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Norman Cameron died in New Haven August 4, 1975 at age 79. Born in Canada of Scottish ancestry, he lived as a child in London and New York City. Due to poverty, he dropped out of high school.
The last time I saw Norman was in New Haven in 1974, two years after the sudden death of his wife, Eugenia, aboard ship on their way to London. They were married for over 50 years. Norman was devastated by her death. Jean, as she was known, had taken loving care of the routine and daily chores of life for them both. Originally a zoologist, she became a child psychiatrist. Norman remained bereft until his own death, with only occasional respites from his depression.
Norman and Jean had retired to a home in Tucson, Arizona, where they renewed an old Wisconsin friendship with the Henry Brosins, also retired. Following Jean's death, he returned unhappy to Tucson. Finding he could not bear it there without Jean, he re-established his home in New Haven in 1973, living there by himself until he died.
I was a student of Norman's in his first Introductory Psychology course at the University of Wisconsin in 1924. Unrivalled as a stimulating lecturer, and being a behaviorist, he easily impressed students with the belief that there was no such thing as consciousness, much less the unconscious. Due to his ability to inspire one to learn, I became his assistant, earning an M.A. in psychology, with a study of the effects of certain drugs on the maze learning and retention of rats. Clinical psychology did not exist then (Crowley 1978).
The enrollment in the Introductory Psychology course increased from the 200 required to take it to 1200, due to Norman's talents for lecturing. The chairman of the department was