Death of Charles W. Tidd, M.D.

DEAR SIR,

Many of your readers will wish to be informed that Dr Tidd died on 7 November 1983 at the age of 80. He had been a member of the International Psychoanalytical Association since 1938 and, with Simmel, Fenichel, Deri, Greenson and others, formed the Los Angeles Psychoanalytic Study Group. He became a charter member of the Los Angeles Psychoanalytic Society and Institute in 1946. The International Journal of Psycho-Analysis published his papers, 'Psycho-analysis and ethology' and 'The use of psycho-analytic concepts in medical education, ' in the July/October issue of 1960.

Orphaned in early adolescence, Dr Tidd worked in Colorado gold mines at 14 and then as press feeder in color printing establishments in St. Louis, Chicago, Seattle and San Diego where he turned 18 and joined the U.S. Navy. Later, he attended San Diego State College, Northwestern University and the Northwestern University Medical School.

As a junior medical student, Tidd joined Robert P. Knight in forming an off-campus group that met with Dr N. Lionel Blitzsten—the first psychoanalyst West of New York. After two years, Tidd and Knight moved on to their internships and then to residencies at what is now the Menninger Foundation. Dr Tidd completed his psychoanalytic training by commuting to the Chicago Institute, and then relocated in Los Angeles.

In his early youth, Dr Tidd developed a profound love of music and literature; and the desire to teach. He applied for a university appointment as early as 1938, but was refused because of his psychoanalytic affiliations. In 1953, however, he became a full-time professor of psychiatry at the University of California at Los Angeles. He was soon known for his interdepartmental seminars in applied psychoanalysis as well as for introducing literature into his teaching of psychiatry. He served as consultant to movie directors having films involving symbolism or other psychodynamic themes.

Dr Tidd studied the Aesculapian cult of Hellenistic Greece