Papers of Gardner Murphy

Abstract: Much of the material found in Dr. Gardner Murphy's papers regards his time with the Menninger Foundation and its Research Department, though other topics regarding his personal relationships with professional colleagues; work he did while at the City College of New York before coming to Kansas and in other capacities; and his ongoing interests in parapsychology are also well-represented. There is extensive correspondence between Dr. Murphy and others, and there is a great deal of information regarding the Menninger Foundation Research Department's administration and individual research projects, including RT (reality testing), PLP (perceptual learning project), value conflict and other social research projects, and numerous other miscellaneous projects. There is also information regarding Dr. Murphy's publishing efforts and some of his interactions with both the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues and the American Psychological Association, as well as some material from his wife Lois Murphy, particularly after Gardner's death. While Dr. Gardner's papers have been divided into different series, much of the material overlaps, and researchers may need to search several boxes and series to find all documents related to a topic.

Biog. Sketch (Full): Gardner Murphy was born 8 July 1895 in Chillicothe, Ohio. He earned his bachelors from Yale University in 1916, his masters from Harvard University in 1917, and his doctorate from Columbia University of New York in 1923. During World War I, Murphy served with the Yale Mobile Hospital Unit as a private first class in the American Expeditionary Force. During World War II he served as a consultant with the Department of Agriculture in Washington, D.C. and in 1950 he was a UNESCO consultant with the Ministry of Education in New Delhi, India.

Gardner Murphy married Lois Barclay in 1926, with whom he had two children, Alpen and Margaret Murphy Small.

Murphy earned the Hodgson Fellowship in Psychical Research from Harvard twice, and his academic focuses while earning his degrees concentrated in telepathy and parapsychology. He performed multiple experiments with French psychical experiment Rene Warcollier.

Dr. Murphy was an assistant professor of psychology with Columbia from 1929-1940. From 1940-1952 he was professor of psychology with the City College of New York, New York. In 1952 he moved his family including wife and fellow researcher Dr. Lois Murphy to Topeka, Kansas and took over as director of the Menninger Foundation's Research Department. He remained in this position until 1964, briefly became an emeritus foundation chair, and then took over again as director when his replacement, Robert Wallerstein, left. Murphy retired around 1970 when his health was seriously beginning to decline, and he and Lois moved to Washington, D.C.

Murphy held numerous leadership positions in various professional associations and other organizations, including serving as chairman of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI) from 1937-1938, president of the Society for Psychical Research in London from 1949-1950, and president of the Eastern Psychological Association (1941-1942), American Psychological Association (1943-1944), and the Southwestern Psychological Association (1954). He was also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for Advancement of Science, the Kansas Psychological Association, the New York Academy of Science, and Sigma Xi.

Gardner Murphy died on 18 March 1979.