Matilda White Riley (April 19, 1911 – November 14, 2004) was an American gerontologist who began working at

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...

as a research specialist before becoming a professor from 1950 to 1973. Here she wrote a textbook and discovered her interest in aging. In 1973, Riley became the first woman full professor at

Bowdoin College Bowdoin College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine. When Bowdoin was chartered in 1794, Maine was still a part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The college offers 34 majors and 36 minors, as well as several joint eng ...

, where she worked until 1981. She spent much of her career as a sociologist specializing in aging at the

National Institute on Aging The National Institute on Aging (NIA) is a division of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), located in Bethesda, Maryland. The NIA itself is headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland. The NIA leads a broad scientific effort to understand the ...

, part of the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

. Additionally, Riley worked with the

Russell Sage Foundation The Russell Sage Foundation is an American non-profit organisation established by Margaret Olivia Sage in 1907 for “the improvement of social and living conditions in the United States.” It was named after her recently deceased husband, rail ...

from 1974 to 1977 where she wrote works on the age-stratification paradigm and aging society perspective.

Life and education

Matilda White Riley was born on April 19, 1911, in Boston, Massachusetts. She was raised by her grandmother in

Brunswick, Maine Brunswick is a town in Cumberland County, Maine, United States. The population was 21,756 at the 2020 United States Census. Part of the Portland-South Portland-Biddeford metropolitan area, Brunswick is home to Bowdoin College, the Bowdoin Intern ...

. Riley attended Brunswick High School; there she met her husband John (Jack) W. Riley Jr. In 1931, she earned her bachelor's (and later her master's degree) from

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston, ...

. Later that same year, she and John married. They were married for sixty-nine years until John's death in 2002. Together, the couple had two children, John W. Riley III and Lucy Sallick. Riley and her husband often worked side by side, recurrently co-authoring papers together. Their first joint scientific paper was published in the 1930s and concerned contraceptive behavior. Riley worked as a research assistant at

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

from 1932 to 1933 while John was a graduate student. From 1942 to 1944, Riley worked as a market researcher and an economist for the

War Production Board The War Production Board (WPB) was an agency of the United States government that supervised war production during World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt established it in January 1942, with Executive Order 9024. The WPB replaced the Sup ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. Along with her father, Riley established the Market Research Company of America from 1939 to 1949. Later she began a career in the Sociology of Aging at

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

and then at

. In 1972, Riley earned her Doctor of Science degree from Bowdoin College and then in 1973 earned her Doctor in Humane Letters from Rutgers University. Matilda White Riley and husband

Career highlights and accomplishments

Matilda White Riley was in charge of Social Science Research in the

National Institute of Aging The National Institute on Aging (NIA) is a division of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), located in Bethesda, Maryland. The NIA itself is headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland. The NIA leads a broad scientific effort to understand the ...

of the

. She was the one of the main chairperson for the NIA, who was mostly in charge of the health and behavior. She was also the co-chair of the joint Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Administration (ADAMHA, no
SAMSHA
and NIH Steering Committee for the Institute of Medicine's Project on Health and Behavior (1979–1982). She served as a spokesperson for the

National Institute of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late 1 ...

(NIH) for behavioral and social science research, coordinating research programs and giving presentations for the institute. She is credited with founding the Behavioral and Social Research Program at the

. She and her husband were co-presidents of the District of Columbia Sociological Society. From 1949 to 1960 she served as the Executive Officer of the

American Sociological Association The American Sociological Association (ASA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the discipline and profession of sociology. Founded in December 1905 as the American Sociological Society at Johns Hopkins University by a group of fif ...

(ASA), and later became the 77th President of the Association. Matilda White Riley had a total of 16 books that she wrote by herself or edited with other authors. Riley continued her work through her later years, she began focusing on age segregation and solutions to attain age integration. In 2016, the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences at the

announce
the Matilda White Riley Early Stage Investigator Honors
program.

Awards, honors, and distinctions

* Executive director of

(1949–1960) * President of the Eastern Sociological Society (1976) * Member of the

Institute of Medicine The National Academy of Medicine (NAM), formerly called the Institute of Medicine (IoM) until 2015, is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Medicine is a part of the National Academies of Sciences, E ...

(1979) * Associate director for behavioral and social research at the National Institute of Aging (1979–1991) * 77th president of the American Sociological Association (1985–1986) * Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

(1987) * Distinguished Scholar Award (1988) * ASA Section on Aging (1989) * Gerontological Society of America Distinguished Creative Contribution to Gerontology (1990) * Member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

(1994) * Social scientist emeritus at the NIH (1998) * Academy of Behavioral Medicine Research

Dedications

On May 8, 1996, the Matilda White Riley House was dedicated in her honor as part of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Bowdoin College. In 2016, the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences at the