Dr. Hermine Hug-Hellmuth was the world's first practicing child psychoanalyst. From this vantage point of being the first person to apply psychoanalysis to the treatment of children, she was also the first person to make use of systematic child observation from a psychoanalytic point of view (1). In addition Dr. Hug-Hellmuth was among the very first of the lay adherents to psychoanalysis to practice psychoanalysis (2). Further, she was one of the first women to obtain a doctorate degree in physics from the University of Vienna. We see that in all these aspects, as a woman, with a lay education, practicing psychoanalysis with children and employing psychoanalytic child observation, she was the first, or among the very first. In this perspective her pioneer status becomes understood to be very important. Others followed and psychoanalysis grew and flourished as did the contributions and the stature of those who would become giants of psychoanalytic history. In part, it was in the shadows of these later giants that the memory of Dr. Hug-Hellmuth has faded.
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