Florence in her office at Pace Univ.
in downtown Manhattan, where she
is a noted professor and role model.

A friend's suggestion started Florence L. Denmark on a career path in psychology that brought her renown as a "Model of Achievement" and a "Feminist Who Changed America" (designations from titles of books published in 1988 and 2006, respectively). Florence says she had no intention of going to graduate school when her friend said, "Let's go apply for doctoral programs in psychology" (one of Florence's two majors). "No, Florence said, "let's get an apartment in New York."

But she did apply and was accepted into two graduate programs, one at Duke University and the other at the University of Pennsylvania. Her friend got an apartment in New York.

Florence chose the graduate program at Penn, in Philadelphia, because she was marrying a student in Penn’s dental school. She was graduated with honors in both history and psychology from what was then Penn’s College for Women, in 1952. There is some irony in the fact that there were separate liberal arts colleges at Penn for men and women when Florence was a student there.

At the time, the proposition that women’s psychology differed from that of men, usually accompanied by the view that women had different sorts of mental abilities from those of men, was used to justify the exclusion of women from many elite institutions of higher learning. In particular, it was used by the dean of the College for Women, who had been a professor of psychology, to justify separate liberal arts colleges for women and men at Penn, and by others to deny women admission to Penn’s noted undergraduate business school, the Wharton School. (Times have changed considerably since then, at Penn and elsewhere.)

Florence avoided these pitfalls and countered them in playing a key role in establishing the psychology of women as a recognized field of scholarly research. She envisioned it as a field that would yield contributions to knowledge about women’s experiences that could be used to improve their status and their lives.

Florence was born January 28, 1931 in Philadelphia, and grew up in a large extended family. Her father was a lawyer, her mother was a musician, and her sister became a physician. Florence has said that she shared many of her father’s aptitudes and interests, but that it was her mother who inspired her to accomplishment and achievement.

Florence Levin, as she was then, was a member of the Class of 1948 at Roxboro High School, in Philadelphia, where she wrote a sports column for the school paper (she is still a football fan). She considered becoming a sports writer but the lack of opportunity for women in that field at the time discouraged her from pursuing that idea. She was valedictorian of her graduating class, and her position as first in her class won her a scholarship to Penn.

Florence married Stanley Denmark in 1953. She got her Ph.D. in social psychology at Penn in 1958. The Denmarks moved to New York City, and had three children, a daughter and twins, a girl and a boy. When the children were young, Florence taught part-time as a lecturer in psychology at Queens College of the City University of New York (CUNY). (When the children were grown, the twin girl died as a young woman, so Florence and her family have known personal tragedy.)

Mentors have played a crucial part in Florence’s life. The first of these in her professional career was a woman who headed the Queens College evening school program in psychology. She tried to obtain a full-time teaching position for Florence at Queens College, and when her efforts were unsuccessful, told Florence of an opening at Hunter College. Florence got the job, as an instructor at what was then Hunter’s campus in the Bronx, in 1964.

At Hunter, Florence met another mentor, a woman whom Florence credits as being her “political” mentor, because she encouraged Florence to join and become active in college committees and state, national and international professional organizations. Florence has, in fact, participated in and risen to be president of state, regional, national and international professional associations, and has received recognition as a valued mentor, herself.

Membership for Florence, however, is not necessarily all work and no play. She belongs to WOW. "WOW" stands for "Wonderful Older Women," which started when a group of women got together after giving papers at a conference of the New York State Psychological Association in 1984. The group has presented programs on different aspects of women and aging and written and published together, but it has also gathered for social occasions with spouses as invited guests.

Florence’s first marriage ended in divorce, and in 1973 she married Robert Wesner, an editor at the Aldine Publishing Co. They met in connection with the publication of Florence’s works. He, like Florence, was divorced and had three children. His son (Florence’s “new son”) became interested in psychology, earned a Ph.D., and began his career at the University of Chicago. Florence and Robert have four grandchildren.

Pace's historic building at 41 Park Row, at one
time the home of The New York Times and the
oldest survivor of the old "Newspaper Row."

Florence rose at Hunter to be named, in 1984, the Thomas Hunter Professor of Psychology, a post she held until 1990. In 1972 she also became, as an associate professor, the executive officer of the doctoral program in psychology at CUNY, the largest such program in the country at the time. In 1988 she was named the Robert Scott Pace Distinguished Professor of Psychology (an endowed chair) at Pace University.

Florence is currently the Robert Scott Pace Distinguished Research Professor at Pace and has been an adjunct professor at CUNY’s Graduate School since 1990. This year, she has taught a graduate school course at CUNY in the history of psychology (“As you get old enough,” she remarks, "you become part of the history course”). In addition, she co-taught a course at Pace on multiculturalism and gender issues in which she covered specifically gender issues as they relate to women.

Florence’s office at Pace is in an historic building in downtown Manhattan now owned by Pace, at 41 Park Row. It was the longtime home of The New York Times and is the oldest of the surviving buildings of what was once known as “Newspaper Row.” The walls of Florence’s office, the walls of the hallway leading to Florence’s office, and the walls of her clerks’ office are covered with honors and awards, placques and certificates.

One large framed certificate attests to Florence’s term from 1980 to 1981 as president of the American Psychological Association (APA). Two others attest to her membership in something called the Broom Closet Society. All past presidents of the APA, Florence explains, belong to the Broom Closet Society.

The name derives from the story that at APA meetings, presidents-elect of the APA are provided with magnificent hotel suites. Presidents are provided with even grander suites. Past presidents are housed in broom closets. Florence has two of these certificates because the first one attested to “his” services to the association. A second one had to be provided attesting to “her” services. Florence enjoys displaying both certificates.

Florence with her APA Pres. and
Broom Closet Society certificates.

In her work as a social psychologist, Florence has specialized in the psychology of women, gender issues as they relate to women, issues of aging, and minority group achievement, leadership and status, as well as cross-cultural and international research. Her most significant research has concerned prejudice and discrimination, women’s leadership and leadership styles, the interaction of status and gender, women in cross-cultural perspective, women and aging, and the contributions of women to psychology.

Florence encourages psychologists to become involved in public policy issues, particularly women’s issues, and her research has been reported extensively in the media, demonstrating its relevance, she says, to the “real world” and the public at large. She has been featured on radio and made appearances on TV shows such as the Today Show and the McNeil Lehrer Report, and her opinions and research have been cited in a host of popular magazines.

The Science section of the July 23, 1979 New York Times led with a story reporting a study by Florence. The study concluded, the article said, that an abrasive personality was not necessarily a bar to a woman’s advancement in academia, business or politics (“Women Held Back by Their Sex, Not Personality, Study Suggests,” by Virginia Adams).

Florence’s commitment to bringing psychological research to bear on public issues is amply demonstrated by her activities representing the American Psychological Association at the United Nations. Since 2005, she has been its Main Representative at the UN. What this involves may be summed up briefly but not without acronyms.

The UN charter empowers the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) to institute structures for consultation with international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The purpose of such consultation is to bring to the Council informed opinion other than that of governments and government officials, and to provide it with a source of special experience and technical knowledge.

NGOs such as the American Psychological Association (APA) that are officially recognized for consultative purposes by ECOSOC are represented on international UN NGO committees. The committees may send observers to the public meetings of the Council and its commissions, and submit memoranda for circulation. The NGOs are required to submit periodic reports to the UN of their UN NGO committee activities, such as organizing panels and roundtable discussions. The UN NGO committees may submit comments on reports of the UN Secretary General.

Florence chairs the UN NGO Committee on Aging, and, in that capacity, attends periodic meetings of the Conference of Non-Governmental Organizations in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations (CONGO). In addition, she is on the executive committee of the UN NGO Committee on Mental Health, and is a member of the Committee on the Status of Women (to be distinguished from the Commission on the Status of Women, so no acronym here) and of two of its subcommittees, one the Subcommittee on Older Women (SCOW) and the other on violence against women.

That’s a lot of meetings. Add to that the speaking Florence does on UN NGO panels, many of them organized by her, on subjects relating to the areas of concern of the UN NGO committees.

Space for honors and awards is running out
on the walls of the office of Florence's clerks.

In her own work, Florence has authored or co-authored or edited or co-edited or contributed to more than two dozen books and monographs and more than one hundred scholarly articles and book chapters. She has given hundreds of scholarly presentations and papers.

One book chapter that Florence co-authored fairly recently is titled, “Empowerment: A Prime Time for Women Over 50.” It begins with the following quote from Florence herself: “As someone who achieved a variety of offices and received many awards after age 50, I felt very much in control of my own life, but in no way felt that I was able to or wanted to control others.” The chapter goes on to state that “although it is important to understand that empowerment and power are tightly intertwined, these two concepts are different.” It is included in a book published in 2007 titled, “Women over 50: Psychological Perspectives,”

For their biographies on Pace’ Web site, faculty members are asked to indicate to what they attribute their success. Florence’s tremendous productivity substantiates her response: “Hard work and a passion for her profession.”

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