I'm interested not in the itemized list, but the reason why it would be alphabetized, then rearranged. I suspect some copy/paste errors between the original and this copy.
Addendum: A tip of the blogging cap to long-time reader Gregory Charles Lyons, who saw a copy of these Reasons For Admission displayed in an exhibition at the Erie Art Museum. At the exhibition the list was noted to have been from the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in West Virginia.
"TOBACCO & MASTURBATION" has to be my fave. How many millions were in these institutions?
ReplyDeleteAlso, it looks like we've come a long way; seems like "sexual abuse" can now pretty much stand on its own without "excessive" as a qualifier...or quantifier.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking as someone who has written many a reason that someone should be admitted to a psychiatric hospital, this, to me, has the feel of someone making a list of the dumbest things they've read in old documentation. Sometimes language like "NOVEL READING" or "IMAGINARY FEMALE TROUBLE" will indicate that the person doing the admission is not particularly impressed with some husband's rationale for having his wife committed. Ironically, a lot of this stuff may be a sign that the folks running this particular lunatic asylum were a little more enlightened than average.
ReplyDeletePoor ladies!!! I guess "THE WAR" covers a lot of ground on the men's side.
DeleteI was amused to see "novel reading" in there. I've read many 19th century moral panic essays warning of the dangers of reading novels, especially by young women.The excitement would drive them to moral turpitude and madness. I wonder whether "sexual abuse" is not what we know today as sexual abuse, but rather a variation on "self abuse." Old clean-living guides seem to have been obsessed with the evils of masturbation.
ReplyDeletei imagine at least one of those multiple copy/paste errors along the way included grabbing in chunks from a multi-column table that ended up as a single column.
ReplyDeleteLong time reader--I recognized seeing this list at the Erie Art Museum I'm pretty sure! wwwDOTerieartmuseumDOTorg/eighty-six-reasons
ReplyDeleteThank you, Gregory. I've added your information and the link to the body of the post.
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