Contains the personal and professional papers of Irving Alexander, a clinical psychologist and professor in Duke University's Department of Psychology and Neuroscience. Types of materials include reading lists, notes, lectures, outlines, clippings, articles, slides, photographs, negatives, slides, programs, correspondence, dream journals, agendas, schedules, membership lists, speeches, meeting minutes, and grant proposals. Materials range in date from 1940 to 2006.
Irving Emanuel Alexander was born in 1922 on the Lower East Side of Manhattan to Al Alexander and Mary Nisenson. In 1940, Alexander began attending the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. During WWII, he served in the Army Air Corps as a bombardier, completing 35 missions over Germany before being discharged in March 1945 with the rank of second lieutenant.
After completing his interrupted undergraduate education at Tuscaloosa, he obtained a master's degree in experimental psychology. In 1947, he began graduate studies in psychology at Princeton University, and, by 1949, had completed both a second masters and a PhD. His dissertation, about the relationship between tonal stimulation and hearing loss, led in part to the now-standard requirement for airfield work personnel to wear protective ear-gear.
Alexander became an associate professor at Princeton and spent part of his first sabbatical from 1955 to 1956 at the Jung Institute in Zurich, Switzerland. In 1958, he began an administrative position at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland, and, in 1962, was offered a professorship in Duke University's Department of Psychology and Neuroscience and worked as a clinical psychologist.
During his 45 years at Duke, Alexander served as department chair, participated on the Academic Council, trained clinicians, and worked as a consulting psychologist at the Durham VA Hospital and in the Halifax County school system. Alexander worked as a visiting professor at Harvard (1966-1967), and Hebrew University in Jerusalem (1971, 1977-1978), and Tel Aviv University (1973).
Alexander was a member of the American Psychological Association, chairman of the Presidential Scholars Selection Committee during the Clinton administration, and a co-founder of the Society for Personology, which honored him with a lifetime achievement award in 2003.
In 1955, while Alexander was president of the organization, the American Association for Gifted Children (AAGC) received the Jimmy Carter Award for Outstanding Contribution by an Association.
He married Miriam Pearl Fisher in 1944, and they had two children. Alexander died on January 3, 2007.
