Prophets of Sex

Up bobs sex determination again (TIME, July 9), and will bob up until it is settled. Now Dr. Isaac Fried, CzechoSlovakian savant, after extensive experiments in Prague and under Professor Devraignes in Paris, asserts that he can diagnose the sex of a child four months before birth. His method is based on a blood reaction similar to the Wassermann test, but no further details are vouchsafed. The French Academy of Medicine appointed a committee of inquiry. Dr. Fried is probably a reputable scientist, but cranks innumerable have flourished on this same subject. Vide Dr. Alzamon Ira Lucas, "Psy.D., Ph.D.," of Rochester, N. Y., sponsor of the "American Super-Race Foundation," who came to Manhattan to hold a congress of superior Caucasians, and to raise $50,000,000 to endow his efforts to salvage the human race. He claims to have determined the sex of 95 babies in utero, including his own two children. His eugenic program is his own secret, for, says he: "I have to earn my living." But in due time mankind will be regenerated. The New York World (see Page 24 for the record of this newspaper for public service) unkindly exposed some unflattering features of his career, and the Hotel Pennsylvania cancelled the arrangements for his congress. His hair is curly, and he claims to be a superior hybrid of Cherokee, Dutch, French, Spanish and Hindu extraction, but not of Negro.