Harry Cherkos, Feeble-Minded Child, Selling Papers, 1910, courtesy Library of Congress

Twentieth-century psychiatry embraced many conditions as madness, including epilepsy, alcoholism, and melancholia (what we now call depression). Early psychiatrists, called alienists at the time,  did not hesitate to stick an “insanity” label on a host of conditions, nor did they excuse any member of society.

Dr. John H.W. Rhein began a 1915 article in the American Journal of Insanity by discussing insanity in children. He stated that few children were in asylums because it was easier to treat them at home. The youngest case of insanity in children (on record) was nine months, said Dr. Rhein. Of 39 cases he had personally studied, five were in 5-7 year-olds.

Neurotic and Epileptic Child, courtesy Library of Congress

Here is a typical case: Female, age 5. “After being threatened with being shut up in a closet and having heard tales of dark places where witches live and the like, was very much frightened…and for months thereafter raved and muttered about hobgoblins. When she recovered she was very much changed.”

A Case of Paralysis in an Insane Child, 1899, courtesy National Institutes of Health

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