The Editor: Genealogy and Eugenics 



377 



Sound and disciplined judgment. 



Conscientious regard to truth. 



A retentive memory. 



A pleasing style as a writer. 



With such qualifications, one can go 

 far, and I venture to express the opinion 

 that one who possesses them has only 

 to fix his attention upon the biological 

 aspect of genealogy, to become con- 

 vinced that his science is only part of a 

 science, as long as it ignores eugenics. 

 After all, nothing more is necessary 

 than a slight change in the point of view ; 

 and if genealogists can adopt this new 

 point of view, can add to their equip- 

 ment some familiarity with the fun- 

 damental principles of biology as they 

 apply to man and are laid down in the 

 science of eugenics, I am firmly of the 

 conviction that the value of the science 

 of genealogy to the world will be 

 increased at least five-fold within a 

 generation. 



Let us examine a little more closely 

 what can be expected from a genealogy 

 with eugenic foundation. 



First and foremost, it will give 

 genetics a chance to advance with 

 rapidity, in its study of man. Genetics, 

 the study of heredity, cannot success- 

 fully proceed by direct observation 

 in the htmian species as it does with 

 plants and rapidly-breeding animals 

 because the generations are too long. 

 Less than three generations are of little 

 value for our researches, and even three 

 can rarely be observed to advantage by 

 any one person. Therefore, second- 

 hand information must be used. So 

 far, we have gained most of this by 

 sending field-workers — a new kind of 

 genealogist — out among the people in 

 whom we are interested, and having 

 them collect the information we wanted, 

 either by study of extant records, or by 

 word of mouth. But the written records 

 of value have been usually negligible in 

 quantity, and oral communication has 

 therefore been our mainstay. It has 

 not been wholly satisfactory. Few 

 people — aside from genealogists — can 

 give even the names of all their great- 



grandparents, far less can they tell 

 anything of importance about them. 



It is thus to genealogy that we are 

 driven. Unless we haveiamily records 

 we can accomplish little. And we 

 cannot get these family records unless 

 you genealogists realize the importance 

 of furnishing them ; for as I have already 

 pointed out, and as I wish to emphasize, 

 genealogies at present available are of 

 little value to genetics, because of the 

 inadequacy of the data they furnish. It 

 is only in the case of exceptional 

 families, such as the royal houses of 

 Europe, that enough information is 

 given about each individual to furnish 

 an opportunity for analysis. What 

 could be done if there were more such 

 data available is brilliantly illustrated 

 by the investigation'^ of Dr. Frederick 

 Adams Woods of Boston of the reign- 

 ing houses of Europe. I commend 

 his writings to every genealogist, as a 

 source of inspiration as well as inform- 

 ation. 



HOPE FOR QUICK RESULTS 



To get more such data, we must look 

 to the future. We must begin at once 

 to keep our family records in such a 

 way that they will be of the greatest 

 value possible — that they will serve 

 not only family pride, but bigger 

 purposes. It will not take long to get 

 together a large number of family 

 histories, in which the idea will be to 

 tell as much as possible, instead of as 

 little as possible, about every individual 

 mentioned. Let me run over a few of 

 the problems on which such genealogies 

 would throw light. 



There is the important problem of the 

 inheritance of longevity. Karl Pearson 

 showed^ some years ago, by advanced 

 statistical methods, that longevity is 

 inheritable. Dr. Alexander Graham 

 Bell, whose investigation of the ancestry 

 of congenital deaf persons at Martha's 

 Vineyard and elsewhere, more than a 

 generation ago, was one of the first 

 pieces of biological genealogy executed in 

 this country, and indubitably estab- 



« Woods, Frederick Adams. Mental and Moral Heredity in Royalty. New York, Henry 

 Holt & Co., 1906; also The Influence of Monarchs. New York, The Macmillan Co., 1914. 



' Pearson, Karl. Roval Society of London, Phil. Trans., vol. 192A, p. 277: Biometrika, vol. I, 

 p. 74. London, 1903. 



