YVONNE (EVE) (BLUE) SKINNER, 1911-1997

Yvonne ("Eve") (Blue) Skinner was born on May 9, 1911, in Chicago . Her parents were Harriet (Read) and Robert Blue ; her father was an ophthamologist and her maternal grandfather was Chicago novelist and humorist Opie Read . She grew up in Chicago and in nearby Flossmoor , and attended the high school of the University of Chicago and the University, where she majored in English and minored in the history of art. She spent her sophomore year at Beloit College . In July 1936, while visiting friends in Cambridge, Mass., she met psychologist and educator B.F. Skinner, who was then doing post-doctoral research as a member of Harvard's Society of Fellows. They were married on November 1, 1936. They had two daughters, Julie (Skinner) Vargas and Deborah (Skinner) Buzan, and lived in Cambridge. For many years, YBS was a lecturer and gallery instructor for the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston . She died on August 30, 1997. For further biographical information, see B.F. Skinner, The Shaping of a Behaviorist: Part Two of an Autobiography (1984), and A Matter of Consequences: Part Three of an Autobiography (1984).

From the guide to the Papers, 1916-1977, n.d., (Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute)