Difference between revisions of "Portal:Featured Article Of The Week"

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|Title= East Tennessee Hospital for the Insane
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|Title= Boston State Hospital
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|Body= The East Tennessee Hospital for the Insane was built on land previously owned by Capt. William Lyon, after more than a dozen years of funding stops and starts and political infighting. The East Tennessee Hospital for the Insane opened in 1886 with 99 patients transferred from the older Tennessee Lunatic Asylum in Nashville. In 1920, the facility's name was changed to Eastern State Hospital as part of a program to rename all of the asylums in the state.
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|Body= The Boston State Hospital – originally called the Boston Lunatic Asylum – was founded in South Boston in 1839. By the 1880s, new ideas about the care of the mentally ill emphasized the importance of fresh air, hard work, and separation from the adverse influences (both social and environmental) of city life, an approach that was referred to as “moral treatment.” Thus, when the time came to move out of the old and overcrowded facilities in South Boston, the Asylum’s leaders looked to West Roxbury – at that time a semi-rural area that had only recently been incorporated into the city of Boston – as an appropriate setting for a new hospital.
  
In 1956, Gov. Frank Clement tours Eastern State, calls what he saw — including 984 patients sleeping on floor pallets because of lack of beds — sad but not surprising. Following the 1955 invention of the tranquilizer, the hospital adopted a new form of treatment. In 1960, they introduced the $2 million Therapeutic Village, which included cottages, a store, a clinic, a coffee bar, a chapel and a pool. Gov. Winfield Dunn appointed a committee to investigate conditions after Rep. Richard Krieg leads unannounced post-midnight visit to overcrowded wards in 1971. The Committee found too little staff, too little training, and unsanitary and inhumane conditions in aging buildings.
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Beginning in 1884, some Asylum residents were moved to the former almshouse at Austin Farm, just across Morton Street from the present Boston Nature Center, where the Harvard Commons development stands today. In 1892, looking for more room for both buildings and farmland, the City purchased the 35-acre Pierce Farm, along Walk Hill and Canterbury Streets – part of which land is now the western end of the BNC. A few years later, the City bought another parcel of land, adjoining Pierce Farm and Canterbury Street, which now includes much of the Clark Cooper Community Gardens and other areas in the central part of the BNC.
  
By 1977, the hospital's name was changed to Lakeshore Mental Institute. Shortly thereafter, in 1980, the state began their plan to shift the patients at Lakeshore to community. State revenue shortfall in 1990 forced reduction of staff, beds; long-term patients released into community. More than half of new admissions denied. State "census" of mentally ill among homeless suggests figure jumped from 12 percent in 1986 to 47 percent. On June 30, 2012 after 126 years of operation, Lakeshore Mental Health Institute officially closed as part of a $25 million budget reduction measure. Not much later, in the spring of 2013, a former employee found patients' records laying in one the buildings, which contained case numbers, dates of birth and Social Security numbers. Currently, plans are to demolish all structures and use the property as a park.  [[East Tennessee Hospital for the Insane|Click here for more...]]
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It was soon decided that Austin Farm would house women, while Pierce Farm became the “Department for Men” of the recently renamed Boston Insane Hospital. The new buildings at Pierce Farm, designed by city architect Edmund March Wheelwright, opened in 1895, and a few additional farm buildings were added over the following years.  [[Boston State Hospital|Click here for more...]]
 
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Revision as of 05:02, 9 September 2018

Featured Article Of The Week

Boston State Hospital


BostonSH.png

The Boston State Hospital – originally called the Boston Lunatic Asylum – was founded in South Boston in 1839. By the 1880s, new ideas about the care of the mentally ill emphasized the importance of fresh air, hard work, and separation from the adverse influences (both social and environmental) of city life, an approach that was referred to as “moral treatment.” Thus, when the time came to move out of the old and overcrowded facilities in South Boston, the Asylum’s leaders looked to West Roxbury – at that time a semi-rural area that had only recently been incorporated into the city of Boston – as an appropriate setting for a new hospital.

Beginning in 1884, some Asylum residents were moved to the former almshouse at Austin Farm, just across Morton Street from the present Boston Nature Center, where the Harvard Commons development stands today. In 1892, looking for more room for both buildings and farmland, the City purchased the 35-acre Pierce Farm, along Walk Hill and Canterbury Streets – part of which land is now the western end of the BNC. A few years later, the City bought another parcel of land, adjoining Pierce Farm and Canterbury Street, which now includes much of the Clark Cooper Community Gardens and other areas in the central part of the BNC.

It was soon decided that Austin Farm would house women, while Pierce Farm became the “Department for Men” of the recently renamed Boston Insane Hospital. The new buildings at Pierce Farm, designed by city architect Edmund March Wheelwright, opened in 1895, and a few additional farm buildings were added over the following years. Click here for more...