Portal:Featured Article Of The Week
Featured Article Of The Week
Longview State Hospital
The first asylum for the insane erected in Ohio was built in Cincinnati, under an act of the Legislature, passed January 22, 1821, entitled, "an act establishing a Commercial Hospital and Lunatic Asylum for the state of Ohio." By the terms of this enactment the trustees of Cincinnati township were to furnish a site for said institution, containing not less than four acres of land, within one mile of the public landing on the Ohio river, and erect the necessary buildings (which were to be of brick) for the safe-keeping, comfort and medical treatment of such idiots, lunatics and insane persons of this state as might be brought to it for these purposes. The trustees were to receive certain compensation for the care of such patients, to be paid by the county sending the same, if paupers, or by the friends or guardians, if the patients had estates.
In addition, the trustees were required to admit and care for, free of charge, all boatmen belonging to boats owned by citizens of Ohio or to boats of the citizens of other states which provided hospital accommodations to boatmen of this state. There were also required to receive into said institution, and care for, all the paupers of Cincinnati township. The institution was to be known as "The Commercial Hospital and Lunatic Asylum of Ohio." The state donated, for the purpose of assisting in the erection of said asylum, $10,000 in depreciated or uncurrent bank bills then in the state treasury, from which were realized $3,500 in specie.
The Commercial Hospital and Lunatic Asylum of Ohio was the parent institution from which afterwards sprung the Orphan Asylum, the City Infirmary, the Cincinnati Hospital and Longview Asylum. It was the beginning, on the part of the state, which has led to the establishment of the great benevolent institutions of which every citizen of Ohio is justly proud. Click here for more...
