Scope and Content Note
The papers of Otto Isakower (1899-1972) and Salomea Isakower (1888-1949) span the years 1880-1975, with the bulk of the items concentrated in the period 1900-1975. The collection focuses on the work of Otto Isakower, a Freudian psychoanalyst who studied and practiced in Vienna, Austria, until immigrating to England and then the United States between 1938 and 1940. Included in the papers are correspondence, writings, miscellaneous biographical data, and other material pertaining to the work of Otto Isakower and to the history of psychoanalysis during his lifetime.
Among the prominent correspondents in the collection are Paul Federn, Anna Freud, Ernest Jones, Bertram David Lewin, and Herman Nunberg. Notable also are photocopies of Sigmund Freud letters to Carl Koller, 1880-1887, and to Albrecht Schaeffer, 1939. An item of special significance is a notebook containing minutes of meetings of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society for the years 1923-1924. Other topics of interest include papers relating to the Isakowers' immigration and resettlement, a patient case file from the Wiener Allgemeines Krankenhaus, and dream material collected by Otto Isakower.