David Starr Jordan


David Starr Jordan was the founding president of Stanford University A leading ichthyologist of his day, he had previously been president of Indiana University. He was an antimilitarist who initially opposed U.S. involvement in World War I.

Birth and education

Jordan was born in Gainesville, New York, and grew up on a farm in upstate New York. His parents made the unorthodox decision to educate him at a local girls' high school. His middle name of Starr does not appear in early census records, and was apparently self-selected; he began using it by the time he was enrolled at Cornell. He said it was in honor of his mother’s devotion to the minister Thomas Starr King.
He was inspired by Louis Agassiz to pursue his studies in ichthyology. He was part of the pioneer class of undergraduates at Cornell University, graduating in 1872 with a master's degree in botany.
He wrote his autobiography The Days of a Man, "During the three years which followed , I completed all the requirements for a degree of Bachelor of Science, besides about two year of advanced work in Botany. Taking this last into consideration, the faculty conferred on me at graduation in June 1872, the advanced degree of Master of Science instead of the conventional Bachelor's Degree...it was afterward voted not to grant any second degree within a year after the Bachelor had been received. I was placed, quite innocently, in the position of being the only graduate of Cornell to merge two degrees into one."
His master's thesis was on the topic "The Wild Flowers of Wyoming County".
Jordan obtained a medical degree, M.D., from Indiana Medical College in 1875. He wrote in his autobiography that while teaching at Indianapolis High School, "I was also able to spend some time in the Medical College, from which, in the spring of 1875, I received the degree of Doctor of Medicine, thought it had not at all been my intention to enter that profession." Jordan taught comparative anatomy at the college the following year ; the Indiana Medical College in Indianapolis opened in 1869 and closed its doors in 1878.
Jordan married Susan Bowen in Peru, Massachusetts on March 10, 1875 and she died in 1885 after 10 years of marriage. They had three children, Edith Monica, Harold Bowen, and Thora. Jordan later married Jessie Knight in 1887. Jordan and his second wife had three additional children, Knight Starr, Barbara, and Eric Knight.

Early academic career

Jordan initially taught natural history courses at several small Midwestern colleges.
He was then accepted into the natural history faculty of Indiana University Bloomington as a professor of zoology in 1879. Jordan's teaching included his version of eugenics, which "sought to prevent the decay of the Anglo-Saxon/Nordic race by limiting racial mixing and by preventing the reproduction of those he deemed unfit". Six years later, in 1885, he was named President of Indiana University, becoming the nation's youngest university president at age 34 and the first Indiana University president that was not an ordained minister. He improved the university's finances and public image, doubled its enrollment, and instituted an elective system which, like Cornell's, was an early application of the modern liberal arts curriculum.

Presidency of Stanford 1891-1916

In March 1891, he was approached by Leland and Jane Stanford, who offered him the presidency of their about-to-open California university, Leland Stanford Junior University. Andrew White, the president of Cornell, had recommended Jordan to the Stanfords based on an educational philosophy fit with the Stanfords' vision of a non-sectarian, co-educational school with a liberal arts curriculum. He quickly accepted the offer. Jordan arrived at Stanford in June 1891 and immediately set about recruiting faculty for the university's planned September opening. Pressed for time, he drew heavily on his own acquaintances; most of the fifteen founding professors came either from Cornell or Indiana University. That first year at Stanford he was instrumental in establishing the university's Hopkins Marine Station. He served Stanford as president until 1913 and then chancellor until his retirement in 1916. The university decided not to renew his three-year-term as chancellor in 1916. As the years went on, Jordan became increasingly alienated from the university.
While chancellor, he was elected president of the National Education Association. Jordan was a member in the Bohemian Club and the University Club in San Francisco. Jordan served as a Director of the Sierra Club from 1892 to 1903.

1899 Essay: "A Study of the Decay of Races Through the Survival of the Unfit"

In 1899, Jordan delivered an essay at Stanford that was a rambling argument on behalf of racial segregation and racial purity. In the essay, Jordan claims that "For a race of men or a herd of cattle are governed by the same laws of selection." As with the pseudo-scientific misinterpretations of Darwin that were common among the milieu of Social Darwinists around the turn of the century, Jordan expresses great fears and phobias for "race degeneration" that would result unless great endeavors were put forward to maintain "racial unity."

Jordan's eugenics-based argument against war

One of Jordan's main theses in the essay is that his goals for an ideal society are better engendered through peace than war. Jordan's argument against warfare contends that it is detrimental because it removes the strongest men from the gene pool. Jordan asserted "Future war is impossible because the nations cannot afford it." As one commentator put it, "Though he found meager evidence to support his preconceptions, he still confidently asserted that 'always and everywhere, war means the reversal of natural selection.' "
Jordan was president of the World Peace Foundation from 1910 to 1914 and president of the World Peace Conference in 1915, and initially opposed U.S. entry into World War I, although he changed his position in 1917 and supported U.S. involvement after he became convinced that a German victory would threaten democracy.

Multiple publications of the racist essay

Soon after it was first delivered, the essay was soon published by the American Unitarian Association under the main title of "The Blood of the Nation" and a subtitle of "A Study of the Decay of Races Through the Survival of the Unfit." Multiple editions of this version followed over the next few years.
An expanded version of the essay was delivered in Philadelphia at the two-hundred year anniversary of Benjamin Franklin's birth in 1906 and printed by the American Philosophical Society. The following year, an expanded version of the original essay with an embossed cover was published by Beacon Press in Boston but now under the main title of "The Human Harvest". This version was dedicated to Jordan's older brother Rufus who had volunteered to fight in the American Civil War and Jordan tells us was part of the "'Human Harvest' of 1862." However, Rufus was not killed as "cannon fodder" in fighting but through what would seem to be the "natural selection" of a disease he was "unfit" to survive.
In 1910, the original and slimmer version of the essay was again published by the American Unitarian Association in a "present less expensive form to insure the widest possible distribution."

Continued influential role as a racist and eugenicist

In 1928 Jordan served on the initial board of trustees of the Human Betterment Foundation, a eugenics organization that advocated compulsory sterilization legislation in the United States. He then chaired the first Committee on Eugenics of the American Breeder's Association, from which the California program of forced deportation and sterilization emerged. Jordan then went on to help found the Human Betterment Foundation as a trustee. The Human Betterment Foundation published "Sterilization for Human Betterment."

Role in coverup of the murder of Jane Stanford

In 1905, Jordan launched an apparent coverup of the murder by poisoning of Jane Stanford. While vacationing in Oahu, Stanford had suddenly died of strychnine poisoning, according to the local coroner’s jury. Jordan then sailed to Hawaii, hired a physician to investigate the case, and declared she had in fact died of heart failure, a condition whose symptoms bear no relationship to those actually observed. His motive for doing this has been a subject of speculation. One possibility is that he was simply acting to protect the reputation of the university; its finances were precarious and a scandal might have damaged fundraising. He had written the president of Stanford's board of trustees offering several alternate explanations for Mrs. Stanford's death, suggesting they select whichever would be most suitable. Given that Mrs. Stanford had a difficult relationship with him and reportedly planned to remove him from his position at the university, he might have also had a personal motive to eliminate suspicions that might have swirled around an unsolved crime. Jordan's version of Mrs. Stanford's demise was largely accepted until the appearance of several publications in 2003 emphasizing the evidence that she was murdered.

Final years and legacy

In retirement, Jordan remained active, writing on ichthyology, world relations, peace, and his autobiography.

Lifetime honors and awards

Although a proponent of eugenics, Jordan was skeptical of certain other pseudoscientific claims. He coined the term "sciosophy" to describe the "systematized ignorance" of the pseudoscientist. His later work, The Higher Foolishness, inspired the philosopher Martin Gardner to write his treatise on scientific skepticism, Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science. However, Gardner noted that "the book is infuriating because although Jordan mentions the titles of dozens of crank works, from which he quotes extensively, he seldom tells you the names of the authors."

Children

His son, Eric Knight Jordan, died at the age of 22 in a traffic accident near Gilroy, California. Eric had participated in a paleontological expedition to the Revillagigedo Islands and was considering an academic career.

Death

On September 19, 1931, Jordan died at his home on the Stanford campus after suffering a series of strokes over two years.

Monuments and memorials

In 1966 the fisheries research ship David Starr Jordan, was commissioned for service with the United States Fish and Wildlife Services Bureau of Commercial Fisheries. The ship later served in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fleet as NOAAS David Starr Jordan. In 2010, the David Starr Jordan was sold for scrap.

Cornell's David Starr Jordan Prize

Starting in 1986, the David Starr Jordan Prize was funded as a joint endowment by Cornell, Indiana University, and Stanford. It was awarded to a young scientist that was making contributions in one of Jordan’s interests: evolution, ecology, population and organismal biology.

Middle school renamed in 2018

From 1937 until 2018, Jordan had a middle school in Palo Alto named after him. After Jordan's involvement with the eugenics movement came to the notice of parents and the school board of the Palo Alto Unified School District, the board unanimously decided in 2018 to rename the school in honor of Frank Greene, Jr. The school district in Burbank, California also renamed a school in 2019.

Papers

Jordan's papers are housed at Stanford University and at Swarthmore College

Works

Numerous genera and species bear the name Jordan.
Genera:
Jordania, Davidijordania, and Jordanella
Species: