SIR FRANCIS GALTON (1822-1911)

An English scientist, explorer and anthropologist, Francis Galton was a cousin of Charles Darwin and was one of the first to recognize how Darwin's theory of evolution was going to clash with theology. He coined the word eugenics to denote scientific endeavors to increase the proportion of persons with better than average genes. This was to be done through selective mating of marriage partners.

Galton as a youth developed a passion for travel. He was taking medicine but when his father died he was left with sufficient fortune that he was free to indulge in his craving for travel. He wrote nine books and over 200 papers. They deal with many diverse subjects, including the use of fingerprints for personal identification, the correlation of calculus (a branch of applied statistics) - in both of which Galton was a pioneer - twins, blood transfusions, the art of travel in undeveloped countries, criminality and meteorology. He was also deeply concerned with improving standards of measurement. He was knighted in 1909 and died near London on January 17, 1911.

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Thomas Blakiston in Japan

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