Boy-Man

At Toledo, Clarence Kehr Jr., 6, standing 4 ft. I in., weighing 87 lb., was barred from both public and Catholic schools because he has a bass voice, smokes, has to shave, is as strong as a grown man. He can lift persons bulking 250 lb., 200-lb. dumbbells, can push without strain a lawn roller, or an automobile filled with passengers. Prime stunt: lifting Jack Dempsey when Dempsey scaled 202 lb. Born normal, Clarence Jr. continued so until 9 mos. old. Between 9 mos. and 3 1/2 years he grew ten years physically in all things except height. When 4 1/2 he was physically 14 1/2, at 6 he is 16. He has no use for girls his own age, prefers them 16 or older.

Doctors attribute his precocity to some defect in his pineal gland. This ductless gland, apparently the rudiment of a third eye,* lies in among the interior folds of the brain. Its functions are not well understood. One thing it certainly does is to inhibit sexual development of chilrendren. Because all the ductless glands of the body delicately control and balance one another's forces, when one acts abnormally as in Clarence Kehr's case, or in Harold Arnold's case (see col. 2), it incites a physiological riot. Clarence Kehr's parents plan to appeal to Ohio's State Board of Education. Meanwhile he is being tutored privately. ^

*In some lizards and other reptiles and in the larva of the lamprey, the pineal gland is on a stalk (like a crayfish's eyes) and is near the top of the head. Here it has a distinguishable retina and lens. French Philosopher Rene Descartes (1596-1650) believed: "There is a small gland [the pineal] in the brain in which the soul exercises its functions more particularly than in the other parts." Contemporaries agreed.

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