This Old Man

Between 1933 and 1977, the state of North Carolina sterilized 7,600 white, black male and female residents under the North Carolina Sterilization Act. Dr. Clarence Gamble heir to the Proctor and Gamble fortune wrote this untitled poem about 1947. He submitted it to the North Carolina Mental Hygiene Society in hopes that it would be used to drum up support for the state's eugenic sterilization program. He was surprised when the society declined to use the poem for promotional material. The State of North Carolina ended its Eugenics program in 1977.