In 1955, a Negro woman, aged 26, was treated surgically in a physician's office for a tumor of the skin of the right back. No pathological examination was done. In 1960, the same surgeon excised a cutaneous tumor from the same region. To her knowledge no pathological study was made. The next treatment agency was Brentwood Hospital. We received a report of an excision of an ulcerated cutaneous tumor from the right scapular area on April 10, 1961. At the same time, a dermal nodule was removed from the right axilla. The pathological examination of a section of the tumor sent to us by Brentwood Hospital showed an erosion (loss of epidermis) in half of the section. Beneath the erosion and the adjacent epidermis were masses and nests of typical basal-cell carcinoma. There was palisading of the border cells. The cells within the masses showed uniform depth of staining and