Edwina A. Cowan

is honored with a Brick from Ann C. Van Doren.

My mother, Edwina Abbott was born in Chicago, IL in 1883. She attended the University of Illinois and received a doctorate in Psychology from the University of Chicago in 1913. Her teaching experience consisted of three years as Laboratory Assistant at Vassar College; one year as Teaching Fellow at the University of Chicago; one summer as Instructor at the University of Illinois; two years as Instructor at Sophie Newcomb College of Tulane University; and twelve years as Professor of Psychology at Friends University.

My mother was Director and Clinical Psychologist of the Wichita Child Guidance Center from its opening date, September 1930 until March, 1941. She was staff consultant psychologist for a number of social agencies among them: Family Service Association of Kansas City, KS; Family Service Association of St. Joseph, MO; Kansas Division of Vocational Rehabilitation; Kansas Welfare Child Division; Lutheran Children's Home, Winfield, KS; and St. John's Military School, Salina, KS. She was an American Psychological Association and Kansas Psychological Association Fellow.

She married Austin M. Cowan, attorney at law, in 1914. They had three children: Edwin, David and Ann. Her hobbies were oil painting, poetry and silversmithing. She was a member of the Soroptomist Club, charter member of the Wichita Branch of American Association of University Women, Chi Omega Sorority, and Plymouth Congregational Church.

After her untimely death in 1948 in an airplane accident in which she and my father were killed, her library was donated to the Psychology Department at Wichita State University.

Even though she was an early "Career Woman," she was always home when her children were young. We always ate dinner together and had our story hour in the evening. She played the piano, my father played the clarinet, and she encouraged each of her children to learn to play an instrument. We often played as a group for our own enjoyment and sometimes for others.

An excerpt from Dr. J. Henry Hornung's tribute to my mother at her funeral follows: "I think of Mrs. Cowan as a pioneer in her field in the City of Wichita. She was interested, not alone in an academic understanding of psychology, she was interested in the application of that understanding to life and to its problems. The history of clinical psychology in Wichita cannot be written without reference to Mrs. Cowan. She was an authority in that field and her interest never waned. There was always something left in her studies which demanded further research. Yet, with all of her interest in her professional field, she still had the responsibility of overseeing a home and of rearing three children. One wonders how some can do so much and others have time for so little."

Needless to say, I think my mother exemplifies the meaning of Heroine.

Submitted by Ann Cowan VanDoren

July 28, 1998