Kentucky's First Asylum A Saga of the People and Practices |
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| Author:
| Deese, Alma Wynelle |
| ISBN: | 978-1-4620-7305-4 |
| Publication Date: | Jan 2012 |
| Publisher: | iUniverse, Incorporated
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| Book Format: | Hardback |
| List Price: | USD $36.95 |
Book Description:
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Asylums were first established to care for the unfortunates of society. It was only later they acquired a negative image. In Kentucky's First Asylum, author Alma Wynelle Deese explores this issue by dissecting the inner workings of the Eastern Kentucky Asylum, Kentucky's first asylum and the second state-supported asylum to be established in the United States. She describes the people who were involved in the creation and maintenance of a medical school, law department, and...
More Description
Asylums were first established to care for the unfortunates of society. It was only later they acquired a negative image. In Kentucky's First Asylum, author Alma Wynelle Deese explores this issue by dissecting the inner workings of the Eastern Kentucky Asylum, Kentucky's first asylum and the second state-supported asylum to be established in the United States. She describes the people who were involved in the creation and maintenance of a medical school, law department, and lunatic asylum in Lexington, Kentucky.
Using historical data, Deese presents a fictionalized narrative to explore this institution's history from 1817 to the 1990s including a chapter dedicated to 1906, a pivotal year for Eastern Kentucky Asylum. That year, four employees were charged in the murder of a patient, and this incident set the stage for the past and present history of this facility.
Kentucky's First Asylum provides a historical understanding of one early asylum that became a state hospital and serves to give broader context for the understanding of the current mental health system. It provides a platform to better comprehend the problems and processes of American psychiatric care.