i6o HEREDITY AND EUGENICS 



feeblemindedness to intermarry will have the desirable 

 effect of bringing it to the surface where the individual 

 can be segregated, rather than spreading the condition 

 subterraneoush^ by marriage with sound stocks. 



That even the most degraded family is not entirely 

 incapable of better things in any of its members is 

 shown b}^ the recent histor}- of the notorious " Juke " 

 family (Estabrook, 191 6). This family, whose history 

 has been a continuous record of crime, vice, and feeble- 

 mindedness, dates from 1720-40, and has been an 

 untold burden upon the State. Dugdale published 

 a histor}^ of it in 1877. Estabrook shows that, in their 

 history, out of 399 fertile marriages about 176 might 

 be classed as eugenic matings and 223 as cacogenic. 

 Fifty-five per cent, of these matings should have been 

 prevented, even putting the eugenic standard as 

 regards intelligence very low. Had this taken place, 

 the remainder would now show less than 5 per cent, 

 of offspring wdth undesirable traits. In fact, over 

 half the total offspring are mentally defective or have 

 antisocial traits. The occurrence of both desirable 

 and undesirable individuals in the same sibship is 

 often startlingly clear in these families. 



Eugenic studies have been made in America of the 

 Edwards, Jukes, and Kallikak families, the Hill Folk 

 and the Nam family. A more recent study of a 

 Pennsylvania family containing good and bad elements 

 has been made by Miss Key (1920). Two pioneer 

 families of German descent are traced through five 

 and six generations on American soil. They mostly 

 belong to the great middle class, containing no 

 eminent members and no notorious criminals. The 

 study began with four young feebleminded in a 

 Pennsylvania Institution. The history of this family, 

 with a network of descent including i ,822 individuals, 

 shows the establishment of lines which var}^ greatly 

 in social efficiency. Marriage selection has given 



