Clippings on cancer scrapbook

Collection

Identifier: MSS 472

Overview

This collection consists of a single volume scrapbook of clippings from newspapers, medical journals, and other publications, all on the topic of cancer. Many clippings relate to the use of radium and its efficacy in the treatment of cancer. Other topics include diet, various treatments and reported cures, tests, and discoveries surrounding the disease. Clippings date primarily from 1913-1914, with one clipping from 1911. A typed index is included at the beginning of the volume.

Dates

1911-1914
Majority of material found within 1913-1914

Creator

Hoffman, Frederick L. (Frederick Ludwig), 1865-1946 (Person)

Conditions Governing Access

This collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

Conditions may apply. Contact the library for more information.

Biographical / Historical

Frederick Ludwig Hoffman (1856-1946) was a statistician and vice president of the Prudential Insurance Company. He investigated the prevalence and causes of cancer, and his research was the first to identify the relationships between diet and tobacco usage and cancer. Though his work helped to improve working conditions in a variety of industries, the accuracy and value of his work has been diminished by his belief in scientific racism and eugenics.

Hoffman was born on May 2, 1865 in Varel, Germany and emigrated to the United States in 1884. He changed the spelling of his name, dropping the second N, around 1890. He married Ella Hay in 1891 and they had seven children.

Hoffman’s work promoted the ideologies of scientific racism and eugenics. He published an article entitled “Vital Statistics of the Negro” in The Arena in 1892, later expanding upon this work in a book called Race Traits and Tendencies of the American Negro, published in 1896. The book’s claim that African Americans were particularly susceptible to disease was used to justify Prudential’s practice of charging Black customers higher premiums, yet the claim was debunked only a year after its publication.

Hoffman was a founding board member of the American Tuberculosis Association and a trustee of the American Cancer society. Tulane University awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1911, and he received the American Cancer Society’s Clement Cleveland Medal in 1943. He continued to publish and lecture on racist and eugenicist topics throughout his career.

Hoffman died in San Diego, California on February 23, 1946.