Patients and Staff Playing Croquet at Willard Asylum, circa 1880, courtesy Robert Bogdan Collection, disabilitymuseum.org

Inspections are simply written and verbal snapshots of an investigator’s particular visit. That visit may have occurred during an exceptionally good or bad time, or during a relatively normal period. Inspections at the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians are somewhat erratic in content, but it does seem clear that it was a better-run place during its earlier years. When it was inspected in 1916, the patient population was small enough that the staff could engage with them in a positive way:

“Calisthentics, [sic] breathing exercises, and marching are provided for such patients as are able to receive physical training. The play-ground equipment consists of outfits for baseball, basket ball, quoits, tennis, and one giant stride [slide], six swings, one portable see-saw, one teeter, tennis and a sixteen pound shot, all of which are popular especially the swings and shot. The play-ground exercises are supervised by the attendants.” The inspector added that instruction in hygiene and sanitation “with especial reference to personal cleanliness is given by the attendants.”

At the time, there were 47 patients in the asylum, mainly in their 20s – 40s. Many would have had some physical problems, but in general, they represented a relatively vigorous age group. Attendants and laborers may well have had a little more time than they did later, to interact with patients who were not otherwise taking up a great deal of their time with nursing duties.

Patient Picnic at Ancora Psychiatric Hospital, late 1950s

Female Patients Exercising at the Metropolitan Lunatic Asylum, Kew, Australia, courtesy, Wellcome Library, London