June 16


1821 

The Bloomingdale Asylum, previously known as the New York Lunatic Asylum, opened for patients.  In 1894, the Bloomingdale Asylum became the Westchester Division of New York State Hospital and moved to White Plains.

1824 

The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was founded in London.  It became the Royal Society in 1840 at the command of Queen Victoria.  The Society was an early embodiment of the movement for humane treatment of animals that continues to provoke controversy and procedural reforms in experimental psychology.

1863 

Friedrich Schumann was born.  Schumann's studies of part-whole relations in sensation and perception were forerunners of Gestalt psychology.

1906 

Hadley Cantril, Jr., was born.  Cantril's research interests included attitude scaling, public opinion, and the influences of social factors on perception.

1909 

Volume 1 of Edward B. Titchener's A Textbook of Psychology was published.

1926 

Congress created the National Institute of Social Science.

1933 

The organizing meeting of the Pennsylvania Association of Clinical Psychologists (PACP), forerunner of the  Pennsylvania Psychological Association, was held in Harrisburg.  The group elected acting president Thaddeus Bolton, of Temple University, and acting secretary Florentine Hackbusch, of the state's Bureau of Mental Hygiene.  The PACP approved its constitution at its founding meeting in Harrisburg on March 30, 1934.

1941 

The Education Ministry of the German Third Reich announced training and examination standards for certification as a psychologist.  Candidates were examined in the conscious and unconscious life of individual and community, developmental psychology, characterology, hereditary psychology, the psychology of expression, biomedical science, and philosophy and ideology.
1947 The first National Training Laboratory for Group Dynamics began at the Gould Academy in Bethel, Maine.  This 3-week summer session was the birthplace of the T-group, an experiential method of learning about interpersonal relations for enhanced group effectiveness.  The early versions were called basic skills training (BST) groups, later shortened to training (T) groups.
1976 The first National Conference on Education and Credentialing was held, sponsored jointly by the APA, the American Association of State Psychology Boards, and the National Register of Health Service Providers in Psychology.
1980 The Fourth District Court of Appeals ruled that two Blue Shield groups in Virginia were liable for antitrust violations for policies which denied psychologists direct payment for services.  Robert Resnick and the Virginia Academy of Clinical Psychologists were the successful plaintiffs.  The U.S. Supreme Court (February 23, 1981) declined to review the decision and The Blues "paid $405,651."
1991 The first annual meeting of the American Association of Applied and Preventive Psychology (AAAPP) was held in Washington, DC, during the American Psychological Society convention.  George W. Albee was the first president of the AAAPP.