrillation is one of the key methods of human resuscitation. This article provides a brief biography of Professor Claude Beck and the story of the first successful human defibrillation that was performed and described in 1947.</p><p>Received 15 September 2017. Revised 30 November 2017. Accepted 1 December 2017.</p><p><strong>Funding:</strong> The study did not have sponsorship.</p><p><strong>Conflict of interest:</strong> Authors declare no conflict of interest.</p><p><strong>Acknowledgement:</strong> The authors thank Boris B. Gorbunov from the Department of Biomedical Systems, National Research University of Electronic Technology (Moscow, Russia) for the access to original Russian publications of the last century and Kay Peterson from the Division of Medicine &amp; Science, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution (Washington, DC, USA) for provision of illustration.</p>

<p>First human-to-human heart transplantation performed on the 3th of December 1967 in Cape Town has become one of the most striking events in the history of medicine in 20th century. It also made an unknown surgeon Christiaan Barnard a world celebrity. Nowadays heart transplantation has become a routine procedure in many countries. Nevertheless, the happenings which took place 50 years ago are still exciting with the determination, courage and charisma of those who were related to this history. This paper describes the circumsances of the first heart transplantation and provides the biography of Ch. Barnard whose name is inextricably linked to this event.</p><p>Received 4 September 2017. Accepted 7 October 2017.</p><p><strong>Funding:</strong> The study did not have sponsorship.<br /><strong>Conflict of interest:</strong> The author declares no conflict of interest.<br /><strong>Acknowledgements:</strong><br />I express my gratitude to prof. Vladimir V. Alexi-Meskishvili (Berlin, Germany), Р. Тоов из Архивов Университета Миннесоты (Миннеаполис, США), К. Петерсон из Национального музея американской истории (Вашингтон, США), Д. Смит из Хелс энд Медикал Паблишинг Гроуп (Претория, ЮАР) and Sergey Yu. Boldyrev (Krasnodar, Russia) for the illustrations used in this paper.</p>