444 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1921. 



Satisfactory answers to this can only be reached through intensive 

 scientific investigation. 



AVe observe on all sides in the American, individually and collec- 

 tively, a mental freshness and vigor not equaled it seems in any other 

 country; but these matters are difficult of proper gauging. They 

 elude measurement or strict appraisal. But there are the physique 

 and the physiological functions of the American stock, all of which 

 yield more or less readily to exact determinations, the results of which 

 would be of the utmost value. The need of such determinations has 

 long been felt, and it was only the chronic lack of means for scien- 

 tific purposes that has thus far prevented the carrying out all the 

 the desirable research in this direction. Notwithstanding this diffi- 

 culty a considerable amount of work has already been accomplished, 

 particularly on the American child, on the students of our colleges, 

 on the drafted men and soldiers during the Civil War as well as the 

 more recent war, 2 and on some of the immigrants. 



Nevertheless these studies, though highly useful, are still more or 

 less incomplete and insufficient, and the records on the recruits and 

 soldiers both from the Civil War and from recent wars suffer from 

 the additional defect of not having been secured by well-trained 

 observers and with the appropriate instruments. In none of these 

 researches, furthermore, was there a sufficient selection of the sub- 

 jects as to American ancestor. They deal with the child, student, 

 or recruit living in America, whether really American or not. Their 

 results are not capable of giving satisfactory answers to the ques- 

 tions concerning the changes already effected or being effected in 

 that part of the population which has longest been subject to the 

 American environment; and they give us little or no information on 

 the general adult population. 



In order to supply, as far as possible, the need in these directions 

 the writer undertook in 1912 a systematic anthropological study of 

 the oldest part of the "Old Americans." By "Old Americans" he 

 designated all those whose families had no mixture with more 

 recent elements on either side for at least three generations. The 

 study lasted until the present year. It was carried on in the anthro- 

 pological laboratory of the U. S. National Museum, but eventually 

 also in the field, and the utmost care was exercised throughout to 

 assure the reliability of the data secured. 



The examinations comprised the most important of measurements 

 on the body with a series of physiological tests and visual observa- 



- See writer's "Physical Anthropology," 8°, Wistar Institute, Phila., 1019; The Amer. 

 .T. rhys, Anthrop., 1918-21; the publications of the Children's Bureau, the Surgeon Gen- 

 eral's Office, and the U. S. Bureau of Education. 



The demography of the United States is being taken care of by the U. S. Bureau of 

 the Census and by the principal life insurance companies. 



