Gwynne Nettler

Biography

When Nettler was young, he acted as a stuntman in multiple Tarzan films, as well as the original Mutiny on the Bounty film. He was also a talented swimmer, and was on a water polo team. He was educated at the University of California, Los Angeles (A.B.), Claremont College (M.A.), and Stanford University (Ph.D., 1946). Early in his career, he worked as the senior clinical psychologist at the Nevada State Department of Health, and as an industrial psychologist in Mexico City, Mexico. He began teaching at the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1947, and he subsequently became a part-time cat-burglar, so much so that a 1951 Time article described him as a "wonderful burglar specializing in rugs, lamps and other bric-a-brac". He joined the faculty of the University of Alberta in 1963, where he was promoted to full professor in 1966; he remained on the faculty there until he retired in 1978.