PSYCHOLOGY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN: VOLUME II BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF FACULTY MEMBERS SERVING ON THE STAFF DURING THE YEARS 1897-1945 ALFRED C. RAPHELSON UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN FLINT COLLEGE 1968 i PREFACE During the collection of the material for this history, we became acquainted with a great many biographical details concerning the men who served on the Department of Psychology staff at Michigan. These details gradually pieced together what for us were the very human and personal dimensions of the picture that was “Psychology at Michigan.” There was some difficulty, however, in deciding the best way to present these portraits. Although we desired to make available what had been learned about these personalities, we did not wish to interrupt the flow of the historic narrative to such an extent that the reader would lose sight of the course of development that psychology had taken at Michigan. It was decided, therefore, to present the history in two parts. The first section, which composes Volume One, includes a description of departmental activities as they developed through the years. Only those biographical details that were considered necessary to convey the setting for the psychological activities were included. The biographical sketches are presented in the second section, which makes up this volume. These portraits are an ancillary companion to the narrative but one, it is hoped, that can be read and enjoyed quite independently of the first part. With three exceptions, the sections that follow have been pieced together from details obtained from the interviews and records which have made up the data for this study. The three exceptions are reprints of previously published accounts of Professor Pillsbury’s life. It seemed appropriate to include them in this collection. Alfred C. Raphelson Flint, Michigan July, 1968 TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE ....................................................................................................................................... i 1. Walter Bowers Pillsbury........................................................................................................... 1 2. Walter B. Pillsbury (autobiography) ..................................................................................... 12 3. Walter B. Pillsbury (by Karl M. Dallenbach)....................................................................... 31 4. Walter B. Pillsbury, A Biographical Memoir by Walter R. Miles...................................... 37 5. John Frederick Shepard ......................................................................................................... 46 6. Henry Foster Adams ............................................................................................................... 57 7. Sven Froeberg .......................................................................................................................... 61 8. Charles Hurlbut Griffitts........................................................................................................ 62 9. Carl R. Brown.......................................................................................................................... 65 10. Forrest Lee Dimmick ............................................................................................................ 70 11. Adelbert Ford ........................................................................................................................ 71 12. John Duncan Finlayson......................................................................................................... 73 13. Martha Guernsey Colby ....................................................................................................... 75 14. Theodore C. Schneirla........................................................................................................... 78 15. Norman Raymond Frederick Maier.................................................................................... 79 16. Edward Barrows Greene ...................................................................................................... 82 17. Burton Doan Thuma ............................................................................................................. 85 1 CHAPTER ONE Walter Bowers Pillsbury1 (1872-1960) I When Walter Pillsbury died in 1960, older psychologists were surprised to learn that younger men on their staffs had never heard of him. For in the early days of American psychology, he was numbered among the great. He was born in Burlington, Iowa on July 21, 1872 and lived there for thirteen years before his family moved to Fullerton, Nebraska. After completing public school, Pillsbury attended the local Penn College for two years and then transferred to the University of Nebraska. At Nebraska, he came under the influence of psychologist H. K. Wolfe. Wolfe had been to Leipzig where he was the second American to earn his doctorate under Wundt. He appears to have been an inspiring teacher who not only offered stimulating instruction, but also exerted a great personal effect on his students by general availability for conversation on all subjects. Wolfe’s total involvement in teaching (psychology, philosophy, and education) and with his students left him little time for research and publication. Hence he is not well-known in the history of psychology. His major influence remained a personal one. After graduation, Pillsbury accepted a position teaching mathematics and English at Grand Island College (Nebraska). A year later, he accepted a scholarship to Cornell University to study psychology. In September 1893, Pillsbury became Edward B. Titchener’s second graduate student being preceded the year before by Margaret F. Washburn. Titchener, Pillsbury found, was quite unlike Wolfe. The “experiment” was the keynote in all his teaching. He devoted most of his time to advanced courses and directed all the research. Titchener held aristocratic opinions on most subjects which contrasted sharply with Wolfe’s extremely democratic views. Titchener believed in publication as the sole end of a scholar’s endeavor. He once said that the only certain immortality was the immortality of the printed page. Pillsbury was greatly taken by his new professor’s attitudes. Perhaps his temperament was one that precluded the democratic, personal level of involvement that characterized Wolfe’s relationship with people and made it easy for Pillsbury to accept Titchener’s value for the printed page. Even twenty-five years after Pillsbury left Cornell, his old professor was “reinforcing” the lesson as the following letter from Titchener to Pillsbury illustrates: . .I see no harm in keeping the Attention on the market. It is either that, you see, with a note saying that you have not been able to do more than revise – or else it is fancy second hand prices for student who can get good out of the book. My feeling is that an author is not bound to spend on revisions time that he 1 The details of Professor Pillsbury’s life have been well document in his own autobiographical sketch, as well as the two obituaries written by Karl Dallenbach and Walter R. Miles. These three essays have been reprinted in this volume and will be found immediately following this article. Here we shall primarily be concerned with additional aspects of Professor Pillsbury’s life which emerged in the course of this study of the departmental history. Psychology at the University of Michigan: Volume II, Biographical Sketches 2 can better use, but that he should see to it that his books (with the note aforesaid) are so far as possible available. Bradley once complained bitterly and venomously to me that Stechart had photographed his out-of-print works. I told him in reply that he was to blame. Professors held seminars and students had to have the books; if he didn’t want to revise he should at any rate keep the books on sale with the statement or caution that they are not revised and did not fully represent his current views. He came around. .2 For his doctoral research Pillsbury determined how images from printed pages in association with memory become words during a reading exercise. The theoretical discussion of these results became the basis of his classification of the conditions of attention which he later published in a book under the title Attention (1906). In his second year, Pillsbury worked on the English translation of Oswald Kulpe’s Introduction to Philosophy, which was later published in collaboration with Titchener. He spent a third year at Cornell as a laboratory assistant doing some teaching and studying subjects related to psychology. In 1897 both the translation and the dissertation were published. These two events in addition to the fact that he was the second doctoral student turned out by Titchener, who represented the Wundtion tradition transplanted in America, contributed greatly to Pillsbury’s reputation as a rising young scholar. Several offers of an instructorship came his way including an offer to remain at Cornell. He chose Michigan and it proved to be a life-time assignment. II Professor Pillsbury was a rather reserved individual who held himself aloof from both colleagues and students. To those who knew him he appeared friendly and cordial. The difficulty was that it was extremely hard to break through his reserve. It is clear that these personal characteristics were not brought about by later illness or by old age. One of his earliest assistants was J. E. Wallace Wallin who came to Michigan in 1902 desiring