Lloyd Morrisett

Lloyd was a smart man. He studied how people learn.

He wanted to help kids. He saw that TV could teach. He worked with Joan Cooney.

They made a show called Sesame Street. It used music and fun. It helped kids learn letters.

Many people watched the show. It won many awards. It is still famous today.

Lloyd helped make the world a better place.

Lloyd Morrisett was an American scientist. He studied how people think and learn. This is called psychology.

Lloyd was born in 1929. His family moved to New York to find a better life. Later, they moved to California. Lloyd went to college at Oberlin. He also studied at Yale. At Yale, he wrote a famous paper. He looked at how thinking helps people do tasks.

Lloyd worked for the Carnegie Corporation. He wanted to help children learn. He saw that some kids had fewer tools for school. He wanted to find a new way to help.

One day, he saw his daughter watching TV. She loved the music and songs on the screen. Lloyd had a big idea. He wondered if TV could teach kids. He worked with Joan Ganz Cooney to try it.

They started the Children's Television Workshop. This group made the show Sesame Street. The show began in 1969. It used fun songs to teach letters and numbers. Sesame Street won many awards. It helped millions of children around the world.

Lloyd Morrisett was an American scientist who studied how people think. This field is called experimental psychology. He spent his life finding ways to help people learn through better education. He was also a leader in philanthropy, which means he helped manage money to support good causes. His work changed how children around the world learn through television.

Morrisett began his journey by studying philosophy at Oberlin College. He later moved to Yale University to earn a PhD in psychology. At Yale, he studied how thinking might help people perform physical tasks. He wrote a paper about how thinking about a task can help. He found that thinking helps with coordination, like using two hands together. This work became an important part of sports psychology.

After college, Morrisett worked for the Carnegie Corporation in New York. He became a vice president at this large foundation. He wanted to help children who did not have many tools for school. He noticed that some children had a hard time getting a good education. Morrisett led experiments to see which teaching methods worked best for kids. He wanted to find a way to reach many more students.

One day, Morrisett saw his daughter Sarah watching television. She loved the catchy songs and jingles on the screen. This gave him a big idea about teaching. He asked Joan Ganz Cooney if television could be used to teach young children. They worked together to start the Children's Television Workshop. They raised millions of dollars from groups like the Ford Foundation.

Their hard work led to the debut of Sesame Street in 1969. The show used fun music and characters to teach letters and numbers. It was a huge success and won 118 Emmy Awards. Millions of children in America and other countries watched the show. Morrisett also led the Markle Foundation to support new technology. He lived to be 93 years old and left a great legacy.

Lloyd Newton Morrisett Jr. was a prominent American experimental psychologist and philanthropist. His career spanned education, communications, and large-scale social support. He is most famous for co-founding the Children's Television Workshop, now called Sesame Workshop. This organization created the landmark educational program Sesame Street. Morrisett combined his scientific knowledge of learning with new media to reach children. His work helped transform how television could serve as a tool for early childhood education.

Morrisett's scientific foundation began with his studies in psychology. He earned a BA in philosophy from Oberlin College in 1951. He later pursued graduate work at UCLA under Irving Maltzman. Maltzman specialized in human learning, creativity, and thinking. Morrisett eventually attended Yale University to earn a PhD in experimental psychology. At Yale, he apprenticed with Carl I. Hovland. Hovland founded the Yale Communications and Attitude Change program. This mentorship sparked Morrisett's lifelong interest in how information is communicated.

As a doctoral student, Morrisett explored the relationship between thought and physical action. His dissertation was titled "The Role of Implicit Practice in Learning." He investigated whether thinking about a task could improve performance. He tested this using activities like long-distance dart throwing and two-handed coordination. He concluded that thinking about dart throwing did not improve results. However, thinking about coordination tasks did help performance. This research is now recognized as an early contribution to the field of sports psychology.

After his academic training, Morrisett moved into the world of philanthropy. He joined the Carnegie Corporation of New York in 1959. He eventually rose to the position of vice president. During his ten years there, he focused on early education and human creativity. He became concerned with the educational disadvantages faced by poor and minority children. Morrisett directed six experiments to test different teaching methods for children. While these experiments were effective, they only reached a few hundred students. He realized he needed a much larger platform to close the education gap.

In 1965, Morrisett observed his three-year-old daughter, Sarah, watching television. He noticed she had memorized many television jingles. This observation led to a central hypothesis. If television could teach catchy advertising jingles, it could also teach substantive educational material. He discussed this idea with Joan Ganz Cooney in 1966. They explored using advertising techniques to teach letters and numbers. This concept became the foundation for the Children's Television Workshop. To fund this mission, Morrisett helped secure millions of dollars. This included $4 million from the U.S. Commissioner of Education and $1 million from Carnegie. The Ford Foundation also provided $3 million in support.

Sesame Street debuted on November 10, 1969, featuring characters like Jim Henson's Muppets. The program was a massive success in both education and entertainment. As of 2008, the series had won 118 Emmy Awards. This is more awards than any other television series. An estimated 77 million Americans watched the show during their childhood. The impact was global, with at least seventeen indigenous versions produced for different countries. The workshop also created other programs like The Electric Company and Pinky Dinky Doo.

Morrisett also served as the president of the John and Mary Markle Foundation. He shifted the foundation's focus from medicine to communications and information technology. He viewed philanthropy through a unique lens. He described his work as being like a "venture capital company." However, instead of seeking financial profit, he sought "social benefit." This approach aimed to invest resources into projects that created lasting positive change in society. He remained active in various leadership roles, including serving on the board of the RAND Corporation for thirty years. Morrisett passed away in 2023 at the age of 93.