Eugenics is based on subjective assessments of human worth around the goal of the “betterment of the race”—not the human race overall, but that of the “superior” race. Today, we often think of race in terms of skin color or religion. But eugenicists envisioned race much more broadly, spanning a complex social web that included ability, race, ethnicity, and religion as well as subjective judgements on behavior, morals, and values. Factors that might be overlooked in certain groups—such as lack of religious conformity, alcohol use, or academic difficulty—would be counted as a black mark against others.

Across the world, eugenicists targeted individuals, families, and communities who they saw as going against localized ideals of the “superior race.” In Vermont, eugenicists co-opted the local mythology of the “Vermonter” to advance the exclusion of certain people and the elimination of their bloodlines. Idealizing the Protestant British colonizers and rural life, eugenicists targeted those they saw as “outsiders”—Native Americans such as the Abenaki, immigrants, African Americans, and Catholics—as well as the “old stock” themselves who did not live up to this ideal.

Celebration of culture, history, and tradition is not the issue at the heart of eugenics: Eugenicists took that celebration much further in an attempt to eliminate certain bloodlines they deemed unworthy of living.