Anna Freud
After receiving her medical degree from Yale in 1929, Dr. Lydia Dawes developed an interest in psychotherapy, and moved with her husband to Vienna. They lived there from 1932-36, during which time Lydia was analyzed by Anna Freud, thus beginning their mentoring relationship. In this 1937 letter to Dr. Dawes, Ms. Freud advised her on how to fully analyze a case and also suggested the following, “I do hope you will succeed in convincing Dr. Ruggles that he ought to give you a salary. One feels so much more settled and part of an institution in a paid position, even if the money itself is not very much.”
After returning from Austria, Dr. Dawes completed her psychoanalysis training at the Boston Psychoanalytic Institute. She went on to become the first child analyst and child psychiatrist at Children’s Hospital Boston. Twenty years after they first met, the success of their mentoring relationship is summed up well in this short letter. Freud wrote, “I always expected you to become a first class analyst, but now I know that you are. I am very glad.”
Despite the physical distance between them, Ms. Freud stayed committed to helping and mentoring Dr. Dawes. She wrote the following, “But after all, through analysis I have entered into partnership with your fate and that continues also at the times when I am, what one calls in business-life here, only a ‘silent partner.’”
Dr. Dawes is the second person from the left in the front row. Anna Freud is the seventh person from the right in the front row.