Dr. Lightner Witmer
By
Hannah Gallagher

Dr. Lightner Witmer Dr. Lightner Witmer was born in 1867, two years after the end of the Civil War, to devout Catholic parents in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Witmer married Emma Repplier who was also a Catholic, very little if anything is known about her. He successfully achieved his Bachelor of Arts from the University of Pennsylvania in 1888. After a brief bout of teaching at a secondary school and an even briefer interest in a career in law, he finally decided to enter the graduate level psychology program at the University of Pennsylvania. Years later he transferred to Leipzig, Germany and there earned his doctorate under Wilhelm Wundt. Witmer is currently heralded as the inventor of the term “Clinical Psychology” and was the co-founder of the world’s first psychological clinic in 1896 at his home university, the University of Pennsylvania. After he returned from Germany following the completion of his doctoral studies, Witmer took over the psychology laboratory. Although Witmer continued to perform experimental research, he gradually became fascinated with the idea of making scientific psychology into a more “practical” science. So, in 1896 he established the world’s first Psychological Clinic. In 1902 he published a laboratory manual, and in 1904 he, along with other leaders of the day including Edward B. Titchener, formed a group later known as the Society of Experimental Psychologists. Witmer used an