Clarence "Ray" Ray Carpenter, Ph.D.

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https://www.libraries.psu.edu/findingaids/149.htm
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Clarence Ray Carpenter was born in Lincoln County, North Carolina to C.E. and Gaddie Lee Harrelson Carpenter. He married Mariana Carpenter in 1932, they had two children, Richard Lee and Lane Evans, Mariana died on July 16, 1963. Carpenter married Ruth Jones on October 8, 1966, who had several daughters from a previous marriage. He completed his bachelor of arts and masters degrees at Duke University in 1928 and 1929, respectively. There he studied with Professor William McDougall. He entered Stanford University in 1929, worked with Professor Calvin P. Stone, and completed work for a Ph.D.in 1932.
His early research was in animal behavior where he used pigeons as subjects and developed a special interest in the ecological and endocrinological conditions which affect
their social behavior. He received a National Science
Research Fellowship for work at the institute of Human
Relations, New Haven Medical School, Yale University, and
from 1931 to 1934 conducted field research on the
naturalistic behavior of primates in Panama under the
sponsorship of Professor Robert M. Yerkes. According to
Harvard's Irven DeVore, "for the succeeding thirty years
almost all of the accurate information available on the
behavior of monkeys and apes living in natural environments
was the result of Carpenter's research and writing". His
first published article concerning primate behavior appeared
in 1934, and was followed by over 40 professional journal
articles, books, book chapters and special publications
dealing with this topic.

In addition, he was responsible for the production of
primate films and videotapes, the establishment of Penn
State University as a depository for the Psychological
Cinema Register and for developing an internationally known
collection of psychological, psychiatric and animal behavior
films.

His other major research interest was in the
communication processes. On the applied level he was
concerned with the application of various educational
technologies to instructional communication in colleges and
universities.

During World War II he served as a technical advisor in
the production of Army training films. After the war he
conducted extensive research on variables to learning in
instructional films. The program which he directed produced
sixty-six technical reports. In 1954, he shifted his
research emphasis to instructional television and other
research developments for improving instruction at the
university level. Beginning in 1957 and 1958, he became
involved in the problems of long range planning for higher
education. He served on the Central Committee for
Projecting and Planning the Pennsylvania State University
Medical School at Hershey, and on the Planning Commission in
Florida for drafting plans for the Florida Atlantic
University. His interest in Communication and learning
potentials prompted his return to Barro Colorado Island in
1959 to resume field studies of its howler population, thus
continuing the line of work he began in the early thirties.
His teaching career began in 1934 when he accepted an
appointment as Assistant Professor and Lecturer at Bard
College, Columbia University. In this capacity he was a
member of the Asiatic Primate Expedition in 1937, was a
Fellow of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard, and
an associate of Dr. Harold J. Coolige, Jr., and professor
Adolph Schultz. In 1938 he transferred to the College of
Physicians and Surgeons and School of Tropical Medicine in
Puerto Rico. There he planned and developed the Cayo
Santiago Rhesus Colony. This required the collection of
some 350 animals in India and their transportation to Puerto
Rico where the colony still exists. In 1940 he moved to the
Pennsylvania State College from which he retired in 1970 as
Research Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Anthropology.
He then accepted a position as Research Professor in
Psychology and Anthropology at the University of Georgia and
in 1974, a visiting Research post at the East-West
Communication Institute, Honolulu.

While at Penn State, Professor Carpenter contributed
many special qualities to the Anthropology and Psychology
departments. As Research Professor in both departments from
1965-1970, he guided their development to accommodate his
precocious notion that human behavior is fundamentally
similar to the behavior of other animals and thus should be
studied simultaneously, utilizing similar methodology and
paradigms. He, more than anyone, is responsible for the
Penn State Anthropology Department's continuing commitment
to primatology, empiricism, science as opposed to humanism,
and most importantly, through the compelling example of his
own successful studies, the melding of the behavioral
sciences with the theory of evolution. In Georgia, he
continued this work both at the University and at the nearby
Yerkes Primate Center where he was on the Board of Advisors.
In addition to the above accomplishments, Dr. Carpenter
received a number of other honors and helped cultivate a
variety of other programs. At Penn State, he established in
1957 the Division of Academic Research and Services, later
the University Division of Instructional Services, which
fostered research on learning behavior and provided
assistance to faculty in developing teaching expertise.
During this time he was instrumental in establishing Penn
State's pioneering instructional television activities. In
1963, he was a member of a team sponsored by the Ford
Foundation which studied the communication systems of India.
In 1964, he was a visiting scientist under the auspices of
the US-Japan Cooperative Science Program and the Japan
Science Council.

He was active in the framing of the National Defense
Act, especially Title VII, concerning employment
discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex or
national origin, and had worked continuously in some
relationship with the US Office of Education from 1958 until
his death. He was a member of the Primatology Committee of
the National Academy of Sciences and served during the
academic year of 1965-1966 as the President of the
Association for Higher Education.

Dr. Carpenter died on March 1, 1975 in Athens, Georgia.
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Cross-listing: Anthropology Tree - PsychTree - Primatology Tree