History and demographic composition of the Robert J. Terry anatomical collection

Abstract

Robert J. Terry began collecting human skeletal remains in the area of St. Louis, Missouri for research and educational purposes in 1898. He continued collecting skeletal specimens in the Anatomy Department at Washington University until his retirement in 1941. Mildred Trotter succeeded Terry as anatomy professor and continued his collecting, and strove to balance the demographic distribution of the collection. In 1967, after her retirement, the collection was moved to the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History. As with several other well-documented collections, the Terry Collection is widely used for a diverse range of anthropological and medical research. Despite its extensive use, there has been limited discussion of the collection's history and incomplete description of holdings and associated materials of this collection. In this paper, the historical background of the collection and the collection process is described; the demographic composition of the collection, and a description of the documentary and supporting data are presented; and the quality and of these data are assessed. The Terry Collection consists of 1,728 individuals. Age at death ranges from 14-102 years, with the majority of the individuals ranging from 20-80 years. Year of birth ranges from 1828-1943; the mean year of birth for males is 1880, and for females it is 1884. The mean age at death for males is 53 years, and for females it is 58 years. Terry's strict protocols for the processing of cadavers and the recording of documentary data make the Terry Collection a valuable resource for anthropological and medical research.

Composition of the Kirsten Skeletal Collection at Stellenbosch University

“…The skeletal profile in general, despite differences in the age and sex composition of three population groups, reflects predominantly the profile of the Western Cape population. The Kirsten Skeletal Collection is unique compared to other known skeletal collections in South Africa 1,[3][4][5] in that the majority of the individuals are from the heterogeneous South African coloured population. …”

“…Current research using human skeletal collections includes developing new techniques to test and standardise regional-specific data regarding osteometric measurements and physical observations. [1][2][3][4][5] These reference points provide practical information for the estimation of biological profiles of unknown skeletons 6 in both forensic anthropology and bioarchaeology, including estimation of age, sex and stature. Detailed descriptions of skeletal remains of known populations are used to confirm or contradict archaeological and social theories for past and present communities.…”

Going south of the river: A multidisciplinary analysis of ancestry, mobility and diet in a population from Roman Southwark, London

“…We recognise that this is a subjective approach (amongst others, Brace, 1995) and that many of the individuals used to generate these methods derive from modern populations outside of the territories that formed the Roman Empire (e.g., the Terry Collection (Hunt and Albanese, 2005)). The method development was particularly lacking in north African and southern Mediterranean populations, whose DNA shows a greater degree of genetic diversity compared to sub-Saharan and more northern ones (Botigué, et al, 2013, Skorecki andBehar, 2013).…”

“Resurrection Men” in Dallas: The Illegal Use of Black Bodies as Medical Cadavers (1900–1907)

“…One of the most commonly used osteological collections is the Terry Collection, originally created by Dr. Robert J. Terry in Saint Louis, Missouri, in the early twentieth century. An invaluable resource, the Terry Collection is itself assembled from unclaimed bodies originally used as medical cadavers and later macerated and added to the osteological collections (Hunt and Albanese 2005). Data from the Terry Collection was used as a comparative for the Freedman's Cemetery analysis.…”