Exile: Homelessness and Northampton State Hospital
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Speaker:
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Christopher J. Sparks, Historian and Writer
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Date:
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Wednesday, March 17, 2021 at 7 pm
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Photograph from a scrapbook about the
Northampton State Hospital dating to 1930. |
Northampton was an agricultural and industrial community of just 6,500 when, on a July 4th afternoon in 1856, local and state dignitaries laid the cornerstone for the third state hospital for persons labeled as mentally ill in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
This program will compare 19th century thinking about the root causes of psychiatric disorders, which led to the establishment of the hospital, with 20th century ideas about mental health, which culminated with the closing of the hospital. We will explore two documents: Dr. Edward Jarvis's “Insanity and Idiocy in Massachusetts” from 1855, (it was so influential that a copy was sealed in the cornerstone of the original building) and video segments from Frontline’s “A Place for Madness,” produced in 1994, on the closing of Northampton State Hospital. |
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A lifelong Northampton resident, Christopher Sparks took an interest in the Northampton State Hospital shortly after it was abandoned. He researches and writes about the hospital with the mission to analyze its history as a symptom of public intolerance of the mentally ill.
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This public talk is presented in partnership with Northampton Open Media.
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