The Pearsall Leader. (Pearsall, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 20, Ed. 1 Thursday, August 13, 1908 Page: 3 of 8
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: Texas Borderlands Newspaper Collection and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the UNT Libraries.
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LIVE FOR WEEKS
IN THE BATHTUB
Feature of New Treatment for Those Who Fear
Insanity or Who Are Really Threatened with
Mental Breakdown—Novel Plans for Preventing
the Dread Calamity of Madness..
Dr. Charles W. Pilgrim, Superintendent of the Hudson River State Hospital
for the Insane.
yEW YORK state’s new Acute
I hospital, on the grounds of the
Hudson River State Hospital
A ^ for the Insane, at Poughkeep-
sie, which will be opened next
October, represents the newest de-
parture in the treatment of mental
“faults.”
Any man or woman may go there of
his or her free will and ask to be ob-
served. It will be done free of charge
—if the patient cannot pay. If he or
she can, the charge will run from 50
cents to ten dollars a week.
It is to be refuge for those who fear
they are going mad, to be observed
and treated before it is too late. It
provides the chance to get well after
a nervous breakdown or mental col-
lapse without undergoing the stigma
of insanity. If there is nothing wrong
the physicians will return the patient
to the world without comment; .if
there is any sign of incipient insanity
the patient will be properly treated.
If the treatment fails he or she will
be committed in the regulation way,
as it is done now.
The building is completed now at a
cost of $100,000. Only the interior
remains to be finished. It is absolute-
ly fireproof; there is nothing inflam-
mable but the wooden floors and trim.
There are reception rooms, a main
dining-room and dormitories. It re-
sembles a well-conducted summer hotel
more than an insane asylum.
No More Fetters or Handcuffs.
A century ago an insane person was
at once put in chains and manacles
and cast into a dungeon cell until
death came as a merciful relief. It
was only the other day that a con-
gressman, visiting the Hudson River
State Hospital for the Insane—it is
not called an asylum—asked to see
the fetters and handcuffs used on the
paients. There isn’t one.
It is not a prison; it is a place to
cure. Times have changed.
Here is the situation to-day: You
have had a great shock; you have
been immensely worried and you feel
that something is going to snap; you
are afraid “there is a screw loose
somewhere!”
“Am I going mad?” you ask your-
self.
It is then time to visit the Acute
hospital.
Suppose you really are insane, the
way you would have been treated in
the past is this: A committee was ap-
pointed for your person. Your estate
was taken in charge. You were regu-
larly passed upon by the physicians,
and a commitment issued. The next
thing you knew you found yourself in
an insane asylum with no chance of
getting out unless the doctors said
you were cured.
But how is this done now?
You f»el that something is wrong.
You find that you can’t collect your
thoughts. Your memory fails you.
You are peevish, nervous, excitable,
melancholy. You are in great distress
over your mental health. Yet you feel
pretty sure you are not insane, though
folks may shake their heads behind
your back and some of your best
friends may remark that you are not.
yourself
What is there to do? Just take the
train to Poughkeepsie, ask for T)r.
Charles W. Pilgrim, superintendent of
the Hudson River Hospital for the In-
sane, and tell him what is the matter.
The First Treatment.
You are conducted to ihe Acute hos-
pital, or Psychopathic ward <as they
choose to call it up there. You tell
your history and what you fear is the
matter. You are asked to step inside
a reception room. No attendants are
about, and you are your own master—
or mistress—and a few questions are
asked. Perhaps a physician takes a
specimen of your blood to ascertain
the condition of your health.
If your case demands it you are as-
signed to a quiet room furnished as
well as the Waldorf-Astoria and just
as clean, with hardwood floors, a hand-
some enameled bed, bureau, chairs
and the like. The physician comes in
and chats with you. You tell him
frankly what your worries are. You
are afraid of yourself; your mind
doesn’t seers to work just right. You
ar£ hysterical; you can’t sleep; you
can’t eat; you -want to scream out
every minute.
“Take this lady to her room and
we’ll try the continuous bath,” says
the physician.
After you have put on your bath-
robe a pretty trained nurse in a smart
little cap and a trim blue uniform puts
her arm around your waist and off
you go to a most wonderful room,
filled with all sorts of taps and faucets
and quiet as the grave.
In the middle of the room is a bath-
tub of the finest porcelain, fitted with
nickeled plumbing. Near by is some
electric apparatus with a thermometer,
which rings a bell should the water
in the tub go above the temperature
which the physician has ordered.
Hammock in the Bath.
But this is no ordinary tub. Within
it is a canvas hammock with a head
rest, about such as you might find
on any summer porch. You lie down
in it and the water is turned on, just
the right temperature and just the
right force. There you lie, with the
warm water softly enveloping you.
The nurse puts a rubber pillow be-
neath your head.
“Now, go to sleep,” she tells you.
"We’ll wake you up at supper time.”
You sleep. At supper time there is
a dainty tray with just a sliver of
chicken and a bit of lettuce, a slice of
toast and a dab of strawberry jam.
You haven’t eaten for a month. You
have slept, however, for perhaps two
hours. You are hungry. You start to
get out of the bath.
“No, lie right where you are,” cau-
tions the nurse, “this is going to be
your home until we get you well
again.”
All the old-fogy notions about not
eating before you bathe are cast to
the winds. You stay in the hammock
in the bathtub, geting calmer every
minute. You sleep for six hours;
more than you have slept at a stretch
for months. Next morning, breakfast
is served to you in the tub, then din-
ner, then supper. If you are calm
enough you may read, but you must
stay in the tub. You find yourself
growing calmer and calmer and calm-
er. The doctor drops in occasionally
and chats with you. Perhaps he takes
a sample of your blood again to see
if you are well nourished or not.
Signs of Improvement.
You notice that birds are singing
outside in the trees. You are taking
naps, when before you couldn’t sleep
at all. You are hungry before meal
times. You are beginning to feel that
you have rested long enough. You
haven’t the slightest desire to scream
aloud. You wonder why people should
be nervous at all.
“I think you might try to see the
view this morning,” says the physician
when he comes in to see you the next
day.
The nurse helps you get out of your
bath and dress, and you are gently led
to a wide porch which looks out on the
sun-kissed hills and valleys of the
lordly Hudson. There is nothing near
by to disturb except the silent labor
of a few men, quietly picking carrots
and peas for your dinner, all of them
insane but getting well.
It is all so restful and peaceful.
You begin to wonder why you ever
wanted to scream aloud or why you
thought the world was against you.
The days slip silently by. You are
content and rested. Suddenly you
realize that you are yourself again.
But not before the doctor does. One
bright morning he comes into your
room. You are hungry for breakfast.
You have slept nine hours without a
dream. You want to be up and doing.
“I think you may go hom« now,”
he tells you. “You are well again.
But it was a close call.”
You have been saved. Another week
—perhaps another day—and your
mind might have been gone forever.
Now you are yourself again, ready to
go out into the world and face it with-
out a qualm.
That is the way New York is saving
those about-to-be insane.
Many Patients Cured.
This splendid place up on the Hud-
son near Poughkeepsie has 2,200 pa-
tients. It averages two new ones a
day. Some 25 per cent, of all those
received are discharged as cured. But
of those who have incipient insanity
and can be taken in time the per-
centage of cures is 70 per cent.
The Acute ward has been built for
Incipient cases—those on the verge
of insanity. It wants people to come
of their own accord. It wants to get
cases before they become chronic, in
order that there may be a chance to
cure.
Dr. I. G. Harris took a writer for the
Sunday World around the new build-
ing the other day. It looks like a well-
built hotel. There are accommoda-
tions for SO patients, 40 of each sex.
For those who are not excitable there
are small dormitories; for other cases
there are private rooms.
In each wing there is a reception
room and dining-room and an open-air
porch. The patients sit six at a table
just as they might in a hotel, at tables
decked with flowers and bearing spot-
less silver and immaculate linen. The
food is far better than the average
boarding-house provides.
There are three floors, each with
its separate rooms and dormitories,
and rooms for physicians and attend-
ants. Each floor has its own sitting
room and bath arrangements for the
continuous bath, and there are also
all the other kinds of bath which any
sick person might need—douche, sitz,
needle, rain, spray and ordinary tub
and shower.
There is a fully-equipped electric
room, too, where there are electric
baths, X rays, static treatment and
other things of twentieth century in-
vention.
Like Any Other Disease.
“Insanity,” said Dr. Harris, “is just
like any other disease. The sooner we
get it the better the chance for a
cure. The trouble is to-day that we
get the average case only after it
has become chronic. If we could pos-
sleep; she is tearing around, imagining
the whole world is against her. We
put. her in the continuous bath. She
sleeps there and eats there. You can
hardly imagine the change that comes
over her. And if things are favorable
her cure is very simple.
“If she needs It, we have the elec-
tricity. There is a massage table,
where tired muscles may be started
anew and the blood gain freshened
circulation. She may be just on the
borderland—this treatment will often
save her. She gets quieted nerves
and new hope; that is the start of a
cure.
“Of course, some Wfll apply who are
not Insane, but think they may be.
It may be only prostration. Imagine
the relief to them when we tell them
that they are all right mentally—
not insane, but mentally tired.
“One of the great rewards of our
profession is the thanks we often get
from those we have cured. They did
not know at the time what the mat-
ter was, but after they had been
cured they realized what had been
done for them. I think there is noth-
ing that can satisfy a physician more
than the appreciation of those he has
saved from mental night.”
Already there have been many appli-
cants for the new treatment. When
thejiew hospital opens it will be first
come, first served. If the patients be
found to improve upon treatment they
will not be deemed insane. If they
should fail mentally after a period of
six months, then the regular commit-
ment proceedings will ensue, just as
they would have done had the patient
waited till the disease had progressed
too far.
Work When Possible.
To-day 75 per cent, of the men pa-
tients and 65 per cent, of the women
patients at Poughkeepsie are able to
work. This gives their minds some-
thing to think about and helps toward
a cure, if this be possible. They are
encouraged to wear their own clothes
if they can afford it, and they are al-
lowed to receive as many visitors as
the doctors consider good for them
There are games for them to play,
and pianos, if they are musicians.
Bathing is insisted upon. If the pa-
tients want to bathe they may do so
as often as they please. If they don’t
want to, then they must ,at regular
School 1
Destined to
Single Dies.
By MISS CATHARINE GOGGIN,
Secretary of Chicago Teachers* Federatlo-
ln the Reception Room.
periods. Those who can be trusted are
allowed the freedom of the grounds;
others even may go to town If they
desire.
But, what is best of all, it costs
nothing if the patient cannot pay.
Board, lodging, medical attendance,
clothing, everything—the state of
New York will pay for if you cannot.
If you can pay $1, $2, $5, $10, all right.
But all this newest treatment is
free if you cannot pay.—New York
World.
Sampling the Blood of a Young Man
Threatened with Mental Derange-
ment.
sibly get it in its first stages the
chance of a cure would be so much
the greater.
“In this new ward we will encourage
patients to come of themselves. Of
course, we would hardly take a paretic
or one with senile dementia, but where
it is a case of nervous breakdown we
would be only too glad. We will put
in this new ward all those cases in
which we consider there is ground for
hope. That doesn’t mean that we
have in the other departments no pa-
tients for whom there is no hope—
far from it. But when we think the
case is incipient we will put the case ;
in this new ward, there to start the i
cure—if it be possi-hje^as soon as i
possible.
‘ People sick physically are often
sick mentally. Those are the cases we
can best reach. A little quiet and rest,
good food, peaceful surroundings, and
the cure is far easier than it would
have been had the patient been kept
at home to allow his or her case to
become chronic.
Sleep and Eat in Bath.
“Suppose we get a patient who Is
excited and restless. Sh. eannot
An Appetizer.
“A lot of people who never buy any-
thing come in here and loaf around
and tune up their systems,” says a
market man. “When those unprofit-
able visitors began to hang around my
shop I felt Inclined to resent their
cheek.
“But when they explained the reason
I hadn't the heart to turn them out.
It seems that a few doctors in this
town have more common sense than
professional sagacity. They have come
io the conclusion that the best appe-
tizer a man can find is uncooked cuts
of roasts and steaks and fresh fruits
and vegetables; so, instead of filling
their patients up with pills, they just
prescribe a walk around to a combina-
tion meat and green grocer’s market,
where big whiffs of nature’s real tonic
are on tap free of cost.
“So every day my market is turned
into a clinic for dyspeptics. They take
up room, and often get in the way, but
1 don’t like to kick. I was always
soft, and. anyway, the new treatment
means new customers for me in the
end, so I shall not be out anything.”
Railroad Helps African City.
The completion of the Uganda rail-
road from Mombasa to Port Florence,
on Lake Victoria, 580 miles, suddenly
brought Mombasa into prominence as
one of the future mainland ports of
'ast Africa, and this has enhanced
f nm year to year until now Mombasa
is a port of call for all the regular*
steamship lines maintaining communi-
cation with Europe. The Uganda rail-
road taps not only the heart of Central
Africa, but draws a considerable
amount of its carrying trade from sec-
tions of German East Africa not
reached by the German railroads.
Very little if any of the goods shipped
to or from points served by the Uganda
railroad reach Zanzibar for trans-
shipment.—Consular and Trade Re-
po rts.
Ninety per cent, of the
United States are women.
Sixty per cent, of these arc
to single blessedness.
Eighty per cent, of the tea<
are forced to work for their livin
Ten per cent, of the wed
voreecs.
Of the remaining ten per c
in ten finds any bliss in marriec
These figures are based on
life. As treasurer of the Ten
most active manager of the
had opportunity to prove them.
By their vocations teachers are imperative. (
with the unruly natures of children mak'-
a woman whose desires are expressed ns ■ ■
husband eagerly avoids.
The so-called master of the house doesn't want
wants a baby, lie doesn’t even desire the n
a school teacher might bring into his home.
Man holds his own liberty and peace of i m
than a piece of mind from his domestic i : i r,
equipped that mind may be.
If a school teacher must earn her own living -
earn as well the living of the drone who cap! iva
school ma’am, should she not be content with -
Again the school teacher is not equip] h h,r
is not, as a rule, attractive to men. Teach r~ a
seldom can be called beautiful. The mind ol i
pomades, curling irons, rouges and cos- a - i:
determining her fortune. A pedagogue's Imanry w ;
centage in her examination. And the school teach
cializing in dressmaking and millinery.
The average “hired girl” has a far better chant
py than lias the woman teacher.
Anil I want to say right here, that the av rage
off than tiro average school teacher.
The salary of the average school teacher is
year. She can work only nine months mid n
months in each year. The salary of the avci age c
a year. The cook is in greater demand ;
earns twice as much, for she receives her oar
dilion to her salary. She has her nights ok. -
nights as well as days to handle her e:.
work for the coming day's lessons. I tell \uu >
Nature’s
Hints
of Im-
mortality
If the
vine power
the buried
from its pi
ed in the
made in the i
stoops to give
cred blossoms
sweet assuram
He withhold
sons of men w
If matter, mi
changed b}r th
tude of forms,
al spirit of man suffer annihilation after
a brief visit, like a royal guest, to this
clay ?
Bather let us believe that lie
parent prodigality, wastes not the rain 1
of grass, or the evening's sighing zep
them all to carry out its eternal plans,
mortality to the mortal, and gather l i
spirits of our friends. Instead of ;
look up and address our departed i
the poet:
“Thy day has come, not gone
Thy sun lias risen, not set;
Thy life is now beyond
The -reach of death or cliang
Not ended—but begun.
O noble soul; O gentle heart!
Hail, and farewell.”
who,
If
a
Bite You
By DR. WILLIAM L. WHEELER,
Pasteur Institute, New York City.
death.
produce
is so final
Ihe figure
• bites oi
DOg mines m
slight won
incut be fo
statute we
by a dog, a
nothing up
the means <
The Past
without doubt the most successfi 1 that ~
The thing above all else that the p
every dog; that bites or snaps has not n
dog falls in a lit and froths at the mouth «
from hydrophobia.
While the public should not heroine >
neither should it neglect any precatu u
ing from a dog bite, for instance, should ?;•>
diagnosis of the dog’s condition. Hyor
in a different manner. With all the exp no
dogs suffering from rabies, 1 can he fooled
antes. I never make a guess with any dog.
> xanimation.
Summed up, there should never be a
•ii ion ami control of your nerves is all th
he effect of any dog bite, whether the dog be
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Neeley, Houston. The Pearsall Leader. (Pearsall, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 20, Ed. 1 Thursday, August 13, 1908, newspaper, August 13, 1908; Pearsall, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth988242/m1/3/?q=central+place+railroads: accessed June 30, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .