posted on Mar, 10 2004 @ 09:21 PM
OH MY!!! I think I found some more Blue people for you
check this out!!!
www.straightdope.com...
The blue Fugates weren't a race but rather an excessively tight-knit family living in the Appalachian Mountains. The patriarch of the clan was Martin
Fugate, who settled along the banks of Troublesome Creek near Hazard, Kentucky, sometime after 1800. His wife, Mary, is thought to have been a carrier
for a rare disease known as hereditary methemoglobinemia, which we'll call met-H.
Due to an enzyme deficiency, the blood of met-H victims has reduced oxygen-carrying capacity. Instead of being the usual bright red, arterial blood is
chocolate brown and gives the skin of Caucasians a bluish cast. Hereditary met-H is caused by a recessive gene. If only one of your parents has this
gene, you'll be normal, but if they both have it, there's a good chance you'll be blue.
None of Martin and Mary Fugate's descendants would have been blue had they not intermarried with a nearby clan, the Smiths. The Smiths were
descendants of Richard Smith and Alicia Combs, one of whom apparently was also a met-H carrier. According to family historian Mary Fugate, the first
known blue Fugate was born in 1832. Because of inbreeding among the isolated hill folk--the Fugate family tree is a tangled mess of cousins marrying
cousins--blue people started popping up frequently thereafter. A half dozen or so were on the scene by the 1890s, and one case was reported as
recently as 1975. They were quite a sight. One woman is said to have had lips the color of a bruise.
[Edited on 3-10-2004 by worldwatcher]