Karl Pearson, 1857-1936

Abstract

Abstract Karl Pearson, who died suddenly on 27 April after working almost to the end, was the son of William Pearson, K.C., and of Yorkshire stock through both parents. “ From my father ”, he said, speaking at a dinner held in his honour in April, 1934, “ I inherited some fraction of his power for hard work. During the legal terms, winter and summer, he was up at 4 a.m. to read his briefs and prepare his speeches for Court. Home at 7 p.m., dinner followed and bed at 9 p.m. Only in the vacation did we really see him ; then he was shooting, fishing, sailing, with a like energy which astonished me even as an active boy. On my mother’s side I am also descended from Yorkshire folk, formerly termed the ‘mad’ Bethels, and from another Yorkshire family, the roaming Whartons. Put into me a combination of those characteristics—a capacity for hard work and a capacity for roving into other people’s preserves—and you have an explanation of my life. Its doings are not due to myself, but arise from the factors contributed to my make-up by my ancestry.” An explanation of his life? Hardly that, perhaps, but certainly an explanation of much.

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