October 25, 1963

Dr. Richard Masland, Director

National Institute of Neurolagical
Diseases and Blindness

National Institutes of Health

Bethesda 14, Maryland

Dear Dick:

After all our previous commotion on arranging support for our damographic
studies, | was a little startled, though pleasantly so, to hear from the National
institute of Child Health and Human Development about thelr Interest In support-
ing the further utillzation of census data. 1 was not very clear whether you
were in close touch with Dr. Rosa about this, and if not, would Tike very much
to discuss some of the detalls with you. We have, in any case, submitted the
enclosed application, whose origins will, | hope, be understood. Or. Bodmer

in our department is an extremely gifted blo-mathematician who has worked on
population genetical problems, in some depth, although he Is now concentrating
mainly In genetic chemistry, and Is equally tnterasted In developing as far as
possible the sclentific uses of this type of Information. Fortunately, too,

Dr. Cann has returned to the Pediatrics Department and will be collaborating in
these studies as well. 1 would be happy to hear from you and Dr. Berendes con=
cerning any aspects of the census tabulations thet ought to be particularly
stressed for their relevance to mental retardation and the perinatal morbidity
study.

| have been thinking about making a pass through the 1/1000 census sample to
get some Impression of the magnitude of educattonal anomalles which might be
evidence of the prevalence of mental reterdation In the non=Institutlonal ized
population. What 1 had In mind was to tabulate for significant discrepancies
between the age of a child and his educational advancement, and to plot this

as against the characteristics of other children in the family and the socio<
economic status of the parents. Of course, a great deal has been remarked
concerning the disfributlon of educational opportunity; | thought It might Just be
possible, howaver, that we could also get some evidence of the distribution of
educational capacity, particularly among the more well-to-do groups. Do you
know whether this sort of study has been conducted on such a scale, and on such
an objective basis? Any other thoughts that you might have concerning weys of
pinpointjng this type of information fran the census data which would bring
them Into relevance to the mental retardation problem would also be very grate~
fully recelved.

Sincerely yours,

Joshua Lederberg
Professor of Genetics