Early Life and Education
Alexander Theodore "Sasha" Shulgin was born on June 17, 1925, in Berkeley, California. His father, Theodore Stevens Shulgin, was a Russian immigrant who taught history and literature in Oakland; his mother, Henrietta D. Aten, was a poet and English teacher. Intellectually precocious, Shulgin won a scholarship to Harvard University at the age of 16, where he began studying organic chemistry. He left Harvard during his second year to enlist in the United States Navy during World War II, serving as a pharmacist's mate aboard a destroyer escort in the North Atlantic, where one of his duties was administering amphetamines to crew members to sustain wakefulness during prolonged operations.
After his military service, Shulgin returned to California and enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley. He earned his bachelor's degree in chemistry in 1949, followed by a PhD in biochemistry in 1954. His postdoctoral work included stints at the University of California, San Francisco, in the fields of pharmacology and psychiatry.
