In the 1940s, Max Hutt was a clinical psychologist with the United States
Army. Following World War II, he was considered to be one of the leading
clinical psychologists in the nation and was hired by Don Marquis in 1946
to join the faculty in the Department of Psychology on central campus as a
half-time Associate Professor. As such he was among the first - if not THE
first - clinically trained faculty member teaching clinical psychology.
Max Hutt was affiliated with the Department of Psychiatry and worked at
the Neropsychiatric Institute in the 1950s. Both Jerry Hover, known to
many of us as one of the VA psychologists, and who was in the first
clinical psychology class in 1946, and our own Marvin Brandwin, who was in
the second clinical psychology class, remember Max as an outstanding and
charismatic teacher and a "master" of psychodynamic psychotherapy; he also
believed he could diagnose many organic brain syndromes using the
Bender-Gestalt and the Rorschach - in fact, he believed the Rorschach
could do anything. He also had great faith in the ability of the
Bender-Gestalt to diagnose brain damage and Max was also a consultant to
the Department of Neurology during his affiliation with the medical
school. Jerry describes his teacher as physically small but a package of
power - a "dynamite guy" in Jerry's words. Max left the University of
Michigan in May of 1960 to take a position at the University of Detroit,
but he clearly continued to have an affection for this department as
manifested by his generous endowment for trainees in the Department of
Psychiatry of the University of Michigan.
Last modified, November 2009
Updated 02-13-2022