New York: [circa 1955].
Price: $850.00
Unbound. Autograph keepsake. Two leaves removed from a notebook, joined at the crown, measuring approximately 6¾" x 8½" and with signatures on the first page only. Slight loss on the left edge during removal, vertical crease, near fine. Signed by 20 early members of the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, with an additional three signatures in another signer's hand.
An autograph keepsake from a "Society Supper" at May Yee's in New York City, the society almost certainly being the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, founded in 1949. (In addition to several prominent hypnotherapists being present, four of the society's first five presidents were at table.) Notable signers include Albert Ellis, developer of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy and a major figure in 20th Century psychology, and pioneering hypnotherapists Edith Klemperer and Milton V. Kline. Another signature of note is that of Felix Spector. As reported in the *BMJ* (the weekly peer-reviewed medical trade journal published by the British Medical Association), about this time Spector began to perform orchiectomies, at first largely for men who didn’t have the money to travel to Stockholm for full gender reassignment but wanted to begin the process. In the age of the internet, he would become well-known in certain circles for performing the same procedure for men desiring to become "voluntary eunuchs."
The other signers, notable in their own right, several having authored books or articles on hypnotherapy or related topics, are: Henry Guze, Vivian Guze, Michael Green, H. G. Beigel, Ruth Doorbar, Samuel Glasner, Sam Saltzer, Rosemary Eultzer [?], Henry S. Tugender, Bernard Raginsky, J[acob]. H. Conn, Jean Bordeaux, Bernard Gorton, Harold and Edith Rosen, G. W. Williams, Jm [Jerome] and Sor [Shirley] Schneck, and (in Vivian Guze's hand) Nathan Israeli, Frieda Kaufman, and Dorothy Kline.
An excellent collection of signatures of notable 20th Century psychologists, many with a close connection to the hypnotherapy movement.
Item #462933
