The Eugenics Survey of Vermont (1925-1936), founded and directed by University of Vermont zoology professor Henry F. Perkins, functioned as Vermont's official agency of eugenics research and education during the interwar years. Inspired by concepts of human heredity that were ultimately discredited and convinced by the conclusions of prejudiced studies, the Vermont legislature enacted a law permitting sexual sterilization of "feebleminded and insane" persons in 1931. The archives of the Eugenics Survey of Vermont and the Vermont Commission on Country Life were preserved for posterity and transferred to Vermont Public Records Division in 1952, where they remained in storage for thirty-five years. Historian Kevin Dann, having discovered the archives in the basement of the Waterbury State hospital in 1986, published the first historical accounts of the Vermont eugenics movement and kindled new interest into this troubling chapter in Vermont's past.
In the past decade, the Eugenics Survey of Vermont has attracted the attention of historians and journalists and fueled the imagination of artists and writers. Frequently cast as "Vermont's Dark Secret" in popular accounts, the Eugenics Survey of Vermont has provided a focal point for discussion of such issues as racism and civil rights, the Abenaki struggle for tribal recognition, the collection, use, and privacy of genetic information in health care, and the historical meaning of Vermont's celebrated identity and traditions.
The idea of a web-based educational resource on the Vermont eugenics movement originated in 1999 with Fern Tavalin, director of the WEB Project, and Nancy L. Gallagher, author of Breeding Better Vermonters: The Eugenics Project in the Green Mountain State (University Press of New England, 1999). Originally conceived as an interdisciplinary educational resource to facilitate use of primary historical sources in relevant content areas, the project expanded in response to a growing interest in the subject among diverse communities throughout Vermont. With initial funding and support from the WEB Project, Nancy Gallagher and Hope Greenberg, Humanities Computing Specialist at the University of Vermont, developed this web-based collection of historical sources on the Vermont eugenics movement in cooperation with participating repositories.
Through providing students, educators, and citizens direct access to the voices of the past, this resource seeks to restore the forgotten history of the role that eugenics played in Vermont public and private life, to open new vistas in our understanding of the ideas and events that shaped the destiny of Vermonters, and to provide multiple point of access and departure to available historical sources for further dialogue, research, and reflection on the influence and legacies of eugenics in Vermont.
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