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

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|Title= Eloise Asylum
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|Title= San Antonio State Hospital
|Image= Eloise13.png
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|Image= SanAntonioTX_SH_PC_01_WEBEDIT.jpg
 
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|Body= In 1839, only two years after Michigan had joined the Union, Wayne County paid $800 to buy a 160-acre farm in Nankin Township (now Westland). The purchase included a log cabin known as the Black Horse Tavern. The County erected an addition to the tavern building and used it to house 35 needy people, a keeper and his wife. They called it the Wayne County Poorhouse. Its first residents were transferred from another poorhouse at Gratiot and Mt. Elliott in Detroit . Many refused to move, claiming the new poorhouse was "too far out in the wilderness." And they were right -- at that time the corner of Michigan and Merriman was nearly two days by stage coach from Detroit.
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|Body= In 1889 the Texas legislature passed a bill establishing a state mental institution to serve Southwest Texas. The new facility was to occupy at least 640 acres and be capable of housing 500 patients. It was to be known as the Southwestern Insane Asylum (not the Southwestern Lunatic Asylum, as it has sometimes been called). A site was selected five miles south of San Antonio and $200,000 was appropriated for the new hospital. The facility began operation on April 6, 1892 with a capacity of 200 patients.
  
But that was what the county officials had in mind. They wanted somewhere well out of sight to send what they saw as society's dregs -- the vagrants, vagabonds, drunkards, pilferers and brawlers. With such a broad charter, it wasn't long before the feeble-minded and the insane were being housed there. Records show that a Biddy Hughes was Eloise's first official mental patient, committed by her family in 1841. She was in her mid-30s when admitted and was kept there until her death 58 years later.
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In the first eight months of operation the patient population grew to 142. By August 23, 1894, there were 225 patients. Provisions for 300 more patients were authorized when $70,000 was appropriated in 1898, and in 1910, $100,000 was voted for expansion to accommodate an additional 300. This addition consisted of one wing each on the male and female departments and two buildings for tubercular. The improvements were completed in 1910 and the hospital could then accommodate 1,000 patients. In 1911 another appropriation of $45,000 was given to construct a building for 100 men, providing care to acute cases and all those who require extra attention. By 1912 the facilities could accommodate 1,140, and improvements were valued at $500,000. By 1915 the hospital's capacity was 1,800. In 1917 a training school for nurses in psychiatry was begun. This school, the only one of its kind in the state system, continued with a three-year course until 1942.  [[San Antonio State Hospital|Click here for more...]]
 
 
Prior to the 1840s, little distinction was made between rational and mentally ill inmates. A county report from the 1840s made reference to harsh restraints used to separate the mentally ill from other inmates. The mentally ill were housed on the upper floor of a farm building used to keep pigs.
 
 
 
County employee Stanislas M. Keenan reported in his 1913 book, "The History of Eloise," that in the first few years people in the surrounding area heard "the chained unfortunates roaring and shrieking in discord with the squealing pigs beneath." Conditions improved in 1869 when the mentally ill were moved to a new building where they were supervised by a neighboring farmer and his wife. But the chains remained until 1881, when Dr. E.O. Bennett, Eloise's first medical superintendent, did away with them.  [[Eloise Asylum|Click here for more...]]
 
 
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Revision as of 03:37, 7 March 2021

Featured Article Of The Week

San Antonio State Hospital


SanAntonioTX SH PC 01 WEBEDIT.jpg

In 1889 the Texas legislature passed a bill establishing a state mental institution to serve Southwest Texas. The new facility was to occupy at least 640 acres and be capable of housing 500 patients. It was to be known as the Southwestern Insane Asylum (not the Southwestern Lunatic Asylum, as it has sometimes been called). A site was selected five miles south of San Antonio and $200,000 was appropriated for the new hospital. The facility began operation on April 6, 1892 with a capacity of 200 patients.

In the first eight months of operation the patient population grew to 142. By August 23, 1894, there were 225 patients. Provisions for 300 more patients were authorized when $70,000 was appropriated in 1898, and in 1910, $100,000 was voted for expansion to accommodate an additional 300. This addition consisted of one wing each on the male and female departments and two buildings for tubercular. The improvements were completed in 1910 and the hospital could then accommodate 1,000 patients. In 1911 another appropriation of $45,000 was given to construct a building for 100 men, providing care to acute cases and all those who require extra attention. By 1912 the facilities could accommodate 1,140, and improvements were valued at $500,000. By 1915 the hospital's capacity was 1,800. In 1917 a training school for nurses in psychiatry was begun. This school, the only one of its kind in the state system, continued with a three-year course until 1942. Click here for more...