Date of Award

12-2020

Document Type

Campus Access Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

History

First Advisor

Timothy Hacsi

Second Advisor

Benjamin Johnson

Third Advisor

Olivia Weisser

Abstract

This thesis is focused on The Psychogram newsletter, which was a periodical that ran from 1916-1977 at Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital in Morris Plains, New Jersey. Patients played a role in every facet of its production. It provided the reader with information regarding the workings of a psychiatric hospital and the unique insight that the patients provide regarding their experiences and understanding of their treatment. Patients shared poetry, artwork, book reviews, and letters to staff. Staff also wrote articles for families that had relatives staying at the hospital to provide them with information regarding treatments and the general welfare of the institution. The Psychogram was produced in the hospital’s expansive occupational therapy program, which grew under the direction of Medical Director Britton Duroc Evans. Evans played a key role in the development and implementation of The Psychogram, as well as incorporating a range of therapeutic treatments under the occupational therapy program, which helped patients to maintain a sense of normalcy while being treated at an institution during a turbulent period in the history of mental healthcare. The Psychogram helped to dispel misconceptions that families had regarding the treatment of the mentally ill within an institutional setting. The unique voices of the patients and staff I will examine demonstrate how therapeutic programs changed, if there was continuity, and how Evans laid the groundwork for the future of the hospital.

Comments

Free and open access to this Campus Access Thesis is made available to the UMass Boston community by ScholarWorks at UMass Boston. Those not on campus and those without a UMass Boston campus username and password may gain access to this thesis through resources like Proquest Dissertations & Theses Global or through Interlibrary Loan. If you have a UMass Boston campus username and password and would like to download this work from off-campus, click on the "Off-Campus UMass Boston Users" link above.

Download
Off-Campus UMass Boston Users

Share

COinS