FURTHER FACTS ABOUT THE KALLIKAK FAMILY
Although the foregoing facts, figures, and charts show conclusively the
difference between good heredity and bad and the result of introducing
mental deficiency into the family blood, yet because it is so difficult
actually to appreciate the situation, because facts and figures do not
have flesh and blood reality in them, we give in this chapter a few cases,
graphically written up by our field worker, to show the differences in the
types of people on the two sides of the family. These are only a few of
the many, but are fairly typical of the condition of things that was found
throughout the investigation. On the bad side we have the type of family
which the social worker meets continually and which makes most of our
social problems. A study of it will help to account for the conviction we
have that no amount of work in the slums or removing the slums from our
cities will ever be successful until we take care of those who make the
slums what they are. Unless the two lines of work go on together, either
one is bound to be futile in itself. If all of the slum districts of our
cities were removed to-morrow and model tenements built in their places,
we would still have slums in a week’s time, because we have these mentally
defective people who can never be taught to live otherwise than as they
have been living. Not until we take care of this class and see to it that
their lives are guided by intelligent people, shall we remove these sores
from our social life.
There are Kallikak families all about us. They are multiplying at twice
the rate of the general population, and not until we recognize this fact,
and work on this basis, will we begin to solve these social problems.
The following pictures from life have been prepared by our field worker,
Miss Elizabeth S. Kite, and besides giving an idea of the family, they
will also show something of her method, and enable the reader to judge of
the reliability of the data.
* * * * *
On one of the coldest days in winter the field worker visited the street
in a city slum where three sons of Joseph (Chart IX, section D) live. She
had previously tested several of the children of these families in the
public school and found them, in amiability of character and general
mentality, strikingly like our own Deborah, lacking, however, her
vitality. There was no fire in their eyes, but a languid dreamy look,
which was partly due, no doubt, to unwholesome city environment. In one
house she found the family group--six human beings, two cats, and two
dogs--huddled in a small back room around a cook stove, the only fire in
the house. In this room were accumulated all the paraphernalia of living.
A boy of eleven, who had been tested in the school previously, was
standing by the fire with a swollen face. He had been kept home on this
account. In a rocking-chair, a little girl of twelve was holding a
pale-faced, emaciated baby. In the corner two boys were openly exposing
themselves. The mother was making her toilet by the aid of a comb and
basin of water, set on the hearth of the stove; a pot and kettle were on
top. The entrance of the field worker caused no commotion of any kind. The
boy with the swollen face looked up and smiled, the mother smiled and went
on with her toilet, the girl with the baby smiled, the boys in the corner
paid no attention. A chair was finally cleared off and she sat down, while
everybody smiled. She learned that the husband made a dollar a day and
that the girl next older than the child of twelve was married and had a
baby. Another younger girl was at school, the family having been at last
able to provide her with shoes. The girl of twelve should have been at
school, according to the law, but when one saw her face, one realized it
made no difference. She was pretty, with olive complexion and dark,
languid eyes, but there was no mind there. Stagnation was the word written
in large characters over everything. Benumbed by this display of human
degeneracy, the field worker went out into the icy street.
* * * * *
A short distance farther on, she came to the home of another brother. The
hideous picture that presented itself as the door opened to her knock was
one never to be forgotten. In the first home, the type was no lower than
moron. One felt that when winter was over and spring had come, the family
would expand into a certain expression of life--but here, no such outlook
was possible, for the woman at the head of this house was an imbecile. In
one arm she held a frightful looking baby, while she had another by the
hand. Vermin were visible all over her. In the room were a few chairs and
a bed, the latter without any washable covering and filthy beyond
description. There was no fire, and both mother and babies were thinly
clad. They did not shiver, however, nor seem to mind. The oldest girl, a
vulgar, repulsive creature of fifteen, came into the room and stood
looking at the stranger. She had somehow managed to live. All the rest of
the children, except the two that the mother was carrying, had died in
infancy.
* * * * *
The following is a story of Guss, whose position will be found on Chart
IX, section A.
When young, he married a normal girl who belonged to a decent family, but
had no education. After a few months the mother of our Deborah came to
visit them. She was then a young girl, ready to associate with any man who
would look at her. The two behaved so badly that the wife turned her out.
This was the first knowledge the wife had of the character of her husband.
She lived with him ten years or more. In that time he did not average
three months’ work out of twelve, so she had, practically, to support him
and her ever increasing family. She knew that he was untrue to her, but
there was no way to prove it. At last she seemed to grasp the situation.
She began to believe that there was something wrong with him
mentally,--wrong with the whole family,--so she decided to leave him. She
took her six living children, rented another house and turned him adrift.
He went at once to live with a feeble-minded girl belonging to a low-grade
family of the neighborhood. Soon after this girl’s child was born he left
her, becoming promiscuous in his relations. At one time, he and two of his
cousins spent the best part of two days and nights in a tree to elude the
police, who were searching for them and another man, all of whom had been
accused by a girl then in confinement. When the other man was caught and
made to marry the girl, they came down.
In 1904, this scion of the Kallikak family, Guss, went off with a gypsy
camp and was married to one of the women. For some time he stayed with the
camp, following them into another State. In the neighborhood where they
located, a murder was committed which was fastened upon the gypsies and
finally settled upon him. A great sensation was raised in the papers about
it. He was arrested, but finally cleared of the charge, though not until
he was effectually cured of his love for gypsy life.
In 1907,--and here comes the most infamous part of the story,--a minister
married Guss to his own first cousin, a woman of questionable character.
The witnesses were Guss’s sister and her husband. Every one concerned,
except the minister, knew that around the corner, in a little street, so
near that at certain hours of the day the shadow of the church spire under
which they were standing fell upon it, was a house in which Guss’s lawful
wife was living and working to support his children. The minister, too,
might have known, had he taken the least trouble, and thus have been
spared the ignominy of uniting two such beings with this travesty of the
blessing of heaven. Soon after their union, this couple ceased to live
together--Guss going off with another woman and his wife with another man.
The field worker was not able to locate Guss, but she found that a
minister farther up the State had, in 1910, married his late wife to the
man with whom she was living. The couple, however, had gotten wind that
some one was looking for them, so when the field worker arrived, she found
that they had moved on, leaving no address.
The following story shows the continuation of these conditions into the
next generation:--
It was considered desirable to see the illegitimate son of Guss, who had
been born to the feeble-minded girl after Guss had been turned adrift by
his lawful wife. This child had had, when young, a severe attack of
scarlet fever which deprived him of his hearing. He had been admitted into
a home for deaf children, but the mother had taken him out. It was learned
that this girl had married her own cousin and that the pair were living
on the outskirts of a country town, with this deaf boy and four of their
own children.
Arrived at this place, the field worker first sought the school where
these children were supposed to go, hoping to obtain some light on the
question of their mentality and also to learn their school record. She
found that they so seldom attended school that the teacher could give very
little information regarding them. By dint of persistent inquiry, the
family was discovered living in the back shed of a dilapidated country
tenement.
It was a bitter, cold day in February and about eleven in the morning when
the field worker knocked at the door. Used as she was to sights of misery
and degradation, she was hardly prepared for the spectacle within. The
father, a strong, healthy, broad-shouldered man, was sitting helplessly in
a corner. The mother, a pretty woman still, with remnants of ragged
garments drawn about her, sat in a chair, the picture of despondency.
Three children, scantily clad and with shoes that would barely hold
together, stood about with drooping jaws and the unmistakable look of the
feeble-minded. Another child, neither more intelligent nor better clad,
was attempting to wash a few greasy dishes in cold water. The deaf boy
was nowhere to be seen. On being urgently requested, the mother went out
of the room to get him, for he was not yet out of bed. In a few moments
she returned. The boy with her wore an old suit that evidently was made to
do service by night as well as by day. A glance sufficed to establish his
mentality, which was low. The whole family was a living demonstration of
the futility of trying to make desirable citizens from defective stock
through making and enforcing compulsory education laws. Here were children
who seldom went to school because they seldom had shoes, but when they
went, had neither will nor power to learn anything out of books. The
father himself, though strong and vigorous, showed by his face that he had
only a child’s mentality. The mother in her filth and rags was also a
child. In this house of abject poverty, only one sure prospect was ahead,
that it would produce more feeble-minded children with which to clog the
wheels of human progress. The laws of the country will not permit children
ten years old to marry. Why should they permit it when the mentality is
only ten? These and similar questions kept ringing through the field
worker’s mind as she made her way laboriously over the frozen road to the
station.
Early in the course of this investigation, it had been learned that the
father of Deborah’s mother had come, when a young man, to the prosperous
rural community where his daughter was living at the time of our
investigation. The informant could not say whence he had come, but the
name of a person was given who was supposed to know. Many fruitless
attempts to find this person were made before the object was attained.
When at last discovered, she turned out to be an elderly lady of
refinement and culture. Strangely enough, long afterwards it was learned
that she was connected with the good side of the Kallikak family, but was
all unconscious of the relationship which existed between it and the
degenerate branch. She was delighted to go back in memory and recall
impressions made on her mind in youth.
She had been raised in B----, a town at the foot of a mountain chain upon
whose top the grandfather of Deborah’s grandfather, Martin Kallikak Jr.,
had always lived. When she was a little girl, he was a very old man. She
remembered being taken to drive, when a child, and seeing the old hut on
the mountain, where he lived with his strange daughters, “Old Moll,” “Old
Sal,” and Jemima. The dilapidated dwelling, with its windows bulging with
rags, formed a picture she had never forgotten. There were in her mind
floating memories of great scandals connected with these women and their
lonely mountain hut. The father went by the name of the “Old Horror,” and
as she remembered him, he was always unwashed and drunk. At election time,
he never failed to appear in somebody’s cast-off clothing, ready to vote,
for the price of a drink, the donor’s ticket.
This information, coming when it did, seemed amazing and carried with it
the probability of establishing the certainty of defect transmitted
through five generations. But the town in question was remote and the
probability of finding any living person able to give accurate information
seemed so slight that nothing further was done in this direction for many
months.
In the meantime, the families of the fifteen brothers and sisters of
Deborah’s grandfather had been worked out, and the names of several living
relatives back in the mountain ascertained. The time was ripe.
Appealing for a night’s lodging at the home of a retired farmer, the field
worker was fortunate enough to be received. As the hostess was showing her
to a room, she asked tentatively, “You have lived in B---- a long time?”
“About sixty-five years,” was the pleasant reply. “So, then, you know
something of most of the old families?” “There are not many old residents
of B---- with whose history I am not familiar.” Then followed a few
cautious questions in regard to the Kallikak family which drew forth
answers that soon convinced the field worker she was on solid ground and
could advance without wasting time in needless precautions. At this
juncture, the supper bell rang. In the dining room the acquaintance of the
host was made. When the meal was over, the couple turned their united
attention to the problem put before them. “Why,” the host began, when he
comprehended what was wanted, “do you know that is the worst nest you’re
getting into, in the whole country? The mountains back here are full of
these people; I can point out to you where every one of them lives.” Then
he turned to the table and began to sketch a map of the mountain roads
which must be followed next day. In the midst of this he paused, as though
an idea had come to him, then he said hesitatingly, “You see, it’s really
impossible for a stranger like you to find all these people. Some of them
live on obscure back roads that you could hardly get at without a guide.
Now, my time is of no value, and if you will permit me, I will gladly
serve in that capacity myself.” Needless to say, his services were
thankfully accepted, with the result that nearly two hundred persons were
added to Deborah’s family chart.
This proved, however, only the beginning of the study that has been made
of the family in the vicinity of B----. Numerous visits to many homes,
always from the center of the genial couple’s house, have made the field
worker such a well-known figure among these people, that they long ago
forgot what little surprise they may have felt at her first visit. “You’re
one of the family?” was frequently asked her at the beginning. “No, not
really, only as I know so many of your cousins and aunts and uncles, I
thought, since I was in B----, I would like to know you.” This usually
sufficed, but if it did not, the field worker was able so to inundate the
questioner with information about his own relatives, that before she was
through, he had forgotten that anything remained unanswered. The relation
once established, no further explanation was necessary. She was able to go
in and out among them, study their mentality, awake their reminiscences,
until finally the whole story was told.
Besides members of the family, numerous old people were here and there
discovered who were able to add materially to the information otherwise
obtained. One shrewd old farmer who was found tottering in from the field
proved to be of especial service in determining the mental status of
Martin Kallikak Jr. In introducing herself, the field worker had spoken of
her interest in Revolutionary times and of having come to him because she
had been told that he was well informed as to the history of the locality.
“Yes,” he said, with excusable pride, as he led the way to the kitchen
steps descending into the garden, “not much has happened in this place for
the last seventy years in which I have not taken an active part. Do you
see that tree there?” and he pointed to a fine maple that threw its
luxuriant shade over the path that led to the barn. “The day my wife and I
came here sixty years ago, we planted that tree. It was a little sapling
then, and see what it has become!” After much more talk she cautiously put
the question, “Do you remember an old man, Martin Kallikak, who lived on
the mountain edge yonder?” “Do I?” he answered. “Well, I guess! Nobody’d
forget him. Simple,” he went on; “not quite right here,” tapping his head,
“but inoffensive and kind. All the family was that. Old Moll, simple as
she was, would do anything for a neighbor. She finally died--burned to
death in the chimney corner. She had come in drunk and sat down there.
Whether she fell over in a fit or her clothes caught fire, nobody knows.
She was burned to a crisp when they found her. That was the worst of
them, they would drink. Poverty was their best friend in this respect, or
they would have been drunk all the time. Old Martin could never stop as
long as he had a drop. Many’s the time he’s rolled off of Billy Parson’s
porch. Billy always had a barrel of cider handy. He’d just chuckle to see
old Martin drink and drink until finally he’d lose his balance and over
he’d go! But Horser--he was a case! I saw him once after I’d heard he was
going to marry Jemima. I looked him over and said, ‘Well, if you aren’t a
fine-looking specimen to think of marrying anybody!’ and he answered, ‘I
guess you’re right--I aren’t much, but I guess I’ll do fer Jemima.’
“Such scandals as there were when those girls were young!” he continued.
“You see, there was a fast set of young men in B---- in those days,
lawyers, who didn’t care what they did. One of them got paid back, though,
for Jemima wanted to put her child on the town, and they made her tell who
was its father. Then he had to give something for its support, and she
gave it this man’s full name. I saw him one day soon afterward and he was
boiling with rage. All the comfort I gave him was to say, ‘I don’t see but
what you’re getting your just deserts, for if anybody wants to play with
the pot, they must expect to get blackened!’
[Illustration: GREAT-GRANDSON OF “DADDY” KALLIKAK.
This boy is an imbecile of the Mongolian type.]
[Illustration: MALINDA, DAUGHTER OF “JEMIMA.”]
“By the way! Do you know that old Martin had a half brother Frederick--as
fine a man as the country owned--who lived about twenty miles from here?
You see, Martin’s mother was a young girl in Revolutionary times when
Martin’s father was a soldier. Afterwards he went back home and married a
respectable woman.”
“Did you ever see the mother of old Martin?” the field worker asked. “No,
she was dead before my time, but I have heard the folks talk about her.
She lived in the woods not far from here. Dear me!” he went on, “it’s been
so long since I’ve thought of these people that many things I forget, but
it would all come back to me in time.”
Two daughters of Jemima lived in B----. A little study of Chart V,
sections A and B, will place them in their relation to the rest of the
family and give the chief facts of their lives. Little more need be added.
One of them was early put out to service and later married a cobbler to
whom she has borne many children. She is not known to have had any
illegitimate offspring, but if she escaped, her daughter has made up for
her deficiency in this respect. The other sister grew up in the mountain
hut with her mother, and was living there when her grandfather died. Her
husband and most of her children are defective, but there are two by
unknown fathers who are normal. One of these, a girl of considerable
ability, supports herself and mother in a decent way and is respected by
her townspeople. The mother is tall, lean, angular, much resembling
Jemima, except that the latter was even more masculine. Many are the
living inhabitants of B---- to whom the old woman was a well-known figure,
for she often came down into the town bringing berries to sell, her large
feet shod with heavy boots, her skirts short, while her sharp, angular
features were hidden in the depths of a huge sunbonnet. She thus formed a
striking picture that could not easily be forgotten.
A third daughter of Jemima had gone to Brooklyn to live, and the question
kept repeating itself, “What will she be like?” and this all the more
because of the uncertainty of the parentage on the father’s side. Perhaps
he was a normal man. Perhaps this will prove to be a normal woman and so
break the dead monotony of this line of defectives.
In a back tenement, after passing through a narrow alley, the home of this
woman was found. It was about ten o’clock in the morning. After climbing a
dark and narrow stairway, one came to a landing from which a view could be
had of the interior of the apartment. In one room was a frowsled young
woman in tawdry rags, her hair unkempt, her face streaked with black,
while on the floor two dirty, half-naked children were rolling. At the
sight of a stranger, they all came forward. The field worker made her way
as best she could, across heaps of junk that cluttered the room, to a
chair by an open window through which a breath of outside air could be
obtained. On the bureau by the window a hideous diseased cat was curled in
the sunshine. The mother, Jemima’s daughter, was not at home, but the
woman who had presented herself was her daughter, and these were the
grandchildren. The woman’s feeble-mindedness made it possible to ask her
question after question, such as could not have been put to a normal
person. Her answers threw a flood of light upon the general depravity of
life under such conditions. When the mother at last arrived, she proved to
be of a type somewhat different from anything before encountered in this
family. She appeared to be criminalistic, or at least capable of
developing along that line. Unfortunately, the visit could not either be
prolonged or repeated, so that no satisfactory study was made.
In the city, the individual is lost in the very immensity of the crowd
that surrounds him, so that his individual actions, except such as he
himself chooses to reveal or can be made to reveal, are lost to the people
about him; therefore there was little hope of obtaining much side light on
the problem here presented. During the short interview the older woman
showed unmistakable signs of wanting to appear respectable in the midst of
her depravity, something quite characteristic of the high-grade moron type
in the family. She was friendly and distinctly more intelligent than her
daughter, but there was little more will power or ability to cope with the
problems of life. One of her daughters had disappeared off the face of the
earth a few years before--there had been a baby--that was all they knew.
She was working at Coney Island. One day she came home and, when she left
the next morning, it was the last they ever saw of her. A brother of the
girl had also disappeared in much the same way.
The field worker left the tenement with the positive assurance that
environment without strict personal supervision made little difference
when it was a question of the feeble-minded.
[Illustration: GREAT-GRANDCHILDREN OF “OLD SAL.”]
[Illustration: CHILDREN OF GUSS SAUNDERS, WITH THEIR GRANDMOTHER.]
Owing to the courtesy of the County Superintendent and the intelligent
coöperation of the teachers, it was possible to apply the Binet tests to
all the descendants of Martin Kallikak who could be found in the schools.
The request for this had been made in a way to give no clew to the
particular purpose underlying the search. By selecting from every class
one or two bright pupils to take the tests along with the dull ones, all
personal element was eliminated. As children everywhere are found to
delight in the tests, only those who were not called out were
disappointed.
A morning was spent in a schoolhouse situated on the top of a bold, rocky
ledge that went by the picturesque name of Hard Scrabble. It was within a
quarter of a mile of the ruins of Martin Kallikak’s hut, and a number of
his descendants were enrolled among its pupils.
One of the grandsons of “Old Sal” lived on a farm near Cedarhill, several
miles farther up the ridge. This man, Guss Saunders by name, had been
reported to be the father of a large family. Nothing, however, had been
learned of him beyond the facts stated, and therefore the inference was
that he had turned out better than the rest of his brothers. It had been
to determine this matter that the long ride was undertaken.
Arrived at the farm, the question of the mentality of this family was
quickly answered. Desolation and ruin became more apparent at every step.
The front of the large farmhouse was quite deserted, but following a few
tracks the back door was reached. Such an unwonted spectacle as a visitor
attracted instant attention. The door opened, revealing a sight to which,
alas, the field worker was only too accustomed. She gazed aghast at what
appeared to her to be a procession of imbeciles. The tall, emaciated,
staggering man at the head braced himself against a tree, while the rest
stopped and stood with a fixed, stupid stare. Quickly regaining control,
the field worker said pleasantly, “Good afternoon, Mr. Saunders. I hope
you don’t mind my intruding on you this way, but you see I am looking up
the children of the neighborhood, and I was sorry not to find any of yours
in the Cedarhill school to-day.” He at once thought he had to do with a
school inspector, and his answer bears no setting forth in print. It was
an incoherent, disjointed, explosive protest against school laws in
general and fate in particular. It was mixed up with convulsive sobs,
while his bleared, swollen eyes brimmed over with tears. The field worker
began to feel real sympathy for the man, although she knew that he was
drunk and that drunkards are easily moved to tears. “Oh, I am sorry for
you,” she said; “your wife then is dead, is she?” “Yes, she’s dead!” he
answered with a wild gesture, “they took her right out of that room--they
said they’d cure her, if I’d let her go. You can see the doctors in
B----, they know all about it--they’ll tell you what they done--they took
her away, and she never come back--Oh!” Stifling his sobs, he went on,
“And now they say I am to send my children to school--and what can I do?
Look there!” pointing to a lump of humanity, a girl who, at first glance,
had thrown her imbecilic shadow over the whole group, making them all look
imbecilic--“do you see that girl? She’s always fallin’ into fits, and
nobody can’t do nothin’ with her.” Breaking in here, the field worker
said, “But, Mr. Saunders, you ought not to have the burden and the care of
that girl; she could be made so happy and comfortable in a place where
they understand such cases. You ought--” The field worker could get no
farther. His eyes suddenly assumed a wild, desperate look and he burst
out, “No, no! They’ll never get her. They tried it once, but they didn’t
get her. They took my wife away and she never came back--they’ll never get
her!” A few soothing words to allay the storm she had unconsciously
raised, another expression of sympathy, and the field worker drove away,
pondering deeply the meaning of what had been seen and heard.
We have come to the point where we no longer leave babies or little
children to die uncared for in our streets, but who has yet thought of
caring intelligently for the vastly more pathetic child-man or
child-woman, who through matured sex powers, which they do not understand,
fill our land with its overflowing measure of misery and crime? Such
thoughts as these filled the mind of the field worker on the ride home.
Arrived at B----, her first care was to obtain an interview with the
doctor who had attended Guss’s wife when she died. She found him ready to
explain all he could of the family which he had always known and attended.
“The mother,” he said, “was a kind-hearted, simple-minded soul, who tended
as best she could to the needs of her family.” The epileptic girl, he
explained, had always been a great care, and the doctor himself, aided by
several prominent citizens, had taken the trouble to complete all
necessary arrangements for having her admitted to the epileptic colony at
Skillman. The father, however, could never be made to give his consent.
The mother was still quite young when she was carrying her eleventh child.
Some accident happened which threatened her with a miscarriage. The doctor
was summoned. He saw that it was a serious case and sent for two other
physicians in consultation. It was decided that an immediate operation was
necessary, if the woman’s life was to be saved. They succeeded in
persuading Guss to allow her to be removed to the hospital. Their efforts,
however, were unavailing; she died under the operation.
On the outskirts of B---- lived the owner of the Cedarhill farm worked by
Guss Saunders. He proved to be an intelligent man, with an admirably
appointed home. He was keenly alive to the needs of the family, about
which the field worker came to inquire. “The pity about Guss,” he began,
“is that he can never let drink alone. Why, do you know, if I paid that
man wages, he’d use every cent for rum. I ceased giving him money long
ago, for if I had, the town would have had to look after his children. I
give him credit at the store, and they supply him with what he needs.”
* * * * *
The foregoing glimpses of the defective branch of the Kallikak family must
suffice, though the field worker’s memory and notebook contain many
similar instances.
* * * * *
In turning to describe the other branch of the family, two difficulties
confront the writer.
First, the question of identification. The persons already described are
either gone and have left nothing behind them by which they can be
identified, or, if living, will never recognize themselves in this book.
The opposite is true of the good family. Some of them will recognize
themselves, but the public must not discover them. To insure this, the
writer must refrain from telling the very facts that would give the story
its most interesting touches.
The second difficulty is that a description of the activity of a normal
family of respectability and usefulness is never as interesting as the
bizarre experiences of the abnormal.
Hence the reader will find in the following sketches only such facts as
will show the thoroughly normal and regular family life of the intelligent
citizens of a commonwealth.
In a certain village of New Jersey, lying picturesquely on the crest of a
hill, is a graveyard where Martin Kallikak Sr. and several of his
immediate descendants lie peacefully at rest. He had in his lifetime a
great passion for the accumulation of land and left large farms to most of
his children. These farms lie in the vicinity of the aforesaid village.
Some of them are still in the possession of his descendants, while others
have passed into strangers’ hands. On the hill above this village is a
stucco farmhouse in a fine state of preservation. It belonged to
Amos--lineal descendant of one of the colonial governors of New Jersey and
to Elizabeth, daughter of Martin Kallikak Sr. The farm is, at present, in
the possession of the widow of Elizabeth’s grandson, the latter having
been a minister in New York City. In renting the farm, the family has
always retained a wing of the house, which, although remodeled, still
presents much the same appearance as in the days of Amos and Elizabeth.
There is the same fireplace, the same high-backed chairs, the clock, desk,
and china cupboard. Every summer the family has come back to the old place
to enjoy the country air, the luscious grapes and other fruit planted by
their ancestor.
On another hill, less than two miles distant, lives a granddaughter of the
same Amos and Elizabeth. Her father had been, in his day, one of the
wealthiest and most prominent citizens of the community. In an old desk,
part of his inheritance from his mother, was found a number of valuable
papers belonging to the Kallikak family. One of these is the famous deed
of the original purchase made in 17-- by Casper Kallikak, signed by the
governor of the colony. These papers the daughter guards with great pride.
She is a woman of ability and manages her large farm with admirable skill.
The splendid old homestead, which has been remodeled and fitted up with
all modern conveniences, was built by her mother’s ancestor. Although she
is deeply interested in all family matters, she has been too much
engrossed in business affairs to have given this subject much attention.
A daughter of hers, however, who has inherited the taste, has been able to
make up for her mother’s lack in this respect. The young woman is now
married, and her oldest son bears the united name of his two ancestors,
the colonial governor and Martin Kallikak.
Miriam, the oldest daughter of Martin Sr., married a man who was a
carpenter and a farmer. Although of good family, yet, for some unknown
reason, he was not personally acceptable to Martin or his wife. Miriam
died when only thirty-six years old, and her husband married again. In his
will, Martin makes no mention of his grandchildren by this daughter. They
have been respectable farming people, but have never held the same social
position as the other members of the family.
Martin’s third daughter, Susan, married a man descended from a family
conspicuous in the colonial history of New Jersey and which counts among
its members one of the founders of Princeton University, while a
collateral branch furnished a signer to the Declaration of Independence.
One of Susan’s sons is still living, having attained the advanced age of
ninety-eight. He is a resident of the town that bears his family name and
has always been conspicuous as a loyal and upright citizen. To-day, the
old man has quite lost his mental power but retains his courteous manner
and placid gentlemanly countenance.
In a central region of northern New Jersey, remote from any direct line of
travel, lies a town named for one of the families connected with the
earliest settlement of the colony. This family rose to distinction in many
of its branches, but honors itself chiefly for having produced one of the
most brilliant advocates of the cause of Independence of which New Jersey
can boast. He was descended on his mother’s side from the first president
of Princeton University and took his degree there before he was sixteen
years of age. From this family, Martin Kallikak’s youngest son, Joseph,
chose his wife. It is interesting to note that the descendants of this
pair have shown a marked tendency toward professional careers. One
daughter, however, married a farmer, and most of her descendants have
remained fixed to the soil. Another daughter married a prominent merchant,
and this line, having been fixed in the city, has produced men chiefly
engaged in mercantile pursuits; but the sons, of whom there were five, all
studied medicine, and although only one of these became a practicing
physician, their children have carried on the family tradition in this
line.
On the outskirts of another New Jersey town, in a beautiful old homestead,
inherited from his mother, lives a grandson of Frederick Kallikak, oldest
son of Martin. He is a courteous, scholarly man of the old school. His
home is rendered particularly attractive by the presence of his southern
wife and two charming daughters. In his possession are numerous articles
belonging to his great-grandfather. This gentleman manifested such an
intelligent interest in giving information in regard to his family that it
seemed a question of honor to inform him as to the purpose of the
investigation, laying bare the facts set forth in this book. He proved to
be, perhaps, the one man best qualified in the entire family for entering
into an analysis of its characteristics, and this he did freely, in so far
as it would serve the ends of the investigation.
Another descendant of Martin Kallikak Sr., a granddaughter of his youngest
child, Abbie, had been previously informed regarding the same facts. This
lady is a person not only of refinement and culture but is the author of
two scholarly genealogical works. She has, for years, been collecting
material for a similar study of the Kallikak family. This material she
generously submitted to the use of the field worker. In the end she spent
an entire day in the completion and revision of the normal chart
presented in this book. No praise can be too high for such disinterested
self-forgetfulness in the face of an urgent public need. We owe to these
two persons most of the information which has made possible the study of
the normal side of this family.
Of Martin Kallikak Sr., himself, the record of many characteristic traits
has been preserved. As stated in another chapter, his father died when he
was a lad of fifteen. The father, in his will, after enumerating certain
personal bequests to his wife, recommends the selling of the homestead
farm, in order to provide for the education of his children. There is a
quaint document still in existence, in which Martin Kallikak, having
attained his majority, agrees to pay £250 to each of his three “spinster”
sisters, still minors, in return for a quitclaim deed of the homestead
farm. This was a considerable burden for a young man to assume, but it
seems to have given him the impetus which later made him a rich and
prosperous farmer.
He had joined the Revolutionary Army in April, 1776. Two years later he
was wounded in a way to disable him for further service, and he then
returned to the home farm. During the summer of enforced idleness he wooed
and won the heart of a young woman of good Quaker family. Her shrewd old
father, however, refused to give his consent. To his objections, based on
the ground that Martin did not own enough of this world’s goods, the young
man is recorded as saying, “Never mind. I will own more land than ever
thou did, before I die,” which promise he made true. That the paternal
objection was overruled is proven by the registry of marriages, which
gives the date of Martin’s union with the Quakeress as January, 1779.
The old Bible of Casper Kallikak, one of the family heirlooms, is in the
possession of a Reverend Mr. ----, who is descended from Casper through
the line of one of his daughters. This Bible was bought in 1704 and is
still in an excellent state of preservation, for, although time-stained,
the pages are intact and there still may be seen in legible handwriting
the family record penned so long ago. On a flyleaf, is a quaint verse in
which old Casper bequeaths the volume to his eldest son, bidding him, “So
oft as in it he doth looke” remember how his father had “aye been guided
by ye precepts in this booke,” and enjoining him to walk in the same safe
way.