Esther L. Richards Collection

Biography

Esther L. Richards was born in Holliston, Massachusetts. She received her A.B. in 1910 from Mount Holyoke College and her M.D. in 1915 from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. In 1917, after interning at Johns Hopkins, Richards joined the psychiatry faculty of the school of medicine and the staff of the hospital’s Henry Phipps Psychiatric Clinic. Richards was psychiatrist-in-charge of the outpatient department of the Phipps Clinic from 1920 until her retirement in 1951. In addition to her medical and academic responsibilities, Richards was very active on the lecture circuit and gave a great deal of her time to community service. She authored over 100 papers and two books, Behavior Aspects of Child Conduct and Introduction to Psychobiology and Psychiatry.

Scope and Content

The Esther L. Richards Collection spans much of her tenure as psychiatrist-in-charge of the outpatient department of the Phipps Clinic and consists primarily of manuscripts of talks. The typewritten manuscipts are entered in loose-leaf binders labeled Books I-XI. The subjects of her talks are wide-ranging, but many deal with the mental health and education of children. They are arranged chronologically, and each volume has an index. There are several additional binders, one entitled Book O, labeled as including “old and unidentifiable mss”. Another binder contains Dr. Richards’ Report of [Phipps] Dispensary Activities (From 1913-1927). There are also two manuscripts by R. Burke Suitt regarding special work done in Francis Scott Key School and Patterson Park High School in Baltimore, 1939-1940. Also of interest is a 1918 letter in which Richards describes the impact of the influenza epidemic on the hospital.

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