G.F. Jacobson, Mental Health Pioneer in Crisis Therapy, Dies

Dr. Gerald F. Jacobson, founding director of the Didi Hirsch Community Mental Health Center and a psychiatrist considered a pioneer in the use of crisis intervention therapy, has died at a nursing home in Los Angeles.

Jacobson, who in 1962 also founded the Benjamin Rush Center in West Los Angeles--the first hospital-based walk-in clinic in the United States--was 65 when he died Aug. 22 of the complications of a heart attack.

Author of “The Multiple Crises of Marital Separation and Divorce,” a work that focused on the lingering effects of divorce on the health of former spouses, Jacobson became executive director of the Hirsch Center in Culver City in 1959.

The Hirsch Center became a community mental health facility in 1974 and today is considered a model for centers offering short-term psychotherapy to people in crisis situations and includes programs for drug abusers and those undergoing marital or other family problems.

It was named for philanthropist Didi Hirsch, who contributed much money to build the facility.

More than 20,000 people each year take advantage of the services at both the Hirsch and Rush centers. Rush was an 18th-Century physician who catered to the indigent and who had an interest in mental illness.

Jacobson was also a practicing psychoanalyst, founded a mental health clinic for the Retail Clerks Union in Santa Barbara and was an associate professor at the USC School of Medicine.

Born in Berlin, Jacobson came to the United States in 1938 and studied at USC. He held degrees in economics as well as medicine.

Survivors include his wife, Doris, three children and a sister.

A tribute has been scheduled at 4:30 p.m. Sept. 18 at the Hirsch Center, 4760 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Culver City.