Southerners Aren’t Lazy and Dumb, They Just Had Hookworm

Stuff You Should Know

• Episode: Southerners Aren’t Lazy and Dumb, They Just Had Hookworm
• Website: Stuff You Should Know
• Feed URL: http://www.howstuffworks.com/podcasts/stuff-you-should-know.rss
• Duration: 00:51:35
• Published: 2017-03-16 08:00

There was a time when the lower classes of the American South were considered lazy and dimwitted, a stereotype that still somewhat survives today. But this stereotype was rooted in fact. Hookworms, it turns out, were sapping Southerners’ life force.