The idea for this book belongs to William Kessen, distinguished developmentalist and historian of psychology in Yale’s Psychology Department from 1952 to 1997. One day in 1988, Bill took us to lunch hoping to convince us to look at the materials produced by the Yale Longitudinal Study and fashion some kind of book out of it. Bill had known everyone involved in the study and was instrumental in salvaging the mountain of documents it generated so it could be preserved by the Yale University Library. Of course, Bill’s persuasive devotion to the many stories hidden among these documents made us very curious. And as we began wading through the stories of Evelyn and the other children who were the study’s subject, we were hooked almost immediately, fascinated by what we read.
Neither of us is a historian of science “by day” and so we had to fit our visits to the archives around the edges of our professional lives. Bill’s shorthand description of the study was that it had “swallowed up its investigators by its massiveness.” Indeed, the thought of wading through all the process notes and the study’s scaffolding was daunting. More than once, we too believed we would suffer the same fate, echoing the investigators’ voices calling out from the hundreds upon hundreds of pages of their observations. But we pushed through, year after year, with many pauses along the way. Grant and book deadlines, the necessary but disruptive migration of more of the YLS papers from Al Solnit’s closet at the Yale Child Center to Manuscripts and Archives, and the daily demands of each of our jobs put the project on the back burner too many times. When Bill passed away in 1999 we recommitted ourselves to seeing this book to fruition. Now, with more than two decades in the rearview mirror, we take enormous satisfaction in completing it and savor the opportunity to acknowledge both Bill’s influence on each of us, and his desire for these materials to be shared more widely.
Many other debts accrued along the way. Donald Cohen, Albert Solnit, and William Sledge each intervened at various points to grant us access to the study during the long pauses between its acquisition and its processing by Manuscripts and Archives. Laura Baum, Nikki Hunter, Ivy Nally, and Margaret Sledge read and summarized sections of the process notes for us. John Modell advised us and helped to secure support for our work between 1995 and 1998 from The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Research Network on Successful Pathways through Middle Childhood. Drs. Anna Wolff and Tony Kris, the daughter and son of Ernst and Marianne Kris, provided important background for our consideration of the context of the YLS. And Frank Kessel gave helpful advice and insightful commentary along the way. One of the most interesting features of this effort, we think, is the perspective our contributors have brought to it—each offering his or her own view of their “part of the elephant”—differing points of entry into the study’s depth and richness.
Our anonymous reviewers provided critical guidance in reframing and reorganizing the book. We thank them and believe the book is much improved by their suggestions. Sara Hoover and later Samantha Ostrowski at Yale University Press offered timely assistance with details of the manuscript’s production. Julie Carlson’s sharp editorial eye saved us from the inaccuracies and oversights that inevitably attend the birthing of a manuscript whose gestation is so protracted, and we want to acknowledge the importance of her contribution here. Finally, this work wouldn’t have seen the light of day if Jean Thomson Black, executive editor for science and medicine at the press, hadn’t believed in its inherent value and championed its revival. For this we are deeply grateful.
Each of us owes a debt of gratitude to members of our own families who in their own ways have nurtured our interest in family stories told over many years and many generations. We each dedicate the book to not only Bill Kessen, then, but also to members of our families: to Marion Mayes, who as the mother of Linda Mayes encouraged her daughter from a very early age to listen to the stories swirling around her and whose courage and curiosity has sustained a vital and generous spirit—and to Stephen’s two sons, young children when we got this project under way and now both wonderful young men. The lives of these children growing up demonstrate (again) just how important temperament and endowment are to happiness and “success” in its many forms.