07 Outcast

Uncle Harry, born in February 1922, spent his first five years at the Fond du Lac County Insane Asylum, a mental health facility on the outskirts of the city of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. His grandparents managed the asylum, and his parents, aunt and uncle, two cousins, and a great aunt and uncle also lived there, as part of the non-patient population. Today I'd like to write about the asylum, and its origins as a poorhouse – a place for the "outcasts" in Wisconsin in the 1800s to mid-1900s... 

Two years prior to Harry's birth, the 1920 census gives us a basic idea of the population at the asylum. There were 212 "insane patients," 99 men and 113 women, and 20 administrative staff and family members. Of the 212 patients, 69 were foreign-born, from 15 different countries; 117 were from Wisconsin and 26 from 12 other states. Ages of patients ranged from two fifteen-year-olds to a couple of 91- and 93-year-old widows. Administration was a bit of a family affair: of the 20 non-patients, about half were my relatives.

In most of the 19th century, people with various mental or physical afflictions who did not have close family support really were outcasts in society, and often ended up in jails or starving somewhere. Poorhouses were an early institutional solution, but were in many cases not much better than jails. Fond du Lac's poorhouse was built in 1856, just 8 years after Wisconsin became a state.

 

In 1871 the state commissioned a board to address better ways of dealing with the unfortunate, to "administer public charity and corrections based on sound principles of economy, justice, and humanity, and so that relations between the state and its dependent classes may become better understood." An 1885 report from the board gives a blunt assessment of Fond du Lac county's situation at that point:

"Fond du Lac County (46,855).  The surplus insane returned from the Northern Hospital, are kept in a brick building, the only decent building on the poor farm, constructed on the plan of single cells, on each side of a central corridor. There are no sitting rooms or dining rooms. The building is a fire trap, and is liable to burn up with half the insane any day. After much effort we have been able to secure from the authorities sufficient warmth to keep the insane from freezing in winter, and somewhat better clothing and bedding. There is a proper separation of the sexes and an attendant for each sex. The insane still eat from tin plates without any tables.
 
The poorhouse consists of a series of ruinous old buildings, with scanty furniture, which are not fit for human habitations. It is to be hoped now that the court house is built, that the county board will construct a poorhouse worthy of this wealthy county. The superintendent is elected by the county board...

Since the above was written, and while waiting for the printing of this part of the report, some steps have been taken looking toward a complete reform in the method of taking care of the insane at once, and the erection of a county asylum. We sincerely hope this may be done. Considering the population and wealth of Fond du Lac county, she is the most backward county in the state in the care of her paupers and of her insane."

Fond du Lac did erect a new county asylum a year after this report, on 172 acres of county property in 1886, adjacent to the poorhouse. Twenty years later Louis Kenyon was appointed superintendent, and served 1906-1927. This was a political post, so Louis must have been active in politics; other than being a farmer, useful for running the agricultural aspect of the operation, he had no training in running mental health facilities that I know of, so I am assuming this was a "learn-as-you-go" experience. His wife Ida became the "matron" of the institution, as was customary in these county asylums. 

Yearly conferences were held for the "Trustees, Superintendents and Matrons" of these county asylums in Wisconsin, hosted by one of the counties; conference proceedings provide fascinating insight into the concerns and operations of these asylums, which ranged from care of patients with various diagnoses, to issues with the agricultural operations of the farms. Some of the papers given at the 19th annual convention held June 9-11, 1920 include: "Experiences of a New Matron," "Some of the Causes of Insanity," and "How to Make a Poor Farm Pay." 

 

The late Dr. Darold A. Treffert, who worked with the asylum in the 1960s, wrote this nice summary of the asylum in a Fond du Lac Reporter column in 2015:  

"The county mental hospital is unique to Wisconsin. After state hospitals in Madison and Winnebago were filled to capacity by 1873, the legislature decided, instead of building more or larger state facilities... they would build small facilities 'rural, close to home, near blooming and growing things, a place to restore the spirit for persons broken on the wheels of living.' Ground was broken on 172 acres of county property and a hospital, designed by George Burke, opened in 1886. The ample land was farmed and provided vegetables and fruit in large quantities. A prize herd of dairy cows, at one time numbering 400, provided milk, butter and ice cream. Some of the men who were able and interested did the farm chores, just as they did on their own farms before succumbing to mental illness. Ladies exchanged stories and tales in the 'paring room' and kitchen. The superintendent and wife-matron lived in the facility, as did some attendants."

I don't know how often the asylum lived up to this picture of life there, but this news clipping does seem to show that at least some of the patients were not always kept separate from the rest of the town's population:

I was able to view an asylum register from the 1920s and 30s when I visited the Wisconsin State Historical Society Museum in Madison, Wisconsin – they had the large ledger book from Fond du Lac in a box in their archives. One big thing struck me: the number of people released in the 1930s after Social Security was implemented, now able to live on their own.

 

Today a Holiday Inn motel stands on the site of the old asylum, alongside the highway that loops around Fond du Lac. We now have better drugs, and diagnoses, but we do not always address the needs of our mentally ill and homeless as well as we did a century ago.

References:

First Biennial Report of the State Board of Charities and Reform of the State of Wisconsin, For the Years 1883 and 1884. Democrat Printing Co., State Printers, Madison, WI, 1885.

 

Keith, G. M., Odegard, B. O. (1939). A History of the State Board of Control of Wisconsin and the State Institutions, 1849-1939. United States: State board of control.

 

Rugg Anne V and Wisconsin Council on Developmental Disabilities. Children of Misfortune : One Hundred Years of Public Care for People with Mental Retardation in Wisconsin 1871-1971. Wisconsin Council on Developmental Disabilities 1984.

 

Treffert, Dr. Darold A. "Broken on the wheels of living; the history of mental health in FDL." FDL Reporter, 24 Feb 2015, accessed online 15 Feb 2023.

Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Images reproduced by FamilySearch.