20 OBSERVATIONS AND MEASUREMENTS ACADEMY MEMBERS 



[Memoirs National 

 [Vol. XXIII. 



The two series of members within the Academy, namely, the old Americans and those of 

 European or recent American derivation, are astonisliingly alike as regards stature, which may 

 be seen especially in the distribution table and in the chart. What small differences there are 

 favor unexpectedly the more recent group, but the slight superiority of this latter, in view of 

 their much smaller number, may be incidental, as is also evidently their smaller variation. 



The above data and comparisons are of course vitiated by old age which affects many of 

 the members. After approximately the fifty-fifth year the body height generally begins slowly 

 to lower, due to absorption in the intervertebral disks in the spine, and due especially to more 

 or less of increase in the normal spinal curvat\ires; and these processes, though often very 

 gradual, are continuous. What difference they produce may be seen in table 20. 



The stature of the members of the Academy of both series up to and including 60 years 

 of age exceeds that of old Americans at large by nearly 1 centimeter or one-third of an inch, 

 even though the latter represent already the highest statured large group of the white race; 

 and it exceeds that of the older by no less than 3.34 centimeters (1.3 inches) in the old American 

 members and by 1.33 centimeters (0.5 inch) in those of European or more recent American 

 extraction. 



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The average high stature of the members of more recent derivation is of even somewhat 

 greater interest than that of the old American group in the Academy, for they are derived from 

 peoples shorter in general than are the old Americans at large. The favorable showing of this 



