Gertrude Crotty Davenport
Gertrude Crotty Davenport | |
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Born | Asequa, near Millia Crotty Davenport | February 28, 1866
Gertrude Anna Davenport (
Life
Gertrude Anna Crotty was born 28 February 1866, in Asequa, Colorado (near Denver), to parents William and Millie (Armstrong) Crotty. She graduated from University of Kansas in 1889 where she stayed as an instructor for three years until she went to pursue a higher degree. She then became a graduate student at Radcliffe College (then known as the Society for Collegiate Instruction of Women). There are conflicting facts about her time at Radcliffe. According to Marilyn Bailey Ogilvie, she was there for two years but did not complete her degree.[5] According to Nicole Hahn Rafter, she was there for five years doing graduate work in zoology and wrote her book The Primitive Streak and Notochordal Canal in Chelonia (1896).[6] Tamsen Wolff said that she did earn her PhD in zoology.[7] While attending Radcliffe, she met Charles Davenport, who was one of her zoology instructors.[6] She married Charles in Burlington, Kansas on June 23, 1894 and went on to have three children. The eldest child was Millia Crotty Davenport, who was born on 30 March 1895.[8] The middle child, Jane Joralemon Davenport, was born on 11 September 1897.[8] The youngest, Charles Benedict Davenport Jr., was born on 8 January 1911.[8] Gertrude played a major role in supporting the domestic, financial, and scientific life of Charles, co-authoring numerous papers with him, sharing management of the Cold Spring Harbor Biological Laboratory, and supervising his financial concerns and expenditures.[9] Gertrude died on 8 March 1946, in Upper Nyack, New York at the age of 80.[10][1][6]
Scientific work
Davenport worked alongside her husband in the field of eugenics. Together they went to
Gertrude and Charles did work on heredity which included studying eye, hair, and skin color of humans. She also did research on embryology using turtles, studied the differences between Sargatia (a type of
In her article from Cold Spring Harbor about the "Zero" family in "Zand," an anonymized clan in a European village, Davenport analyzes the branches of the Zero family tree. Using the work of Dr. Jörger from a Swiss insane asylum, Davenport discusses the favorable or "good" branches of the Zero family, characterized by industriousness, fiscal responsibility, good manners, strong morals, and in-group marriage, in comparison to the unfavorable branch, characterized by criminal behavior, alcoholism, vagabondage, and marriage to foreign women. Davenport remarks upon hereditary explanations for the two branches; she examined their physical phenotypes and even attempted to exclude environmental effects by considering the vagabondage developed in Zero children taken from their families and distributed to respectable caretakers.[13] Her work attempts to highlight a heredity nature to criminal behavior, comparing this criminal breed of human's innate disposition to crime to that of a race horse's disposition to race. Her piece pushes a strong attitude associating degenerate heredity with matrilineal inheritance, as she traced the lineage of the criminal branches of the Zeros through blood-related and insane women. Davenport did not advocate for negative eugenics at the time, believing that the decline heredity and physical phenotypes of the vagabond branch would bring about its extinction on its own.[14]
Gertrude and Charles worked on eugenics to breed better humans. They claimed that this type of eugenics, called negative eugenics, was a necessity. Gertrude was worried that those who were "feebleminded" would hide their heredity.
Published work
Gertrude and Charles Davenport had a productive working relationship which yielded many scientific works through the years. They produced two textbooks, the first of which was written for secondary students titled Introduction to Zoology.[19] The second textbook was titled Elements of Zoology: To Accompany the Field and Laboratory Study of Animals and was to be used as a guide for zoology studies and experimentation.[20] Charles and Gertrude's studies on genetics included Heredity of Skin Pigmentation in Man,[21] Heredity of Eye Color in Man,[22] and Heredity of Hair-Form in Man.[23] During the course of these studies and publications, the Davenports explored how human traits, specifically skin pigmentation, eye color, and hair characteristics, were passed on to the next generation with Mendelian genetics. Each study also included a "practical application" statement on how the marriage of two individuals with certain traits influences the passing of said traits.[21][22][23]
Gertrude also individually authored the monographs The Primitive Streak and Notochordal Canal in Chelonia (1896)[24] and Variation in the Number of Stripes on the Sea-anemone, Sagartia luciae (1902).[25] In the former study, the notochordal canal in turtle embryos was observed as the embryos developed. This study produces a series of descriptions of how the notochordal canal develops and some implications based on its development.[24] In the latter study, samples of Sargatia were taken from Cold Spring Harbor and examined in a laboratory. Under a microscope, the sea anemones' cell division was examined in both natural conditions and artificially placed strain. During and after the division processes, the various stripe characteristics were noted and recorded from different samples.[25]
References
- ^ ISBN 978-0-585-27684-7.
- ^ "Charles B. Davenport · Galton's Children · OnView: Digital Collections & Exhibits". collections.countway.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2019-03-17.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8135-4998-9.
- JSTOR 25095679.
- ^ Ogilvie, Marilyn Bailey (2000). The Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science: Pioneering Lives from Ancient Times to the Mid-20th Century. Vol. 1. Routledge. p. 328.
- ^ ISBN 9781555530303.
- ISBN 9780230615854.
- ^ a b c "Davenport Genealogy: Ninth Generation". members.tripod.com. Retrieved 2019-03-08.
- JSTOR 4604920.
- ^ "Davenport, Gertrude Crotty". Men and Women of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporaries. New York: L.R. Hamersly & Company. 1909. pp. 452–453.
- ^ a b Ogilvie, Marilyn Bailey; Harvey, Joy Dorothy (2000). The Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science: Pioneering Lives from Ancient Times to the Mid-20th Century. Vol. 1. Routledge. p. 328.
- ^ Kevles, Daniel J. (2004). In the Name of Eugenics: Genetics and the Uses of Human Heredity. International Society for Science and Religion. p. 51.
- S2CID 222435277.
- )
- ISBN 9780230615854.
- ^ Hasian, Marouf A (1996). The Rhetoric of Eugenics in Anglo-American Thought. University of Georgia Press. pp. 72, 81, 88.
- ^ Davenport, Gertrude (January 18, 1912). "The Eugenics Movement". The Independent. Vol. 72. New York, NY. pp. 146–148.
- ^ Davenport, Gertrude (April 27, 1914). "Society and the Feebleminded". The Independent. Vol. 78. New York, NY: The Independent Weekly, Inc. p. 170.
- ^ Davenport, Charles Benedict; Davenport, Gertrude Anna Crotty (1900). Introduction to zoology; a guide to the study of animals, for the use of secondary schools;. London: Macmillan company.
- ^ Davenport, Charles Benedict; Davenport, Gertrude Anna Crotty. Elements of zoology, to accompany the field and laboratory study of animals (Rev.. ed.). New York: Macmillan.
- ^ PMID 17754423.
- ^ S2CID 84362414.
- ^ JSTOR 2455602.
- ^ a b Davenport, Gertrude Anna Crotty. The primitive streak and notochordal canal in Chelonia. Boston: Ginn.
- ^ a b Davenport, Gertrude Anna Crotty (1903). Variation in the Number of Stripes on the Sea-anemone, Sagartia Luciae. Henry Holt.