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Breast and pubic hair development is occurring much earlier than that described in currently accepted standards, particularly in African-American girls, according to a 1997 study of more than 17,000 girls (aged 3 to 12) from suburban U.S. pediatric practices (see Pediatrics 1997; 99:505). Current standards are based on relatively old studies that used small, nondiverse samples, including Marshall and Tanner's 1969 study of 192 white girls from a British orphanage. The American girls in the 1997 study reached Tanner 2 breast development at the mean ages of 9.96 (white girls) and 8.87 years (African-American girls), approximately 1 and 2 years earlier than accepted standards. These findings led the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society (…