The Rock Island Argus and daily union. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1920-1923, 1922-01-10

Washington, D. C., Jan. 9.-The
most prolific people in the United
States, when they are classified &C
cording to occupation, are fore
men, overseers and inspectors OF
mines. The wives of these men
bear on an average as children per
wife and each of them has on an
average of 39 children now living.
These interesting figures on the
proliferation of mine foremen have
just been issued by the bureau of
census as a part Of long tabul3-
ton of the American birth rate &C
cording to occupation. 1t is most
interesting tabulation and some
what bewildering one in a way. It
upsets our preconceived notions IS
to what kinds of people have the
most children and why. 1t also
sheds some light on that much dis
cussed question as to whether the
native population Of the United
States is maintaining itself or
slowly dying out and leaving the
country to the immigrants.
But before We proceed to general
izations, let us note some of the as
tonishing figures which the census
bureau has brought out. Next to
mine foremen, we find that the
most prolific occupational class in
the United States is that of fore
men and overseers on steam and
electric railroads. The wife of a
traction foreman bears on an aver
age AZ children of which 3.S sur
vive. This average mortality of
less than one-half child per fam
lily is especially creditable to the
transportation business.
Foremen and overseers of all
kinds seem to have a lot of chill
dren and they seem to have good
luck in raising them. Perhaps this
is not surprising. A foreman or
overseer is apt to be a workman
of more than usual intelligence
who has worked his way up, and
who receives good income:
Naturally, having lived on day
wages for long time, his standard
of living will not be as high as
that of a lawyer or doctor. He will
not spend as much on luxuries, and
SO will be more inclined to raise
children.
The Janitor's Family.
So much for the foreman. The
next most prolific occupational
class we find to be that of janitors
and sections. The jantors' wives
average Al children per wife, and
no less than "a of these children
on an average survive to cry at
dead cats in the dumb-waiter. Why
as many an apartment dweller
has doubtless asked before-should
janitors be so philoprogenitiVe? Of
course, they get rent and heat
free and they have the whole base
met for the kids to play around in.
But it is surely surprising to find
that in the whole United Stater,
only these two kinds of foremea,
janitors and sections and one other
class succeed in begetting an aver
family. In all of the other occnpa-
tional classes listed, the average
number of children born is less
than four, and in none of them is
the average number of children
living as much as four. The mine
foreman, with his SO smiling
babies, has the largest average
family in the country. For the
registration area of the United
States the average number of chill
dren born per mother was 3.3, and
the average number of children liv-
ing per mother was 20.
What we have always heard
about the birthrate is that the
population is dying at the top"
by which it is meant that people
of wealth and people in the pro-
LESSONS have small families, while
the laborers and very poor people
generally have large families. We
are usually told that the average
woman must raise three children
in order to keep-up the population
and increase it little. If this is
true, the population of the country
as a whole is just barely being
by the people in it, and
the increase is due wholly to immi-
grafton. This study shows once
more that the problem of restricting
and regulating immigration is the
zeal population problem in the
United . States-and one which
seems nowhere near solution.
The surprising thing in this tab
ulation is that it fails to discover