Development
Gonads start developing as a common anlage (an organ in the earliest stage of development), in the form of gonadal ridges, and only later are differentiated to male or female sex organs. The presence of the SRY gene, located on the Y chromosome and encoding the testis determining factor, determines male sexual differentiation. In the absence of the SRY gene from the Y chromosome, the female sex (ovaries instead of testis) will develop. The development of gonads is a part of the development of the urinary and reproductive organs.
Read more about this topic: Human Gonad
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“This was the Eastham famous of late years for its camp- meetings, held in a grove near by, to which thousands flock from all parts of the Bay. We conjectured that the reason for the perhaps unusual, if not unhealthful development of the religious sentiment here, was the fact that a large portion of the population are women whose husbands and sons are either abroad on the sea, or else drowned, and there is nobody but they and the ministers left behind.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)