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Eugenics Record Office

Gründung

In 1910, the Eugenics Record Office was founded in Cold Spring Harbor, New York, as a center for the study of human heredity and a repository for genetic data on human traits. It merged with the Station for Experimental Evolution in 1920 to become the Department of Genetics at the Carnegie Institution, and under the direction of Charles B. Davenport and later of Albert Blakeslee and Milislav Demerec, it became the most important center for eugenic research in the nation. However with intellectual currents shifting, the Carnegie Institution stopped funding the office in 1939. It remained active until 1944, when its records were transferred to the Charles Fremont Dight Institute for the Promotion of Human Genetics at the University of Minnesota. When the Dight closed in 1991, the genealogical material was filmed by the Genealogical Society of Utah and given to the Center for Human Genetics; the non-genealogical material was not filmed and was given to the American Philosophical Society Library.

(Quelle: American Philosophical Society)

Das Eugenics Record Office' wurde 1910 in Cold Spring Harbor, New York, als Forschungszentrum für menschliche Vererbung und Datenbank für Humangenetik und Charakterkunde gegründet. 1920 wurde es mit der Gruppe "experimentelle Evolution" zur "Abteilung für Genetik an der Carnegie Institution" zusammengelegt; unter der Leitung von Charles B. Davenport und später von Albert Blakeslee und Milislav Demerec, wurde es das wichtigste Zentrum für die eugenische Forschung in den USA. Infolge von Strategieänderungen der Carnegie Institution wurde die Finanzierung des Büros im Jahr 1939 beendet. Es blieb aktiv bis seine Aufzeichnungen 1944 dem "Charles Fremont Dight Institut zur Förderung der menschlichen Genetik an der University of Minnesota" überantwortet wurden. Nach Schließung der "Dight" 1991 wurde das genealogische Material durch die "Genealogische Gesellschaft" von Utah verfilmt und an das "Zentrum für Humangenetik" gegeben; das nicht-genealogische Material wurde nicht verfilmt und an die "American Philosophical Society Library" gegeben.

(Übersetzung: Google Translate / Wolf-Dieter Batz)

Gründer

The eugenics movement in the United States had a fairly consistent core group of leaders up through the 1930s, including Harry H. Laughlin, Henry F. Osborn, David Starr Jordan, and Madison Grant, and, one of the foremost, Charles B. Davenport.

Die Eugenik-Bewegung der Vereinigten Staaten existierte bis in die 1930er Jahre als weitgehend konsistente Gruppe, darunter Harry H. Laughlin, Henry F. Osborn, David Starr Jordan und Madison Grant, und, als exponiertestes Mitglied, Charles B. Davenport.

Charles Benedict Davenport

The heart of the world eugenics movement relocated to the United States from Europe in the first three decades of the twentieth century. This is well demonstrated by the three International Eugenics Congresses (1911, 1922, and 1932). The first Congress was held in London and was dominated by Karl Pearson’s adherents. After the Great War the International Eugenics Congresses, moved to New York City and were held at the American Museum of Natural History.

A dedicated group of American sociologists, economists, physicians, scientists, and activists provided the intellectual momentum to institutionalize and organize the American eugenics movement. American believers such as Charles Davenport courted and convinced the rich to support the study and control of increasing human degeneracy.

The Eugenics Record Office and its publication Eugenical News provided the structure and the voice to popularize and promote eugenics among the American public.

Davenport’s leadership, combined with his connections to great early American fortunes and his recruitment of Harry Laughlin as the Superintendent of the Eugenics Record Office at Cold Spring Harbor, made the American eugenics crusade a formidable social movement.

(Quelle: http://library.missouri.edu/exhibits/eugenics/davenport.htm)

Harry Hamilton Laughlin

Harry Hamilton Laughlin was a leading American Eugenicist in the first half of the 20th century. He was among the most active and energetic individuals influencing American eugenics policy.

Laughlin was born in Iowa and graduated from the First District Normal School in Kirksville, Missouri (Truman State University). Always an ambitious self-promoter, he began a correspondence with Charles Davenport and, when they finally met in January of 1909 at the American Breeders Association meeting held in Columbia, Missouri, Davenport was impressed with Laughlin’s energy, ambition, and enthusiasm. When Davenport secured private funding for the Eugenics Record Office (ERO) in 1910, he invited Laughlin to come to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and become the first superintendent of the ERO.

Laughlin had two principal interests in eugenics: immigration restriction and compulsory sterilization of the unfit. One of Laughlin’s proudest and most significant contribution was the drafting of a model eugenic sterilization law that states could use to craft constitutionally sound state statutes.

Laughlin had strong contacts with fascist Germany from the early 1930s. The Reichstag passed the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring in 1933, which was loosely structured on Laughlin’s model eugenic sterilization law. Laughlin applauded the vigorous application of the law in Germany; 350,000 individuals were sterilized under the law during the twelve years life of the Third Reich.

In 1936, the University of Heidelberg awarded Laughlin an honorary doctorate for his work in the science of “race hygiene.” He also was a member of the editorial boards of several German journals devoted to race hygiene. Western newspaper reports about the extensive application of compulsory sterilization in Germany began to appear in the late 1930s. By the beginning of the 1940s eugenics in the United States was largely discredited and more associated with fascism and primitive racism than credible science.

(Quelle: http://library.missouri.edu/exhibits/eugenics/laughlin.htm)

Publikationen

ERO BULLETIN No. 10A: Report of the Committee to Study and to Report on the Best Practical Means of Cutting Off the Defective Germ-Plasm in the American Population. I. THE SCOPE OF THE COMMITTEE'S WORK

ERO BULLETIN No. 10B: Report of the Committee to Study and to Report on the Best Practical Means of Cutting Off the Defective Germ-Plasm in the American Population. II. THE LEGAL, LEGISLATIVE AND ADMINISTRATIVE ASPECTS OF STERILIZATION