Finding aid for the Paul W. Thayer papers

Biography of Paul W. Thayer

Paul W. Thayer was born in Birmingham, Alabama on July 18, 1927. He was the fifth son of Hugh and Elizabeth Thayer. Thayer grew up around the country as the family moved often for his father's job at DuPont.

In 1942-1943 while attending Swarthmore High School, Thayer enrolled in the Penn State wartime program which allowed students to begin their first semester while still a high school senior. Thayer entered Penn State at age 16 and received his high school diploma on D-Day in 1944.

Thayer started at Pennsylvania State University as a business major but switched to psychology in his second semester. At 18 Thayer joined the US Merchant Marine Cadet Corps. and took the engineering track. After a tour in Asia (to distribute aid) Thayer returned to the US Merchant Marine Academy (USMMA) to complete his degree in engineering. Thayer returned to Penn State to complete his psychology degree in 1949. During the summers of 1949 and 1950, Thayer worked at the personnel research office at DuPont. He graduated from both Penn State and from the USMMA in 1950.

Thayer started a PhD in psychology at Ohio State University in 1950. Thayer interned with Bill McGehee in the summer of 1953 and was offered a position at the University of Pennsylvania in 1954. In 1956 Thayer accepted a position at the Life Insurance Agency Management Association (LIAMA).

Thayer served as president of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) from 1976-1977. In 1977 Thayer left LIAMA for a Professorship at North Carolina State University (NCSU) where he stayed until his retirement in 1993.

Thayer's most well known publication is Training in Business and Industry, co-authored in 1961 with William McGehee.

Scope and Content

The Paul W. Thayer papers include Thayer's speeches, publications and professional correspondence throughout his career at LIAMA and NCSU as well as his involvement in various psychological organizations. Full texts of his speeches make up the bulk of the collection. There are a number of drafts and typed copies of his various publications in insurance industry magazines and the final draft of Thayer and McGehee's Training in Business and Industry. Some professional correspondence relating to his involvement in the American Psychological Association (APA) and the American Psychological Society (APS) is also of note.

Statement of Arrangement

Restrictions on Use

The researcher assumes full responsibility for observing all copyright, property, and libel laws as they apply.

Restrictions on Access

There are no access restrictions on the materials for research purposes, and the collection is open to the public.

Reel-to-reel audio tape of lecture by Paul Thayer given to insurance agents on employee selection issues. Tape is located in box A57, Tape 1.

Subject Headings

The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.

Subjects:

Persons:

Organizations/Corporations:

Technical Requirements

A reel-to-reel audio player is needed to listen to the reel-to-reel tapes.

Preferred Citation

Cite as: [identification of item], [folder number, box number], Archives of the History of American Psychology, The Drs. Nicholas and Dorothy Cummings Center for the History of Psychology - The University of Akron

Acquisition Information

The Paul W. Thayer papers were donated to the Center for the History of Psychology by Paul Thayer in 2007.

Processing Information

The Paul W. Thayer papers were processed by Nathalie Chernoff in August 2011.

Detailed Description of The Collection