Patients Reading circa 1930
| With the patient population growing steadily, lots of construction, renovation, remodeling, and refinishing occurred throughout the Brattleboro Retreat during the biennial ending in June, 1930. Buildings affected by this work included many wards (especially the ward bathrooms), the farm buildings, the superintendant’s home, Lawton Hall (the new out-patient building), garages (now that automobiles were more common), employee housing, and the female nurses’ home. The development of employee (nurse, doctor, staff, etc.) housing was of particular importance because even as the number of patients climbed, the number of doctors willing to work with the insane was declining nation-wide, and the ability of the hospital to have employees on-site at all times, and also content with comfortable living situations, was a major asset to the institution. |
Patients Reading circa 1930 |
|
Brattleboro Outing Club Ski Jump circa 1930 |
The
conversion of Lawton Hall from a gymnasium/casino/nurses home
to
an out-patient department marked a new branch of mental healthcare at the
Retreat, specifically care and treatment for “border-line” cases—people
who needed to “recuperate under ideal conditions but with more freedom
than on the ward.” This department was constantly full, and expansion
seemed entirely necessary. Despite this great amount of work and the fact that the hospital was in better “physical and general condition for the care, treatment, and comfort of the patients than ever before,” however, increased hospital capacity was needed to keep pace with the upward trend in patient numbers; if the hospital could not expand, it would likely be forced to start turning patients away. Among the hospital’s needs were an updated ventilating plant, fire-safety sprinkler system, and yearly ice storage, the construction of an infirmary for insane chronic physical invalids, more verandas on the wards, and repairs to chimneys and farm buildings including the piggery. |
| While the physical hospital was experiencing a fair amount of change, so too were the treatment regimens and day-to-day lives of the patients. Treatment methods for mental disease in the years surrounding 1930 included hydrotherapy and electrotherapy as before, but also saw the introduction of physiotherapy and occupational therapy. In occupational therapy patients made brooms, baskets, chairs, rugs, luncheon sets, and other items of use throughout the hospital. Perhaps the fact that 80% of the hospital’s in-patients were usefully employed in 1930 can be attributed to the occupational therapy department. Patients’ daily activities included chapel, holiday parties, plays, musicals, dancing, skating, skiing, and snowshoeing. The hospital also offered a dentistry department, the services of a dietician, and a beauty parlor. |
Patients Doing Craftwork circa 1930 |
Principal
Psychoses 1930 |
Though
seemingly running smoothly, there were occasional signs of trouble at
Brattleboro. For example, 1 of every 3 patients discharged was later readmitted
with a new episode of insanity. Based on this statistic, there was clearly
room for much advancement in the care of the mentally ill. There also
existed in 1930 the belief that the mentally handicapped were highly likely
to marry each other after discharge from the hospital, and would then
procreate and perpetuate the mentally ill population. In the era when
the eugenics movement still carried substantial and provocative weight,
the Supervisors of the Insane wrote in their 1930 biennium report, “It
would appear that some means should be provided to prevent the procreation
of children with an inherited tendency to crime, feeble-mindedness, epilepsy,
idiocy, imbecility, or insanity.” They followed with a proposed
bill to sterilize the “unfit” in Vermont. 23 states already
had sterilization laws at the time. |
