Alex Comfort

Alex Comfort, Ph.D. (1920–2000) was a British biochemist, physician, sex researcher, and author of numerous works, including The Joy of Sex (1972), which sold over 12 million copies.

The Comfort collection consists of 132 archival folders and card files (3.5 linear ft.) of professional correspondence (1958-1976), manuscripts (1975-1983), research notes, clippings, illustrations, and bibliographical citations on human sexual behavior.

This archive also includes materials related to the Sandstone experimental sexual community where Comfort lived for a short time (1970-1972), and magazines, catalogs, advertisements, sketches, and commercial photographs depicting bondage/pseudo-aggression (1971–1978).

Davidson-Moore Collection

The Davidson-Moore collection contains materials related to the research of Dr. J. Kenneth Davidson, Sr.—professor emeritus of sociology and former coordinator of family studies at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire—and Dr. Nelwyn B. Moore, professor emerita of family and child studies at Texas State University-San Marcos.

The collection consists of more than 46 boxes. This includes:

• Biographical/professional information on Davidson and Moore
• Correspondence
• Teaching materials, presentations, and lectures
• Research grant applications
• Publications

There are also more than 10,000 articles (31 boxes) on the topics of contraception, family planning, physiology, sex attitudes, sex behavior, and sex knowledge.

Publications and manuscripts

Davidson and Moore authored and co-authored many publications and manuscripts, and much original data and research material exists in the collection. Topics include: sexual fantasies, premarital sexual intercourse, college-level sex education, sex attitudes and behavior, female sexuality, guilt, masturbation, parenting, orgasm, and contraception.

Also included: the Davidson and Moore Survey Data-Set on Regional Variations in Sexual Attitudes and Behavior of College Students (2000)

Robert Latou Dickinson

Robert Latou Dickinson (1861–1950) was a sex researcher and gynecologist. The Dickinson collection comprises 136 archival folders (2.5 linear ft.) of manuscripts and publication drafts, clinical case files and related sexually explicit materials, professional correspondence, medical drawings, and an incomplete draft biography by George Barbour, Dickinson's son-in-law.

The collection also includes organizational records, minutes, and correspondence associated with The American Association of Marriage Counselors (1944), the Institute for Sex Research (1945–1949), The National Committee on Maternal Health (1931–1949), and the World League for Sex Reform (1926).

The Dickinson collection mostly consists of case studies, sexual histories, and gynecological/sexology subject files selected from the original 5,200 files (1883–1923). The bulk of the original archive is held by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine at Harvard University Medical School.

Havelock Ellis

Henry Havelock Ellis (1859-1939) was a British sex researcher, physician, and social reformer. The Ellis collection consists of 13 archival folders of:

• Correspondence by and about Ellis (1929–1982)
• Correspondence regarding the National Committee on Maternal Health (1930–1933)
• Publication drafts (1901–31)
• Article offprints
• Biographical information

Alice Field

Alice Withrow Field (1909–1960) was a sex researcher, criminologist, and social scientist. The Field collection comprises five file boxes (4 linear ft.) of papers, statistical and criminal reports, professional correspondence, research notes, manuscripts, charts, publication drafts, and legal information regarding criminal cases of sexual offenders and the relevant penal codes for New York City (NYC). The two foci of the collection are materials pertaining to the NYC Sex Offender study and materials concerning cases in the Women's Court and Wayward Minors' Court.

The New York Sex offender study (1951-1956)

• Notes and literature regarding NYC penal codes and legislative acts pertaining to sex offenses
• Published bulletins from the Chief City Magistrate regarding new or amended crime-oriented legislative bills
• Correspondence with Alfred Kinsey (1945–1955) and NYC magistrates about the study

Women's Court and Wayward Minors' Court under the New York City Department of Probation (1940-1945)

These materials include legal and statistical documents, reports, memoranda, two Masters theses on minors' court issues, data sheets on minors' court cases (1936-1943), and a series of 49 filed reports on female minors.

The remainder of the collection consists of U.S. and international crime research publications and notes, clippings, manuscripts, journal articles and offprints (1943-1951), correspondence with Dr. Robert Latou Dickinson (1939–1943), and miscellaneous correspondence.

Benjamin Graber

Benjamin Graber, M.D. is a neuroscientist and noted researcher on the neurophysiological aspects of sexual behavior, orgasms, and female sexuality. He is also the author of Woman's Orgasm: A Guide to Sexual Satisfaction and numerous scholarly journal articles such as Brain Structure and Function in Sexual Molesters of Children and Adolescents and Demystifying Sex Therapy.

The collection consists primarily of scholarly journal articles authored or co-authored by Graber, including his two studies on male orgasm and sex offenders. The Graber collection also contains an extensive research file of approximately 5,500 scholarly journal articles and research publications organized in a ProCite database.

Elaine Hatfield

Dr. Elaine Hatfield is a professor of psychology at the University of Hawaii. The Hatfield collection consists of two boxes divided into four series: biographical, Proxmire, video, and miscellaneous.

Biographical materials

This series contains items relevant to Hatfield, including personal correspondence and documents detailing her professional and personal accomplishments.

Proxmire materials

The Proxmire series includes materials relevant to the attack on Hatfield's work by Senator William Proxmire (D-Wisc.) in 1975. Hatfield, then working at the University of Wisconsin, had received an $84,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to study passionate love. Proxmire felt this was a waste of taxpayer money and launched an aggressive and successful campaign to revoke Hatfield’s funding. Hatfield became the first recipient of Proxmire’s Golden Fleece Award, an infamous award bestowed upon "the most outrageous examples of federal waste." Proxmire continued to designate an award winner up to his retirement in 1988.

This series includes a detailed collection of 165 items including articles, newspaper clippings, correspondence, essays, and court documents detailing the Proxmire attack and subsequent fallout.

Video materials

This series includes television appearances, videotaped interviews, and home movies from the 1990s and early 21st century. The programmed topics include love, appearance, and sexuality. A small portion of the video material focuses on the work and extra-curricular activities of Hatfield's husband, Richard L. Rapson.

Magnus Hirschfeld

Magnus Hirschfeld (1868–1935) was a German physician and sex researcher. The Hirschfeld collection is credited with founding the German homosexual rights movement. The collection consists of four flat boxes (4 feet) that hold the contents of an oversized scrapbook, which was compiled for eventual publication by Carl Hoefft, Ph.D. The materials are in German.

The collection includes: invitations to professional events and lectures signed by Hirschfeld; publications and publication announcements; reports, clippings, handbills and posters for lectures on homosexuality and other topics (1895–1928).

It also features:

• Professional correspondence (1906–1931)
• Confidential reports and minutes of the Wissenschaftlich-humanitäre Komitee (Scientific-Humanitarian Committee) meetings on homosexual legal reform (1902-1921)
• A program from International Congress of World League for Sexual Reform (1928)
• Magazines and articles on homosexuality and transvestitism (1914-1920)
• Book advertisements, title pages, and table of contents on fetishes, transvestitism, and homosexuality (1898-1928)

Additional materials include trial case sketches, news clippings, and court documents regarding persons accused of homosexual practices (Krupp, Bülow-Brand 1907, Grunowski 1927-1928) or involved with accusations of royalty being and exclusively hiring homosexuals (Moltke-Harden 1907, Prince Eulenburg 1908) and other homosexual-related cases. Clinical materials consist of Hirschfeld's famous letter to the 3,000 students of the Charlottenburg Institute of Technology with sexual orientation survey cards (1903), psychobiological questionnaires (1930), and self-reported homosexual and transvestite case histories and photographs.

Charles L. Ihlenfeld

Charles L. Ihlenfeld worked with Dr. Harry Benjamin, the endocrinologist and expert on transsexuality, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. A graduate of New York University School of Medicine, Ihlenfeld was working as an internist when Dr. Benjamin asked for help with some of his patients. Ihlenfeld and Benjamin worked together until Benjamin's retirement in 1974 and wrote a number of published articles on transsexuality during that time.

Ihlenfeld continued treating transsexuals for another year before retiring from his practice to pursue a residency in psychiatry. He has remained actively involved in the field of sexology and with transsexual and transgender issues and continued to maintain a close relationship with Dr. Benjamin up to Dr. Benjamin's death in 1986.

The Ihlenfeld collection includes writings, correspondence, and lecture notes, as well as materials on Benjamin and Ihlenfeld's research, clippings, and audio cassettes of interviews and radio appearances. The materials were collected between the late 1960s and the mid-1990s.

Carney Landis

Carney Landis (1897–1962) was a physician, sex researcher, and psychologist. The Landis collection consists of 38 archival folders (2.5 ft.) of case studies detailing the personal and sexual histories of 293 women obtained through interviews (1934–1937).

Stephen Porges

Dr. Stephen Porges' research intersects psychology, neuroscience, and evolutionary biology. Through his development of the Polyvagal Theory, Porges is discovering how the autonomic nervous system controls the reactions and behaviors of individuals affected by a wide-range of traumatic experiences, including sexual assault and partner violence, bullying, and the trauma associated with diagnoses and treatment of the reproductive system.

Currently, Porges is also the director of the Kinsey Institute Traumatic Stress Research Consortium, founded to address the life-changing affects and treatments around trauma. He leads a team of collaborative researchers and clinicians from the Kinsey Institute and other partner institutions to document both the effects of trauma on people’s ability to form intimate relationships and the development of novel treatments to reverse its effects.

The Stephen Porges Media Library contains videos of interviews with Dr. Porges and his video presentations regarding his work on the Polyvagal Theory and the Kinsey Institute Traumatic Stress Research Consortium.

Pepper Schwartz

Dr. Pepper Schwartz is a sociologist, sexologist, columnist, and professional matchmaker best known for her research on sexuality and couples. She has written extensively on her studies of both homo- and hetero-sexual intimate relationships. In addition, she served as an expert witness on many important trials, including "Don't Ask, Don't Tell” and the Hawaii gay marriage trial.

Schwartz developed the Perfectmatch.com Duet Personality Profiler used by internet dating services to successfully match adults seeking long-term relationships. She is the author of more than 50 academic articles and sixteen books, including American Couples, The Great Sex Weekend, and Prime: Adventures and Advice on Sex, Love, and the Sensual Years. She has also contributed to many publications including The New York Times, Sexual Health, and Psychology Today.

Schwartz donated many of her own publications to the Kinsey Institute Library. They include publications in Polish, Japanese, German, and Chinese. The collection also features archival material such as research data for her couples studies with Philip W. Blumstein, correspondence, and publication drafts.

Leonore Tiefer

Leonore Tiefer is a scientist, activist, researcher, educator, therapist, and author. Concerned about the role of pharmaceuticals in sexology in the 1990s, Tiefer convened the New View Campaign to raise awareness of potential professional conflicts of interest in pharmaceutical initiatives and challenge the notion of sexual variability as a disease or a disorder.

Through political and scholarly work, Tiefer and her colleagues assert that female sexual problems "should not be in the hands of reductionist research and marketing programs of the pharmaceutical industry, but rather should be treated by research and services that are driven by women's own needs and sexual realities."

Tiefer has donated more than 900 monographs to the Kinsey Institute. These materials cover topics such as women’s studies, feminism, clinical psychology, and human sexuality. The collection also includes several educational videos, educational slides, and personal photo albums from professional conferences.

Beverly Whipple Collection

Beverly Whipple, PhD, RN, FAAN, is Professor Emeritus at Rutgers University, and a certified sex educator, counselor, sex researcher, and sexologist. Much of the research included in the Whipple collection is devoted to female sexuality and pain control.

The collection currently consists of 10 boxes divided into five series:

• Biographical and personal materials
• Correspondence
• Publications, manuscripts, and lectures
• Research, grants, and patents
• Miscellaneous materials and research files

The Correspondence Series (three boxes) consists of 2,160 letters directed to Dr. Beverly Whipple from the general public, each requesting more information on sexuality and/or providing personal sexual histories after viewing her interview on the Phil Donahue Show.