East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1912-10-09
RELATION OF THE HAIR
TO HUMAN GENIUS
Edgar Ellsworth owen in Chicago
Record Her9 Id }

Edgar Ellsworth owen in Chicago
Record -Herald.)
What the relation may be between
genius and the color OF the hair has
been a subject for the contemplation
Of mankind many hundreds of years.
Influences OF environment and of eli
mate in the fixing OF racial colOrs, and
peculiarities have been considered;
other countless mysteries of nature
have helped to make more difficult
any conclusions other than that many
things in the universe are past finding
out.
The seed Of a sunflower is not far
different from that of a waterme elOn
You may plant them side by side in
soil Of precisely similar character and
witness two Of the many miracles be-
yond human solution; in one spot will
grow a tall. coarse, fibrous plant that
will throw out large yellow flowers,
and in the other spot will grow ten
der vine upon which will develop lus-
ciOus fruits Of enormous size. You
may try like experiment with poppy.
nearly alike an amateur gardener
might not know which was which and
| the remarkable dissimilarity in the
plants and flowers that will come out
of the earth can not be charged to
difference in environment or OF eli
mate
In times past magic and folk lore
became tangled up with ethnology'
philosophy and astrology. when scar
chers after truth faced such problems.
The practice of physiOgnOmy led to
many impositions and in the reign of
Elizabeth a law was passed declaring
all persons "fayning to have know
ledge of phisiognomie or like fantas-
tical Ymaginacions shall be stripped
naked from the middle upwards and
openly whipped until his body be
bloudye." This act was modified by
an act passed during the reign OF
Il Queen Anne. In the time of King
George all persons pretending skill in
physiognomy were deemed rOgues and
vagabonds and were liable to be pub
licly whipped. Investigations of to-
day may not reach more definite con-
clusions, but the Investigators run nc
risk of being whipped while enter
tanning their audiences.
With a determination to show the
relation of hair color to genius in the
ruman race Charles Kassel Of Fort
Worth has devoted considerable re-
search and now offers his conslusions
to the public through the Popular
Science Monthly. From all sources
of information from which he has
been able to draw he decides the haii
of genius is In very large majority
of cases dark. ut must be confessed
he says that anything beyond ten
tative consusions seem forbidden by
the scantiness of the data available
upon the subject The inattention oi
many biographers to the details %
personal appearance Is a blighting OBJ
stacle in inquiries of this nature, and
even where present in works of bio
graphy, the absence of adequate in
dexes makes the task of gathering this
information tedious and painful"
Mr.. Kassel finds classified as darl
| the hair of Browning. Rufus ChOate
| Alexander Dumas the elder Wash
ington Irving, LandOr, Francis Park
man. ROssetti. r l.. Stevenson. Martir
| Van Buren,, Tennyson and Mendels
sohn with black hair were Matthew
| Arnold. S. r. Coleridge, stephen A
| Douglas, Sir Thomas More, Leigh
| Hunt, Ibsen, Paul Jones. Charles
| Lamb, John Marshall, Daniel Web
| ster, ]. G.. Whittier, and Sir Arthur
Sullivan. In the list of brown heads
| were William Cullen Bryant Charlie!
| XII. of Sweden. Captain Cook, Crom
| well. Defoe, Longfellow, Farragut (be
coming in middle life almost black)
Dean Farrar, Eugene Field, Glad
: stone, Oater black). Gordon, U. $
= Grant Keats, Sidney Lanier, Napole
on. John Milton, Peter the Great
George Ripley, Robespierrc, Johr
Ruskin, Shelley Southey, Charles
( sumner, Bayard Taylor, Thoreau, Gen
{ eral Thomas, George Washington, y
p. Willis
The remainder of the names in his
list, aside from the case Of Thacker-
ay, whose hair Is described sometimes
as white and sometimes as flaxon, Mr.
Kassel has classed as reddish" The
hair of Bunyan is 50 described, thai
Of Andrew Jackson Is described as
reddish sandy" that Of James Rus
sell Lowell as "ruddy'' or auburn,
that of Swinburne as "red" in his
youth, though the information Is moi
form an authoritative biography
William the Silent is described al
having auburn hair and Savonarola as
having reddish eyelashes.
This effort to associate the color ot
the hair with genius seemed to cas-
ual reader likely to lead to most In
teresting possibilities in an age wher