Overview
The Fanny Bowditch Katz papers, 1901-1934, consist of Katz's correspondence and papers relating to her psychoanalysis treatment by Carl Jung. The collection contains ten letters from Jung and twenty-six letters from neurologist James Jackson Putnam dating from the course of her treatment. Additional items include include Katz’s notebooks with notes from Jung and Alfred Adler’s lectures, and other personal records such as accounts of her fantasies, poems, drawings, and clippings.
Dates
- Creation: 1901-1934
Creator
- Katz, Fanny Bowditch, 1874-1967. (Person)
Conditions Governing Access
Collection is open for research. Access requires advance notice. Consult Public Services for further information.
Conditions Governing Use
The Harvard Medical Library does not hold copyright on all materials in the collection. Researchers are responsible for identifying and contacting any third-party copyright holders for permission to reproduce or publish. For more information on the Center's use, publication, and reproduction policies, view our Reproductions and Use Policy.
Extent
1 boxesThe Fanny Bowditch Katz papers consist of correspondence constituting a case file from Katz’s psychoanalytic treatment with the psychiatrist Carl Jung (1875-1961). In addition to letters from Jung, the collection includes correspondence between Bowditch Katz and James Jackson Putnam (1846-1918), Hugo Kronecker (1839-1914), Maria Moltzer (died 1944), and Selma Bowditch (1853-1918). Includes ten letters by Jung and twenty-six letters by Putnam, most of them written during Bowditch Katz’s analytic treatment. Putnam was a psychoanalyst who followed the theories of Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), and in the early 1870s he opened one of the first neurology laboratories in the United States (1). The letters provide information about the early international psychoanalytical movement and Putnam's feelings about it. Some of the Bowditch Katz papers were used to research a Harvard University Press publication of Putnam’s psychoanalytic correspondence with Freud, Ernest Jones (1879-1958), Sandor Ferenczi (1873-1933), William James (1842-1910), and others. The collection includes some of Bowditch Katz’s notebooks and drawings. Personal Papers and Writings (Series II) includes notebooks in German and English that Bowditch Katz wrote while attending Jung’s lectures.
1. James Jackson Putnam papers, 1818-1961 (inclusive), 1850-1920 (bulk). H MS c4. Harvard Medical Library, Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Boston, Mass. https://id.lib.harvard.edu/ead/med00582/catalog Accessed September 28, 2020
Biography
Fanny Bowditch Katz (1874-1967) was an American woman who was a psychoanalytic patient of Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), the Swiss psychiatrist who founded psychoanalysis, and Jung’s trainee, Martha Moltzer (died 1944). Bowditch Katz corresponded with Jung, Moltzer, and neurologist James Jackson Putnam (1946-1918) about her psychoanalytic treatment.
Fanny “Fan” Bowditch Katz was born Fanny Bowditch in Boston, Massachusetts in 1874 to Henry Pickering Bowditch, a physiologist and Dean at Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, and to Selma (Knauth) Bowditch, who was German. Bowditch Katz was identified as white in the 1910 U.S. Census. In 1911, when Bowditch Katz was 37, her father died. Bowditch Katz subsequently suffered from a breakdown, with symptoms of anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts. In 1912, Putnam sent Bowditch Katz to Zürich, Switzerland to undergo psychoanalysis with Jung. Bowditch Katz also underwent analysis with Jung’s trainee, Moltzer. After arriving in Zürich, Bowditch Katz began to correspond with Putnam about her psychoanalysis. She stopped her analytic process in 1916 but remained in Europe. She married Johann Rudolf Katz (1880-1938) a psychiatrist from Amsterdam, Netherlands on October 20, 1917 (1).
Bowditch Katz died on September 30, 1967.
1. McGuire, William, ed. Dream Analysis: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1928-1930 by C. G. Jung. Routledge, n.d.
Series and Subseries in the Collection
- I. Correspondence, 1901-1934, undated
- ___ A. Letters from Fanny Bowditch Katz, 1912-1915, undated
- ___ B. Letters to Fanny Bowditch Katz, 1901-1934, undated
- ___ C. Related Collected Correspondence, 1912-1929, undated
- II. Personal Papers and Writings, 1912-1913, undated
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Beatrice Crossman, Bowditch Katz’s longtime companion and the heir to Bowditch Katz’s estate, donated the papers to the Harvard Medical Library in the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine.
Processing Information
Charlotte Lellman revised the Scope and Content Note, the Biographical Note, and the Immediate Source of Acquisition, in this finding aid in September 2020 to bring it into compliance with the Center for the History of Medicine’s Guidelines for Inclusive and Conscientious Description (2020). In particular, Lellman provided more biographical information about Bowditch Katz and eliminated subjective claims from the Scope and Content note. The previous version of the finding aid is being maintained for transparency around the descriptive process.
Creator
- Katz, Fanny Bowditch, 1874-1967. (Person)
Subject
- Putnam, James Jackson, 1846-1918 (Person)
- Adler, Alfred, 1870-1937 (Person)
- Kronecker, Hugo, 1839-1914 (Person)
- Moltzer, Maria (Person)
- Title
- Katz, Fanny Bowditch, 1874-1967. Papers, 1901-1934: Finding Aid
- Author
- Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine. Center for the History of Medicine.
- Language of description
- und
- Sponsor
- The Fanny Bowditch Katz papers have been processed and made available by the Archives for Women in Medicine project with generous support from our donors.
- EAD ID
- med00090
Repository Details
Part of the Center for the History of Medicine (Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine) Repository
The Center for the History of Medicine in the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine is one of the world's leading resources for the study of the history of health and medicine. Our mission is to enable the history of medicine and public health to inform healthcare, the health sciences, and the societies in which they are embedded.