Hansford: Mental Defectives in County H., Indiana 9 
manner employed heretofore, those who had not taken up land 
claims found that the members of the other group had taken 
up all the fertile land, making it necessary for them to go 
among the hills in the eastern part of the county. Those of 
this group who had been able to secure good land soon found 
themselves unable to compete with the superior group, and 
were gradually pushed into the less fertile districts. 
In the study of the family histories, it will be shown how 
these families have intermarried after isolating themselves 
among the hills. Not only has there been a concentrating of 
bad characters all these years thru intermarriage, but a third 
factor has done much to hasten the deterioration of these 
families. Whenever there has been born an individual in this 
group superior to his family, as a rule he has refused to remain 
in a place where it is almost impossible for an ambitious man 
to make a living. So there has been a constant draining off 
of the most ambitious blood from these inferior communities, 
leaving the most unfit of the unfit to propagate their kind. 
In studying the population of the county, an interesting 
fact to note is that in 2 districts which were settled largely 
by Ohioans, there are few or no mental defectives. In 1 of 
these districts, in the past 9 years there have been only 2 
patients received at the Hospital for the Insane ; only 3 persons 
have in the past 2 years applied for poor relief ; and in com- 
parison with other townships, very few of the school children 
were found to be feeble-minded. It would seem that this 
difference is due to a difference in the original stock rather 
than to the degenerative forces usually at work in the out- 
lying districts, since there has been a drainage of the popula- 
tion to the city as in other districts, and in the rough country 
in the western part of the township there is the same oppor- 
tunity for the building up of defective stock as there is in 
any parts of the county. 
In all parts of the county there has been a gradual shifting 
of the population until at the present time much of the de- 
fective stock has collected in the isolated, unfertile regions, 
and the more competent persons have taken possession of the 
good farming land. This throws the unprogressive districts 
on the outer edge of the county. The rough bits of territory 
were originally settled for the most part by those who failed 
to obtain a foothold in the more fertile sections, or in other 
