Welcome to the eugenics podcast.
I'm Patrick Merricks. And I'm Marius
Turda.
Good afternoon, Marius. How are you doing?
Good afternoon, Patrick. I'm very well
thank you. Yourself?
Brilliant. Thanks. I'm all fired up to
talk about eugenics on our podcast.
So everything the stars have aligned.
Things are looking good.
So  our topic this week is 'Galton
Falls':
UCL - that's University College London - and
its eugenic past.
So this is based around some events
that have been happening this year,
really developing over the last few
months and sort of culminating
very recently. So it's 
about University College London
accepting, acknowledging its relationship
with the
the eugenics movement at the
beginning of the
20th century and
now the renaming of certain buildings
after the key figures in the eugenics
movement which were Francis Galton and
Karl Pearson.
So do you have any introductory remarks,
Marius?
It is, I think, very important to revisit
the eugenic legacies of certain public
institutions
and universities are so central to our
public culture,
so, not surprisingly, University College
London has been trying to do so for some
time now,
they finally succeeded in renaming
theaters which were named after
important eugenicists such as Francis Galton and Karl Pearson.
So the big debate to be had now is, I
suppose,
how much public awareness
is of that academic move
towards rewriting the past and embracing
the eugenic legacies
of the early 20th century. And I hope the
public will contribute and come together
with academics
to engage in this wide debate on the
history of eugenics.
So to help contribute to this we're
taking a brief look at the history behind this. So what relationship did Galton and Pearson have
with University College London.
So let's start by looking at Francis
Galton, the figure.
He's widely known in historical
sort of circles as the founder of
modern eugenics but as we can see from a
brief Google search
he had many vocations and eugenics is
just
one of them, along the list. So
that's quite interesting, Marius. What do
you think about him, is he just a statistician or is he more than that?
It is interesting that the first thing
they put up there is statistician
I would have thought anthropologist
would be probably closer to what he
really was but, ultimately, of course, as we
know,
he was the founder and the person who
promoted most forcefully
the eugenic ideal, as he called it.
So he was indeed a person coming from a
tradition
of English scientists, who were very
good at many things. And he was an
explorer and a psychologist and
sociologist
and he did contribute to statistics as
well
but, ultimately, he should be remembered
for his contribution to eugenics and
I think the correct 
description of Francis Galton there
should have been
eugenicist rather than statistician
and then the other proclivities.
So we see he died in um in January 1911
and towards the end of his life he was
really looking to leave his
his legacy and this is when he became
involved in with University College
and basically he founded or helped
to
found a research fellowship in eugenics
in 1904 and he came up with an approved
definition with the university which is:
"The term 'national eugenics' is here
defined as a study
of agencies under social control that
may improve or impair the racial
qualities of future generations
either physically or mentally." So
Marius, when we were talking earlier
about this,
you pinpointed the word 'national' there
and I'd like you to,
what's the significance of this 'national
eugenics'?
Well when he was approaching
University College to suggest
a research fellowship in eugenics he was
asked to provide
certain clarifications and a definition
of eugenics.
So he offered them a definition of
eugenics which was found too cumbersome, so
then together with Karl Pearson
and with Arthur Rücker from University
College, Galton worked on a new
definition of eugenics which is the one
you presented.
Now this is the definition of eugenic
most used
but ironically it's only the second part
that is well known:
namely, the study of agencies under
social control.
So that's that's interesting that a lot
of people
and in books you read about eugenics,
the first part
is being taken out whilst Karl Pearson
is very keen to emphasize that
if someone talks about 'national' eugenics
this is how the term 'national' eugenics
was used for the first time in
in this context in relationship to
University College when they
were trying to set up a research
fellowship and it's also important
because we emphasize so much
the broad character of eugenics and
'national' is the word that Galton
explicitly wanted
to be introduced as part of the
the attributes of the fellowship and
this is what the fellow needed to look
at:
namely, national eugenics.
Well I'm glad you mentioned the fellow
because now we move on to
Edgar Schuster, who was the first holder
of the Galton research fellowship
at the University of London, very
significant figure
to Karl Pearson,
certainly, who later stated that
this funding this 1500 pounds for three
years
furtherance of the study of eugenics.
This was
solidifying eugenics as an academic
study
like any other subject we might study at
university. Eugenics, Galton hoped, and
Pearson hoped, and Schuster as well
that this would kind of be the start
of something
great. And we actually have a
picture on on the right here of Schuster
to put it into what just does kind of give some
illustration to the character.
So we have him on the on the left
hand side there holding a skull.
I believe - and there quite a few skulls in
the picture - he
is with some Oxford zoologist friends. So
Marius, what can you tell us about
Schuster and his importance?
Well, firstly, we should
emphasize the element that is always
contentious in this conversation with his
the character
scientific character eugenics. Galton was
very keen, as he negotiated with
University College to emphasize the
scientific
element of his enterprise and he wanted
to establish eugenics as a field of
academic inquiry.
So academic life was very important to
him. He wanted to give it academic
legitimacy.
So he approached University College in
this way
and then he proposed a research
fellowship. It's interesting that when he
corresponded with Schuster about what
his role was and what kind of research
Schuster should do - I mean Schuster coming from Oxford; he was
an undergraduate in Oxford. This is why
we have this picture with
some of his professors. He was Weldon's
student and
he studied at the New College in Oxford -
he told Schuster, you know, one
of the themes that are important for
eugenics
is that the theme of feeble-mindedness, so
to look at feeble-minded people was what Schuster
was supposed to do as a research fellow.
So there's one side of the story. The
other one, of course, is the role of Karl
Pearson
and when Galton died in 1911, as you
mentioned, they created a 'Galton' chair
in the history, the 'Galton' chair
in eugenics'
and that went to Karl Pearson.
Thank you for that introduction to
Karl Pearson, who's our next figure that
we discuss
and one of the names in this
UCL debate from this year. So
here we have the link between
British eugenics theory and what was
originally known
as sort of the the 'dark' side of eugenics,
although most people would call eugenics
generally has a dark history now, but
so this is
the quote for Karl Pearson and his
retirement dinner so as you mentioned he
was a
Galton Chair of National Eugenics and
this was him
retiring, retirement dinner at UCL, 1934: "The climax of eugenics lies
in the future perhaps with Reichskanzler
Hitler
and his proposals to regenerate the
German people.
In Germany a vast experiment is in hand,
and some of you
may live to see its results. If it
fails it will not be for want of
enthusiasm
but rather because the Germans are only
just starting
the study of mathematical statistics in
the modern sense."
So what is this link between Britain
and Germany here,
Marius? What can you tell us about
that?
It's a complicated relationship
and Karl Pearson is essential to this
story of British and German
eugenics in many ways.
He dies in 1936, so this is two years
before he died and of course he could
not have seen the full development of
the Nazi
project of human engineering and how it
worked with
racial hygiene and eugenics but he did
indeed believe that the Germans by
introducing
sterilization laws and by embracing
politically and publicly and nationally
eugenics
they are moving forward towards Galton's
vision of a eugenic future. Now of course
I really like the end,
where he goes back to his 'scientific'
approach to eugenics
by saying they still are at the
beginning of studying
modern statistics in mathematical way.
Basically, he's trying to say that there is
not enough scientific research
being done in Germany about eugenics and
enthusiasm
compensates for the lack of
scientific research.
But ultimately he, as many others - both in
Britain and
indeed across the world - were quite in
awe with the German government
in 1933-1934 when they began
their vast experiment as he calls it of
human engineering.
So end was where we began here so the
University College London changes
names of three buildings that were named
in honour of eugenicists so
lecture theaters in a building named
after prominent eugenicists
Francis Galton and Karl Pearson have
been given new names.
So what is the significance and the
importance of
renaming um these buildings to you,
Marius?
It sends a very positive message, I think.
We are
at a very crucial moment
in our lives when many things are
being
discussed, debated and
eugenics is part and parcel of that. We
could see eugenics and racism
creeping up in the public rhetoric,
public discourse, activities
proposed by government or public or
private organizations, so we need
to engage with this history, we need to
welcome
public spaces and public institutions
which
are able to revisit and embrace their
eugenic past.
This has been a fascinating conversation,
Marius, and a very important one too.
I want to thank you for joining me and
also thanks to everyone for
watching or listening.
And we'll see you next time. Thank you,
Marius.
Thank you, Patrick.
