ABSTRACT
Cora Bussey Hillis was an Iowa mother and activist who became convinced that facilitating the study of normal growth and development was her own personal responsibility. In 1918, John D. Rockefeller founded a special fund in his wife's memory, the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial (LSRM), to support research and social programs to improve the lives of women and children. Lawrence K. Frank, an economist, become administrator of programs for children and parents, and he felt strongly that something needed to be done to improve the upbringing of children during the early years. John Anderson also had a strong-minded administrative assistant, a secretary whose name was Kathryn Bellows and who stayed from 1926 to 1968 the longest tenure any staff member has achieved in the Institute of Child Development. He resigned as director in 195444His festchrift became the most famous book ever published by the Institute of Child Development, The Concept of Development.
