William Andrew Horsley Gantt (24 October 1892 – 26 February 1980)[1] was an American physiologist and psychiatrist. At the time of his death in 1980, he was one of only two surviving students of Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov.[2] He spent fifty-six years of his career extending Pavlov's seminal experimental research on classical conditioning.[1] He is also recognized for his research in psychophysiology.[3]
Early life and education
Gantt was born on October 24, 1892, on the Rock Cliff estate in Wingina, Virginia.[4] His father was a businessman and his mother was college-educated. Gantt's father died when he was three years old. When Gantt was twelve years old, his mother enrolled him in the Miller School in Charlottesville, Virginia, which he attended on a scholarship. In 1913, he enrolled at the University of North Carolina, from which he received his B.S. degree in 1917. He then attended the University of Virginia, from which he received his M.D. in 1920.[1]
In 1955, Gantt founded the Pavlovian Society, of which he served as president from then until 1965.[1] He went on to found the society's journal, Conditional Reflex, in 1965.[7] He insisted on giving the journal this name because the term "conditional" preserves the fact that the reflex, rather than being fixed, is dependent on a stimulus and subject to change.[8] He was the founding editor-in-chief of Conditional Reflex (later renamed the Pavlovian Journal of Biological Science) from 1966 to 1978.[1]
Gantt married Mary Gould Richardson on June 23, 1934. They remained married until she died of cancer on July 17, 1964. They had a son, Andrew, and a daughter, Emily.[1] After the death of his first wife he married the former Rebecca Annie Esler in August of 1965. Gantt died on February 26, 1980, in Baltimore, Maryland, after a short illness.[2] He is buried at Rock Cliff in Wingina, Virginia, the same property on which he was born. This property met criterion B to be added to the National Register of Historic Places because Gantt was born there, and lived there until 1910; it also met criterion C because it is associated with his medical career.[10]