Time Capsule

1774

On July 28, Franz Mesmer performed his first supposed cure using 'animal magnetism' on patient Fräulein Osterlin, who had 15 'hysteric' symptoms.

Mesmer believed the whole universe was pervaded with a natural force he called animal magnetism, which, when unevenly distributed in one?s body, caused mental disorders. He claimed he had the power to redistribute the magnetism and thus cure mental health conditions such as numbness, paralysis, nausea, convulsions and occasionally, blindness, muteness and deafness.

No physical cause for these disorders could be found, and because most of the sufferers were women, the condition was called 'hysteria.'

Mesner?s claims about animal magnetism proved false when a royal commission, appointed by Louis XVI and headed by Benjamin Franklin, showed that his effects could be caused by suggestion alone.

1843

Camillo Golgi was born on July 7. Golgi was a neurologist who first identified axons and dendrites and their functions. He also identified the sense receptors of muscular sensations. He won the Nobel Prize in 1906.

1899

On July 1, the Illinois legislature responded to the urging of women?s groups and passed the first state law establishing separate courts and detention facilities for juveniles.

1918

In a July 18 telegram to the U.S. Army chief of staff, Gen. John J. Pershing, recommended mental testing of soldiers before overseas duty. Pershing wrote, 'prevalence of mental disorders in replacement troops recently received suggests urgent importance of intensive effort in eliminating mentally unfit.' The telegram was a turning point in military psychology.

1930

Sigmund Freud?s book 'Civilization and Its Discontents' was published in the United States on July 16.

1941

On July 15, psychologist John C. Flanagan was commissioned in the U.S. Army Air Force with the rank of major. He immediately became director of the Aviation Psychology Program, which was primarily responsible for selection, classification and training of Air Force personnel in World War II.

1976

The California Supreme Court, ruling in Tarasoff v. Regents of the University of California, decided on July 1 that when a psychotherapist knows of a client?s threat of harm to another person, 'he incurs an obligation to use reasonable care to protect the intended victim against such danger.' This court decision significantly altered the nature of the therapist-client relationship.

1979

Because of 'sunset' legislation, Florida and South Dakota allowed their psychologist licensure laws to expire on July 1. In Florida, hundreds of new applications for licenses were received by county offices?many from people with no credentials. One psychologist licensed himself, his wife, four sons and a hamster.

1983

In its decision of People v. Kirk L. Hughes on July 5, the New York Court of Appeals held that testimony obtained through hypnosis was invalid.

Source: APA Historical Database, created and maintained by Warren R. Street, Central Washington University, and published as 'A Chronology of Noteworthy Events in American Psychology' (APA, 1994).