The 1909 Conference
In 1909, Clark University President, educator, and noted psychologist G. Stanley Hall organized an international conference to celebrate the institution’s twentieth anniversary. The conference, which took place September 6th through September 19th, featured lectures, discussions, and demonstrations from prominent scientists and scholars across the physical, biological, and social sciences. Many of the invited speakers received honorary degrees, including Franz Boaz (who also taught at Clark from 1888-1892), Carl Jung, Ernest Rutherford, Albert A. Michelson (who taught at Clark 1889-1892), Vito Volterra, Percival Lowell, and E.H Moore. Additionally, a five-day Conference on Child Welfare took place two months earlier, from July 6th through the 10th, featuring representatives from twenty-seven types of child welfare organizations.
The legacy of the 1909 Conference extends far beyond its role in Clark’s early history. Sigmund Freud, founder of psychoanalysis, would make his first and only trip to America to speak at this conference. The five lectures he gave, collectively titled “The Origin and Development of Psychoanalysis” and subsequently known in print as “Five Lectures on Psychoanalysis”, mark the formal introduction of his theories to the United States. The honorary degree presented to him by Clark University was the only one of its kind Freud ever received.
Sigmund Freud was and remains a controversial figure. By 1909 his psychoanalytic theories had struggled to receive widespread enthusiasm or reception in Europe. Meanwhile, G. Stanley Hall was known to have been interested in Freud’s work as early as 1901. Clark University was well known to psychologists in Europe at this time, making Hall’s invitation to both Freud and Jung a somewhat provocative one both at home and abroad. In his diary, Freud would recollect stepping up to deliver his lectures, feeling that “psychoanalysis was no longer a product of delusion, it had become a valuable part of reality”. Freud’s Clark talks and their dissemination began a seismic shift in the field of modern psychology, a shift that would take on a life of its own, cementing Sigmund Freud as a predominant fixture in the cultural consciousness of 20th century America.
This collection is comprised of three series. Conference Materials contains any internal materials related to the event itself such as invitations, planning documents, programs, lectures, etc. The Freud/Hall series contains all correspondence between Sigmund Freud and G. Stanley Hall. This correspondence primarily took place in 1909 but began in 1908 and ended in 1923. Press and Retrospectives contains external materials, primarily scrapbooks containing comprehensive local and national press coverage from 1909.
The materials in this collection reflect the time period in which they were written. Some of these materials contain outdated, biased, and/or offensive ideas, perspectives, and terminology.
While these materials represent the bulk of the collection, we expect to add more in the coming months. (Written February 2025).
