782 



AMERICAN MEN OF SCIENCE 



in regard to the nationality and race of 

 their parents. Of the thousand scientific 

 men first selected 126 were born abroad 

 34 in Canada, 38 in Great Britain and 19 

 in Germany. Table I. gives the national- 

 ity of the parents of 917 leading scientific 

 men. Six hundred and twenty-eight, or 

 more than two thirds, have both parents 

 of native American (United States) birth, 

 23 others have an American father and 42 

 an American mother, foreign men having 

 married American women more frequently 

 than the reverse. In 165 cases both 

 parents are foreign born and of the same 

 nationality. Including Americans there 

 are 124 marriages in which the nationality 

 of the parents was mixed, but they were 

 largely British. The American-bom par- 

 ents are mainly of British and New Eng- 

 land descent; of foreign-born parents, 137 

 fathers and an equal number of mothers 

 are English, Scotch, Irish or Canadian. 

 Germany contributes 77 fathers and 66 

 mothers. Other nations contribute in all 

 52 fathers and 44 mothers fairl}- equally 

 distributed among Norwegians, Swedes, 

 Russiajis, Dutch, French and Swiss, with 

 several from Denmark, Italy and Japan. 

 The parents of American men of science 

 are thus predominantly British-American, 

 with an admixture of nearly 8 per cent, of 

 Germans and about 5 per cent, from other 

 nationalities. 



Twelve a.nd six tenths per cent, of our 

 leading scientific men are foreign born, 

 12.6 per cent, are native bom of foreign- 

 born parents, and 7.1 per cent, have one 

 foreign-born parent. In the general popu- 

 lation of the United States 14 per cent, of 

 the people are foreign born, 13.5 have 

 both parents foreign born and 6.7 have 

 one parent foreign bom. The foreign 

 bom and those of foreign-born parentage 

 thus contribute less, but only slightly less, 

 than the native population to scientific 

 productivity. There is a great difference 

 in the different nationalities. Those born 

 in Great Britain contribute 1.2 per cent. 



to the population and 3.4 per cent, to our 

 scientific men; Germany contributes 2.7 

 per cent, to the population and 1.9 per 

 cent, to the scientific men; Russia 1.7 to 

 the population and 0.6 to the scientific 

 men; Italy 1.5 to the population and 0.1 

 to the scientific men. These differences 

 are not, however, necessarily' due to any 

 racial superiority of the British and Ger- 

 mans. Men have been called from these 

 countries to scientific positions here or 

 have come to seek them, and in general a 

 larger proportion of their immigrants 

 have been from the educated class. In 

 my own science men so distinguished as 

 Professor Miinsterberg from Germany and 

 Professor Titchener from England have 

 accepted chairs of psychology in our uni- 

 versities. It is most unfortunate for us 

 that this tnovement appears to have 

 ceased. Between 1903 and 1910 only one 

 scientific man of high distinction was 

 called to this country, whereas nine lead- 

 ing scientific men returned to their native 

 countries. 



We could and should see to it that the 

 foreigners coming to the United States 

 contribute their share of men of perform- 

 ance. From the point of view of national 

 selfishness nothing could be more profit- 

 able than to add to the community as 

 many foreign men of distinction as would 

 come for five or ten thousand dollars a 

 j'ear, and as many young men of promise 

 as would come for one or two thousand 

 dollars a year. Such men are already 

 selected and their education is paid for. 

 We have paid for the education of some 

 150,000 physicians to obtain at most 1,000 

 who are competent to advance medical 

 science. The services of this thousand are 

 probably worth as much as those of all the 

 others combined, so if we divide equally 

 the cost of bringing up aud educating 

 these physicians, the cost of a man com- 

 petent to advance science is perhaps $500,- 

 000 and his value is far greater. Such 

 men we can obtain from abroad free of 



