Eugenics Record Office
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2007-09-30T22:59:22Z
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The '''Eugenics Record Office''' at [[Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory]] in [[Cold Spring Harbor, New York]] was a center for [[eugenics]] and human [[heredity]] research in the first half of the twentieth century. Both its founder, [[Charles Benedict Davenport]], and its director, [[Harry H. Laughlin]] were major contributors to the field of eugenics in the [[United States]] (and in many ways, [[Germany]]).
Founded in [[1910]], the ERO was financed primarily by [[Mary Williamson Averell|Mary Harriman]] (widow of railroad baron [[E. H. Harriman]]) and then the [[Carnegie Institution]] until [[1939]]. In [[1944]] it closed, and its records were transferred to the Charles Fremont Dight Institute for the Promotion of Human Genetics at the [[University of Minnesota]].
Its scientific advisory board contained a number of prominent scientists like [[Irving Fisher]], [[William E. Castle]], [[Adolf Meyer (embryologist)|Adolf Meyer]] and [[Alexander Graham Bell]].
The ERO advocated for laws that led to the [[forced sterilization]] of many Americans deemed "feebleminded".
== References ==
* Daniel J. Kevles, ''In the Name of Eugenics: Genetics and the Uses of Human Heredity'' (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001).
== External links ==
*[http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/ Eugenics Archive] - features many materials from the ERO archives.
*[http://www.amphilsoc.org/library/mole/e/ero.htm American Philosophical Society ERO index] - index of ERO archives.
*Edwin Black, ''War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race'', (New York / London: Four Walls Eight Windows, 2003);
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[[Category:Eugenics]]