Portal:Featured Article Of The Week
Featured Article Of The Week
Central State Hospital
Chartered in 1837, Central State Hospital Central State Hospital was a product of the nineteenth century's social reform movement. Since its founding, the hospital not only has cared for thousands of patients but also has been the focus of political discussions in Georgia regarding the role of government and public health. By the 1960s Central State Hospital had become the largest mental health institution in the United States.
Movements to reform prisons, create public schools, and establish state-run hospitals for the mentally ill swept across the nation during the first decades of the nineteenth century. In 1837 Georgia politicians responded by passing a bill calling for the creation of a "State Lunatic, Idiot, and Epileptic Asylum." Located in Milledgeville, the state capital at that time, construction of the facility was completed in October 1842, and the hospital admitted its first patient later that year.
Care of patients was based on the "institution as family" model, which asserted that hospitals were best organized when they resembled extended families. This model met with great success at Milledgeville, particularly under the leadership of Dr. Thomas A. Green, who served at the hospital from 1845 to 1879. Click here for more...
