Perry London

Perry London was born on June 18, 1931 to a Jewish family in Omaha, Nebraska. His perants, Max and Rose Ladizhinski, immigrated from Russia in the early 20th century. He had two older sisters and one younger sister. After two years of public high school in Omaha, he moved to Yeshiva University High School in New York, where he graduated in 1948. During his Senior year in high school he wrote his first academic article which earned him a full college scholarship. Consequently, the article was published in a peer-reviewed academic journal.[1] In 1952 he graduate from Yeshiva College. He later earned a master's degree in psychology at Teachers College, Columbia University in 1953 and a doctorate in 1956.[2] In his first year at Graduate School he applied for a program offered by the US Army for grad students in the professions allied to medicine, and was accepted. He consequently was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Army's Medical Services Corps, and did his internship in 1954-1955 in Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington DC.

After graduating from Columbia University, London was promoted to First Lieutenant and was assigned to a three-year tour of duty in an army hospital in return for the army having supported his graduate education. The assignment was to Madigan Army Hospital in Tacoma, Washington. When released from service he joined the faculty of the department of Psychology in University of Illinois, moving four year later to University of Southern California, where he was appointed Head of the Psychological Research and Training Institute.[3] After five years in that job, he was invited to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem as a Visiting Professor for the purpose of designing the research program for the newly created NCJW Center of Innovation in Education. During that year (1968-69) he was awarded an NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health) five-year Career Development Fellowship for promising young researchers that freed him from all teaching and administrative responsibilities, enabling him and his family to divide their time between the US and Israel. London went back full time to USC in 1973 and immigrated officially to Israel in 1979, where he received teaching positions at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv University. He moved back to the US in 1983 becoming the director of the counseling and consulting psychology program at Harvard University.[1] six years later, in 1989 he joined the faculty at Rutgers University as a professor and dean of the Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology.[2]

London's research included the study of altruism in people who assisted Jews during the Holocaust.[2]

London married Vivian Jacobson after entering graduate school. They had four daughters before divorcing in the 1970s. The pair remained life-long friends. London later married Beverly Rose.[2] He resided in Edison, New Jersey. He died on June 19, 1992 of cancer at the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.[2] He was survived by his daughters, five grandchildren, wife, and two stepchildren.[3]

• Perry London's publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)