Anthropometric Statistics of Amherst College. 35 



ANTHROPOMETRIC STATISTICS OF AMHERST 

 COLLEGE. 



By Edward Hitchcock, M.D. 



When the Department of Hygiene and Physical Education 

 was established in Amherst College, about thirty years ago, 

 one of the very first things accomplished was the securing of 

 bodily measurements and tests of every student as he entered 

 the college, and again at intervals. This has been kept up 

 with increasing accuracy and enlargement, and is still an 

 important feature of the department. It has been the habit 

 of the department to furnish at many of the public occasions 

 of the college, along with the schedule of the exercises, some 

 anthropometric and other closely connected statistical details 

 in a printed form. 



The first work to be mentioned is the result of five years' 

 record of the measures of all the students of college, in eight 

 items of inquiry, from 1861 to 1865. These averages were : 



Age, 21 years and 4 months. 



Weight, without clothes, . . . 137.9 pounds. 



Height, 67.8 inches. 



Chest girth, without clothes, . . 35.3 " 



Arm girth, 11.3 " 



Forearm girth, 10.9 " 



Capacity of Lungs, 237.2 cubic inches. 



Measure of strength, .... 11.3 



During the same five years the sickness of college students 

 as averaged to each man, and to the four classes, was recorded. 

 In this study each man in college lost 2.34 days of the year 

 from sickness or accident, a man being regarded as "sick" 

 who was absent three or more consecutive days from all col- 

 lege exercises. 



