When barely twenty years old itself, the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research took on the difficult task of sponsoring the development of a new psychoanalytic institute at Emory University in Atlanta. Bernard Holland, a Columbia Psychoanalytic graduate, had been chosen to head a new department of psychiatry at Emory, and in his ambitious five-year development plan was included a psychoanalytic institute. In 1964 an agreement was signed between Columbia and Emory, missing the five-year goal by just a year, and the first class was enrolled in 1965. George Goldman and Henriette Klein, with the support of Larry Kolb, carried the responsibility for the program during the first several years, including semiannual meetings with committees of The American, which at that time were suspicious of any Columbia project. Several Columbia graduates followed Holland to Atlanta, and three of them—Lee Hall, Richard Ward, and Downing Tait—were appointed training analysts along with Holland himself. Hall became director of the fledgling institute.
In those early days, Columbia faculty traveled to Atlanta on weekends to share teaching and supervision responsibilities with the Emory faculty, and the first two groups of candidates (the classes of 1965 and 1967) did not have to travel to New York at all. Willard Gaylin, Arnold Cooper, Aaron Karush, Lionel Ovesey, Samuel Feder, Dan Shapiro, George Papanek, and Sanford Stevens did the traveling and the bulk of the teaching. Somewhat later, candidates in the classes begun in 1970, 1973, and 1976 commuted to New York for some of their instruction and supervision. Robert Michels, Milton Viederman, and Helen Meyers eventually joined the weekend traveling faculty, and AI Polatin became head of the Emory Committee at Columbia. Another Columbia graduate, Jerry Weiner, joined the Emory faculty and became a training analyst, but he left in 1974 for an administrative position in another medical school.
As are all new training facilities, the Columbia-Emory project was monitored by committees of The American, and in 1978 a site visit was held in Atlanta. At that point it was recommended that no new classes begin until improvement was made in certain problem areas. This led to a thorough redesign of the program by Columbia, with Donald Meyers assuming the administrative responsibility at Columbia. There was no interruption for the candidates in training at the time, and eventually nineteen graduated in the first five classes. New classes, however, were put on hold until additional training analysts could be
recruited. Of the five training analysts in 1978, two declined to be reevaluated and two were approaching retirement age, leaving too few for a viable program. A period of time ensued during which there were no active candidates.
In 1979, the gradual rebuilding began. Burness Moore relocated to Atlanta, and he and Ralph Roughton, a graduate of the Columbia-Emory program, were appointed training analysts. Columbia's new director, Ethel Person, provided strong support, encouraging Meyers and the Emory faculty to persevere. Over the next few years, four more training analysts were appointed: Hugo Zee and Ramón Ganzarain from Topeka, Larry Inderbitzen from Baltimore-Washington, and Jack Hawkins from Columbia-Emory. In 1985 a comprehensive new plan was approved by Columbia and The American.
A class of seven candidates was quickly selected, and the second phase of psychoanalytic education in Atlanta began in the fall of 1986. In addition to the newly appointed training analysts, there was also now a cadre of enthusiastic and capable teachers and other potential training analysts among the nineteen graduates. Columbia still provided supervision of the program and some teaching support, but with the demonstrated strengths of the faculty and the training and supervising analysts, it was decided that candidates would not have to travel to New York. With growing experience, the Emory faculty assumed more and more responsibility, both for teaching and for committee and administrative work, while the Columbia faculty began to function as consultant to an increasingly autonomous faculty at Emory. Another Columbia-Emory graduate, Steve Levy, was approved as a training analyst in 1989.
With the rapid growth and maturation of the faculty, The American scheduled a site visit for the fall of 1989, subsequent to which the Emory University Psychoanalytic Institute was granted provisional status. In 1991, following a second comprehensive site visit, Emory was approved for full independent status.
The program continues to prosper. A class of five candidates began in 1990, and another seven candidates began in 1993. There have been four graduates from the 1986 class. Three additional training analysts have been appointed: Peery Grant (Columbia-Emory), Beth Seelig (Columbia), and Sybil Ginsburg (NYU). Several other analysts have moved recently to Atlanta, and they augment what has become a very strong analytic presence in the Emory department of psychiatry and in the Atlanta community. With a few exceptions, the analysts in Atlanta were either trained there in the Columbia-Emory program or moved there to be part of the new institute. Those who have moved there represent eight other training institutes, thus lending an eclectic flavor to the Columbia influence. For its size, the Emory faculty (currently twenty-four members) is extraordinarily productive in scholarly and professional pursuits, having authored numerous articles appearing in periodicals and compilations. In addition, three faculty members have published books, five have recently been on the editorial boards of major journals, and two currently chair committees of The American.
The development of the Emory Institute was truly a group effort, one that involved numerous other faculty members who taught classes and supervised in New York, who served on committees, and who made occasional trips to Atlanta to teach. For their work during the renewed developmental phase, Ethel Person and Don and Helen Meyers deserve much of the credit for nurturing the program through the final years of a long gestation. The many hours of extra work have paid off, and Columbia can be proud of what it spawned during its own still-formative years.