AMERICAN MEN OF SCIENCE 



(99 



showing that the white population of the 

 United States increased from 1790 to 1800 

 by 35.7 per cent., adults over 20 by 50.9 

 per cent., and children under 16 by 38.8 

 per cent., whence it follows that children 

 from 15 to 19 decreased 22 per cent. This 

 is of course absurd and is due to a gross 

 error of some sort. However, the ratio of 

 white adults twenty years of age and over 

 to white children under 16, according to 

 the census reports, is shown on the curve. 

 The percent-age of children under 16 years 

 of age in the white population increased 

 from 1790 to 1810 and was the same in 

 1820 as in 1790. In 1810 just half the 

 white population consisted of children 

 under 16; in 1900 the percentage of chil- 

 dren had decreased to 35.7. 



From a special study by Mr. Kuczynski,^- 

 it appears that the birth rate of the native 

 population of Massachusetts has been 63 

 per thousand women of child-bearing age, 

 as compared with 85 in France, 104 in 

 England and 143 in Russia. Its birth 

 rate per thousand of the population was 

 17, the size of family 2.61 and of the sur- 



-MlOOLlEBURY 



WESL 

 NEW 



EYAN 

 YORK 



* HAftVlATtP 



1815 ie35 t&bb 1875 l85'j 15.5 1935 



Fig. 2. The decrease in size of family of college 

 graduates. 



12 Quarterly Journnl of Economics, November, 

 1901, and February, 1902. 



viving family 1.92. Special statistics have 

 been gathered for college graduates. Pres- 

 ident Eliot in his report for 1901-02 

 stated that 634 married Harvard gradu- 

 ates of the classes from '72 to 77 had an 

 average family of 1.99 surviving children. 

 Only 71.9 per cent, of the graduates were 

 married, and the number of children for 

 each member of the class was 1.43. If 

 only 72 per cent, of Har^'ard graduates 

 are married at the average age of fifty, 

 it is a serious indictment of the kind of 

 men who go to Har^-ard or of the influ- 

 ences under which they come. We have 

 seen that 91 per cent, of American men 

 of science over 40 are married. Other 

 data concerning the families of college 

 graduates have been publislied by Pro- 

 fessor Thorndike" aaid others. 



Cur\'es are here drawn for some of the 

 data, which show that the gross size of the 

 family of college graduates has decreased 

 from 5.6 at the beginning of the century 

 to 2.5 for classes graduating in 1875, while 

 at that time the size for Harvard was 

 about 2. A projection of these curves 

 which of course gives no scientific informa- 

 tion shows the curious result that if the 

 decrease should continue at the same rate 

 students graduating in 1835 would have 

 no children. The average college graduate 

 has a famib' of about the same size as the 

 scientific man of the same age. Data 

 collected for the graduates of Yale," in 

 the classes 1869-86 twenty years after 

 graduation and thus not quite complete, 

 give the following results for different 

 occupations : 



Occupation 



MarriagM Family 



Clergj' 



Law 



Education 



Manufacturing. 



Medicine 



Merchant 



Miscellaneous. . 



119 

 39S 

 163 



88 

 IDS 



S2 

 258 



2.0 

 2.0 

 2.0 

 1.7 

 1.7 

 1.0 



13 ' ' The Decrease in the Size of American Fam- 

 ilies," Edward L. Thorndikc, PopuHar Science 

 Monthly, 1903. 



14 Yale Alumni Weekly, 1907. 



