Isabelle Kendig

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Isabelle Kendig was a prominent clinical psychologist in the mid-20th century United States. She was best known as Head Psychologist at St. Elizabeths Hospital in Washington DC.[1] In that role she was part of a cohort of senior clinicians that helped guide the expansion of clinical psychology in the post-WWII era.[2] She also qualified as a member of the second generation of women psychologists in the U.S.[3]

Less well known than Kendig's clinical career are the two other careers that preceded her doctoral studies and PhD. She began as a eugenic field worker in 1912, investigating alleged hereditary defects in the Pratt family of Shutesbury Massachusetts.[4][5] This was followed by living in Washington DC, working as a campaigner for Women's Rights, Anti-Militarism, and Socialism.[6][1]

In all these careers and her personal life, Kendig was an outspoken feminist who exemplified the struggle for a career and personal life free of patriarchal constraints.[7][8]

Education[]

Isabelle Kendig was educated at St. Xavier’s Academy in Chicago, a Catholic school. After high school, she attended Cook County Normal School, a teachers college known for its progressive philosophy and connections to Chicago’s poor and immigrant populations. Next, she became an elementary school teacher in the Chicago public schools. She then attended Oberlin College, graduating Phi Beta Kappa.[1] Later, she obtained a M.A. and PhD at Radcliffe College. She studied and conducted research at the Harvard Psychological Clinic under its director Henry Murray, who became a lifelong friend. As Murray's biographer described, she was a prominent member of a group of researchers that included future leaders of the field of clinical and personality psychology, including Saul Rosenzweig, Robert W. White, and Erik Erikson.[9]

Work[]

Kendig began as a eugenic field worker, trained at the Eugenics Record Office in Long Island. Field work in eugenics was a popular job for young people, particularly women, who wanted to improve society by investigating the connection between heredity and social problems.[10][11] Skeptical of the assumptions of hard-line eugenicists, Kendig produced data that contradicted their basic beliefs. When she presented her research to Charles Davenport and other social scientists concerned with social defect, Kendig was shunned by Davenport, who, in turn, falsified her findings to fit his beliefs.[12] She gave up her role as researcher and became an executive secretary for a state-wide social service agency in Massachusetts, advocating for a new institution for people with intellectually disabilities (then known as the feebleminded).[13]

She was then an activist in socialist, feminist, and anti-militarist organizations in Washington DC.[6][1][14] In the National Women’s Party, Kendig was a field organizer and its Legislative and Organizational Secretary.[15] She lobbied and helped organize local groups in the South and created equal rights publicity material for a national audience.[16] She also created the NWP’s Councils for various professions and its Homemakers’ Council—a forum in which policies on marriage and family could be created.[17]

After leaving the Women's Party, Kendig gained national recognition as a founder and Executive Secretary of the Women’s Committee for Political Action. This national organization of socialists, feminists, and anti-militarists was founded to make sure women’s interests were represented in preparations for the election of 1924. A goal of the WCPA was to create a strong female presence within a larger group: the Conference on Progressive Political Action (CPPA), which launched the Presidential campaign for Robert (“Fighting Bob”) La Follette.[18]

Kendig also worked for the anti-militarist National Council for the Prevention of War as a researcher and author. Among her projects was a survey and critique of the portrayal of war in history textbooks, which activists could use to argue for less militaristic schools [19] Kendig also served as the ACLU's Washington Representative and organized a campaign to oppose a bill for the registration and deportation of aliens, testifying before the relevant Congressional committee.

Her final career was as a clinical psychologist, and she rose to the rank of Head of Psychology at St. Elizabeths Hospital in Washington DC. She made history there by giving projective tests to the hospital's most famous patient, the poet Ezra Pound.[20] She also taught at George Washington University Medical School and Catholic University.[21] In the 1940s, Kendig published widely on assessment and psychopathology and completed a book on intellectual deterioration in schizophrenia that had been begun by William Alanson White, former superintendent at St. Elizabeths. After WWII she helped lead the field of clinical psychology, locally and nationally, as it expanded its scientific and social influence [22][2]

Kendig c. 1955.jpg

Family[]

In 1915, Kendig married Howard Gill, who became a prominent criminologist.[23] A year before they married, Kendig and Gill began planning how they could each have a career, a home life, and children.[5] Later, Kendig offered advice on how women could maintain some financial independence in their marriage.[24] They had four children.[1]

References[]

  1. ^ a b c d e Dr. Isabelle Kendig, 84, Dies, Active in ACLU. Washington Post. September 25, 1974, p. C10.
  2. ^ a b Baker, D. B., & Benjamin, L. T., Jr. (2005). Creating a Profession: The National Institute of Mental Health and the Training of Psychologists, 1946-1954. In W. E. Pickren Jr. & S. F. Schneider (Eds.), Psychology and the National Institute of Mental Health: A historical analysis of science, practice, and policy. (pp. 181–207). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
  3. ^ Johnston, E., & Johnson, A. (2008). Searching for the second generation of American women psychologists. History of Psychology, 11(1), 40–72. https://doi.org/10.1037/1093-4510.11.1.40
  4. ^ Savo, W. (2002, December). The master race. Boston Magazine, pp. 127-131; 167–170.
  5. ^ a b Harris, B. (2021). Eugenics, Social Reform, and Psychology: The Careers of Isabelle Kendig. History of Psychology, 24, 350-376.
  6. ^ a b Kendig, I. (1924). Women in the progressive movement. The Nation, Nov. 29, p. 544.
  7. ^ Josefek, K. A. (1970, August 26). Suffragette says women have long way to go. New Bedford Standard-Times.
  8. ^ Goodman, Ellen. (1970, July 19). Women with a goal: end name-dropping. Boston Globe, p. A-8.
  9. ^ Robinson, F. G. (1992). Love's story told: A life of Henry Murray. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  10. ^ Rafter, N. (1988). White trash: The eugenic family studies, 1877–1919. Northeastern University Press.
  11. ^ Bix, A. S. (1997). Experiences and voices of eugenics field workers: ‘Women's work' in biology. Social Studies of Science, 27(4), 625–668. https://doi.org/10.1177/030631297027004003
  12. ^ Harris, B. (2021). Eugenics, Social Reform, and Psychology: The Careers of Isabelle Kendig. History of Psychology, 24, 350-376.
  13. ^ Zenderland, L. (1998). Measuring minds : Henry Herbert Goddard and the origins of American intelligence testing . Cambridge University Press.
  14. ^ Berger, M. S. & Swanson, K. (2001). A Milwaukee woman's life on the left: The autobiography of Meta Berger. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin.
  15. ^ Paul, Alice (1975). Interview by Amelia R. Fry. University of California, Suffragists Oral History Project.
  16. ^ Swain, M. H. (1984). Organized women in Mississippi: The clash over legal disabilities in the 1920s. Southern Studies: Interdisciplinary Journal of the South, 23(1), 91–102.
  17. ^ Haskin, F. J. (1922, December 26). Adjusting family finances. Grand Forks Herald.
  18. ^ Cott, N. (1988). The grounding of modern feminism. Yale University Press.
  19. ^ Kendig-Gill, I. (1924). War and peace in United States history textbooks. National Council for Prevention of War.
  20. ^ Gillman, R. D. (1994). Ezra Pound's Rorschach diagnosis. Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, 58, 307-322.
  21. ^ "Kendig, Isabelle V. - Social Networks and Archival Context". snaccooperative.org. Retrieved 2021-10-31.
  22. ^ Taylor, J. A., & Stirling, E. C. (1993). The District of Columbia Psychological Association. In J. L. Pate & M. Wertheimer (Eds.), No small part: A history of regional organizations in American psychology (p. 171–188). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
  23. ^ Johnsen, T. C. (September/October 1999). Howard Belding Gill (pp. 54–55). Harvard Magazine.
  24. ^ Haskin, F. J. (December 26, 1922). Adjusting family finances. Grand Forks Herald.
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