ABSTRACT
The student of neuropsychology who was interested in nonhuman primate, brain-behavior relationships had few laboratory options in the 1930s, 1940s and early 1950s. As far as chimpanzees were concerned, the only laboratory in America offering opportunities for their study was the primate station in Orange Park, Florida. Established by Robert M. Yerkes in 1930, the laboratory came to be known as the southern station of the Yale Laboratories of Primate Biology. An eminent primatologist, Yerkes selected the site in Orange Park for its favorable semitropical climate and its isolation from worldly distractions. In 1943, Yerkes published a summary of studies of chimpanzees conducted at Yale Laboratories that revealed knowledge of the life history, physiology, and behavior of these primates, more extensive than that available for any other species with the possible exception of the laboratory rat. A complete list of publications was issued by the Yerkes Primate Research Center in Atlanta to commemorate 50 years of publications, 1925-1974.
