ABSTRACT
Early Life Eugen Bleuler was born on April 30, 1857, in Zollikon, which was then a farming village and is now a suburb of the city of Zurich, Switzerland. His father was a merchant and local educational administrator, but his ancestral roots reached deeply into the Swiss farming tradition. It is quite significant for Bleuler's personal and professional development that during the 1700's the farmers and their families living in the countryside around Zurich were governed by the aristocrats living in the city. These city authorities restricted the access of the country people to educational opportunities and to certain professions, a state of affairs that caused great resentment among the peasants. Thus, in 1831, they overthrew the aristocracy and established a democratic form of government. The Bleuler family participated in this social and political movement, one of the primary goals of which was to create a university open equally to all citizens. The University of Zurich was founded in 1833 in the hope that the children of the farm families could gain the advanced training necessary to serve the legal, educational, religious, and medical needs of the population, and to do a better job of it than had been done by the officials appointed for this purpose by the aristocracy.
