Selling a Solution
Group founded by Hanes, others sent sterilization in new direction

James G. Hanes was a master at selling hosiery, and he was just as successful at selling an expanded program of eugenic sterilization to the people of North Carolina. In the spring of 1947, Hanes helped found the Human Betterment League of North Carolina, bringing cash, a Manhattan advertising agency and slick mass mailers to promote an idea that almost every other state was writing off as a mistake.

'It Ain't Fair'
Old IQ score helped social workers get teen-ager sterilized

Bertha Dale Midgett Hymes comes from a place where generations of locals have spilled blood and sweat just surviving. Hymes, 52, grew up in Wanchese, a fishing village on Roanoke Island where folks take pride in hard work. It is also a place where people struggle to get by and government handouts are sometimes grudgingly accepted.

City's kids put to the test in '48
ALL ABOARD: Newspapers jumped on sterilization bandwagon

DOCUMENT - Gamble poem
DOCUMENT - Human Betterment League Pamphlet


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