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STATE OF NEW YORK.

No. 23.

IN ASSEMBLY,

JANUARY 11, 1883.

THIRTY-SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE TRUSTEES OF THE NEW YORK ASYLUM FOR IDIOTS.

To the Legislature of the State of New York:

Agreeably to the provisions of the act establishing this institution, the undersigned Trustees respectfully submit this their Thirty-second Annual Report.

RESOURCES FOR THE YEAR.

CLASSIFIED SUMMARY OF EXPENDITURES.

On Current Expense Account of the New York Asylum for Idiots, for year ending September 30, 1882.

From an examination of the books of the asylum we are able to report that on the 1st of October, 1882, there were outstanding obligations and cash assets, in the following amounts:

OUTSTANDING INDEBTEDNESS, OCTOBER 1, 1882.

ASSETS, OCTOBER 1, 1882.

The slight apparent deficiency of assets, as compared with the liabilities, is compensated by an additional amount of supplies in the various store-rooms of the institution.

In our last report the attention of the Legislature was called to the need of some addition to the fire apparatus of the asylum, and the sum of $1,500 was appropriated for that purpose. This has been expended in the purchase of an excellent chemical fire-engine. A six-inch main has also been brought from the city water-works, and several hydrants have been located at convenient points about the building. There is now a good pressure of water in the upper stories of the buildings.

In accordance, also, with another suggestion of the board, an appropriation was made for the purchase of a farm, for the use of the asylum, and a moderate sum for addition to the present farm buildings. In carrying out this purpose a committee of the board devoted considerable time and thought to the questions of location and adaption. A farm was finally selected at Fairmount. It is just five miles from the city, on the Auburn railroad, and very near the station, and only four miles from the institution.

The price given for eighty-seven acres was $10,000, or $115 an acre. The title to the property is unquestionable, the present ownership being but a few removes from an original State grant.

It is not only a desirable location, but the farm is in every way suitable, in the judgment of the board. The soil is good; a portion of it adapted to ordinary farm crops, while another part is well fitted for gardening purposes. There are upon it never-failing and copious springs, and it also has running through it a living stream of excellent water.

As soon as the title to the property could be obtained an additional farm-house was erected and is now nearly ready for occupation. It is plainly and substantially built and will accommodate comfortably about forty of the older boys. Attached to this report is a financial statement of the mode of expenditure of this special appropriation. The amount of work accomplished was only practicable by utilizing the work of some of our inmates. Thus, the necessary excavation for the cellar was done by our boys. The stone for the cellar walls was collected on the place by the same kind of labor. A portion of the work on the building itself was done by our own carpenter with the aid of one of the boys familiar with the use of tools.

The desirableness of this new acquisition to the asylum will be better understood by a brief statement of the general scope and purpose of institutions for idiots. There seems to be some misapprehension in the public mind upon this subject.

As beneficiaries of the State, idiots may be divided into two classes. The one, constituting, perhaps, twenty-five per cent of the total number are simply objects of a State's charity. They are incapable of any useful occupation. They are not only helpless, but they require a great deal of care, and this increasing as they grow older. Their infirmity is the result of an undeveloped brain, or of an organic disease of the brain. As such they need special care and management to obviate positive discomfort or suffering. They are not responsible for their condition and so are the more entitled to sympathy and help. They are not a very numerous class, and, therefore, the cost of their public maintenance is quite moderate. Little more can be done for these than to improve their habits, thus adding to their comfort while diminishing the burden of their care.

When present in indigent families they cripple the industrial energies of any family so afflicted. To such, a public refuge for their unfortunate ones affords an immense relief.

When found in county poor-houses they are equally troublesome, and because of the trouble their care involves, they are often the victims of neglect or ill-treatment. Quite a large proportion of the inmates of our own institutions have been committed by the county superintendents of the poor. Doubtless the ratio of idiots is greater among the poor than among the rich or those in comfortable circumstances. At all events on account of their infirmity almost all the cases of idiocy occurring in indigent families become, sooner or later, a public charge. This is especially true of city populations.

If the class of cases above described were properly cared for in the county institutions, the cost of their maintenance and care would be but little less than in a well-managed State institution. Their separation from others of the dependent classes does not increase the cost of their maintenance. This is seen in the fact that in the large aggregations of the dependent classes, in a great city like New York, such separation is made as a matter of convenience and economy. Under such circumstances, the needs of this class in fact of any class can be better understood and be more easily and economically met.

For this lower grade of the general class of idiots, systematized efforts for the improvement of their habits is all important. This fact is now recognized by social scientists both in this country and in Europe.

It should be added, perhaps, that the class in question is not a long lived one; and furthermore, that society is rarely called upon to assume the burden of their support till they are seven or eight years old.

But, by far the larger portion of the general number of idiots are of a different character. While on the one hand they approach in point of default of intelligence such as have already been described they are bounded on the other by persons of average human intelligence. Of these, taken together it may be said of them, that they are capable of some useful employment and of acquiring habits of industry after having had an appropriate industrial training. This capacity for occupation not only diminishes, to a certain extent, the future cost of their maintenance but it adds to their happiness. With them idleness is often irksomeness, if not resulting in disagreeable or destructive habits.

The failure in the matter of capacity for any useful occupation is the result of their want of intelligence, of their want of control of their natural organs and upon their want of will or disposition to exercise their natural faculties and powers. Special training is therefore needed to obviate these infirmities of theirs.

Hence in all institutions for the amelioration of the condition of idiots schools have been organized. And this not because the inmates are expected to become qualified to get a living by their wits, but to give them command of the faculties they have; to teach them to observe what is going on about them, to heed and understand what is said to them, and to do what they are told to do.

The casual visitor to an asylum may go away with the impression that the mental exercises are predominant. The term "school" sometimes applied to such institutions may have fostered the idea. however if an inquiry is made by such visitor, he will be told, at once, that such exercises are only means to an ultimate end; and that, to make the pupils capable of some employment, he will be told that all the mental training is subordinated and contributory to that main purpose. Even the amusements are made to subserve the same end.

The various methods used to accomplish this result in our own establishment have been set forth, from time to time, in our annual reports. No one can visit the asylum thoroughly without seeing that these elementary methods of training and instruction have resulted in the development of a good deal of industrial capacity on the part of the pupils; and that they have acquired habits of industry. The older girls are rendering efficient service in the various departments of household work. In fact, as soon as she attains the proper age and strength, every girl is engaged under an attendant. teacher in all kinds of house-work for a part of the day.

A few facts will illustrate this statement. The number of inmates of the asylum is now nearly four hundred. Three paid employes, with the help of some of the older girls, do all the laundry work of the whole establishment.

One woman, with similar assistance, does all the baking of the whole family. At least thirty girls can use the sewing-machine with skill. Quite a number assist very intelligently in the care of the nursery-cases.

In the male department, there is the same attention paid to industrial training, and with like results. Farming, gardening, care of grounds, work about the stable and grading furnishes occupation for all the older boys during eight months of the year, for either the whole or a part of the day. During the winter, recourse is had to the shops for the same purpose.

So predominating is the practical training in our institution, that if the term "school" were applied at all, it should be industrial school for idiots.

Up to this time the institution has labored under the disadvantage of not having land enough to employ the labor it could command. In this respect, it was like most of the other institutions of a similar character, in this country.

The new purchase will furnish the opportunity for the profitable employment of some forty of the older boys. A few of them have, already, been located there and with fair results from the summer's work, not only in the amount of products raised but in the improvement of the farm.

Unless the trustees are disappointed in their expectations, this addition to their means of supplying work to a portion of the inmates will result in some lessening of the general cost of management; that is to say, that a larger number can be supported with the usual appropriation.

The statistics of the domestic affairs of the asylum are detailed in the report of the superintendent herewith annexed. Accompanying this report will also be found that of the special committee who have had the especial charge of the custodial branch of this institution at Newark.

To these the attention of the Legislature is respectfully called.

NEIL GILMOUR.
C. W. LEAVENWORTH.
N. T. GRAVES.
D. PRATT.
ALLEN MUNROE.
ALFRED WILKINSON.
F. D. HUNTINGTON.
GEO. F. COMSTOCK.

TREASURER'S REPORT.

ALLEN MUNROE, Treasurer of the New York Asylum for Idiots, in account current with the State of New York, for cash received and expended for the general supplies, and the salaries, and wages of officers, teachers attendants and servants of said asylum, during the year ending September 30, 1882

RESOURCES FOR THE YEAR.

DISBURSEMENTS.

ALLEN MUNROE, Treasurer.

CUSTODIAL BRANCH.

Classified Summary of Expenditures on Current Expense Account of the New York Asylum for Idiots, for year ending September 30, 1882.

Provisions.

Bills paid on Special Appropriation Account.

NEW YORK ASYLUM FOR IDIOTS,
SYRACUSE, N.Y., October 11, 1882.

We certify that we have examined the above statement, with tables annexed; have compared it with the treasurer's books and with the various books kept at the asylum, and the bank-book, as also the vouchers for the moneys expended; and find the same correct.

E.W. LEAVENWORTH,
N.F. GRAVES,
ALFRED WILKINSON,
Executive Committee.

SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.

To the Trustees of the New York Asylum for Idiots:

GENTLEMEN -- I herewith submit a report of the affairs of the institution of which I have immediate charge, for the year ending September 30, 1882:

MOVEMENT OF POPULATION.

CAUSES OF DEATH OF THE PUPILS WHO DIED DURING THE YEAR.

This is less than two per cent on the number of pupils. The average death-rate for the thirty-one years of the history of the asylum has been less than two per cent on the average population.

The past year has been in the main an uneventful one in the history of the asylum. The usual amount of educational work has been done, and on the part of the pupils as a body, satisfactory progress has been made. It may he left to the Board of State Charities and to the Commissioner of Lunacy, the official visitors on the part of the State, to report upon these points. If there has been any change in manner, or in methods, on the part of those engaged in the work, it is an increasing attention to the development of industrial capacity in the pupils.

During the last year the new pupils admitted have, in the main, been quite young. This is a favorable circumstance, as it affords greater opportunity for their radical improvement. It is a gratifying fact, also, because it shows a more wide-spread knowledge and an increasing confidence in the purpose of the institution and in its mode of management. Otherwise, parents would be unwilling to submit their young or helpless children to its care.

In accordance with the spirit of our State institutions generally, no distinction is made in the care or instruction between the few pay cases and the many who are a State charge. The friends of the former hare been frankly told that no special privileges can be accorded; that the whole educational scheme of the asylum aims at fitting the pupils for some form of employment, because this is the prevailing need of the class for whom it was designed; that the pupils while in the institution are graded according to their intelligence and habits and not socially. And yet the announcement of this policy has been cordially accepted, almost without exception, by those who have committed children to its care.

But a good deal of attention has always been given to adopting such a system of classification as would prevent any pupils from suffering by association with those mentally of a lower grade. The growth of the asylum itself -- originally constructed for the accommodation of 140 inmates, but now capable of housing 350 -- aids in this work of classification. A series of buildings, of modified form, the outcome of varying needs, each for a special department, with convenient connection by covered ways, to admit unity of organization, has some advantages over a more compact structure, built at one time and however well devised.

As in past years, so in the present, the aim of the officers has been to keep down the expenses of the asylum to the lowest limit practicable with effective work. The public, who provide the means for its support, have a right to demand this. The new departure of last year, by which the asylum has acquired a farm, where the labor of the older boys can be utilized, encourages the expectation that the annual cost of maintenance may be in the future somewhat diminished. The institution will furnish a ready market for all its farm products. It will, of course, take a little time to get the new farm into the most productive condition and to perfect the working arrangements.

The expense of maintenance and clothing of the inmates of the custodial branch of idiotic females, now no more than that of the average cost of support in the county poor-houses of the State, also warrants the presumption that the new farm will reduce the per capita cost of maintenance in our own establishment.

There are now very few idiots of a teachable age or condition remaining in the county poor-houses. Those classed as idiots in their statistics are, in the main, old or helplessly crippled, or bedridden cases. From the information I have many of them are also not idiots but persons who have once been insane and then become demented.

Speaking in behalf of the officers and those directly engaged in the work, I solicit your close supervision, not only of the financial matters, but the every-day management of the institution. Such oversight is a constant stimulus to efficient and faithful service.

Respectfully submitted,
H. B. WILBUR,
Superintendent,
SYRACUSE, October 10, 1882.

REPORT OF SPECIAL COMMITTEE.

The committee of the board of trustees, to whom was in trusted the special oversight of the custodial branch of this institution, established four years since, on the recommendation of the Board of State Charities, herewith present their report of its affairs.

The initial steps in carrying out the purpose of the Legislature in founding a home, for adult female idiots have been described in former reports. It was designed mainly to relieve the county poor-houses of the care of such cases, as in many instances these institutions have not the proper means for the separation of the sexes. In fact with few exceptions the intimates of the new asylum have been committed directly from the poor-houses.

A building quite well adapted to the purpose was leased temporarily at Newark, in Wayne county.

The statistics of the year are as follows:

But, in comparing the cost of these inmates with those of other State institutions, it should be noticed that included int he -sic- total expenditures were items that should not be reckoned as maintenance, etc. Thus, rent, $965.

About $1,100 expended in improvements to increase the accommodations for inmates. Also about the same amount for new furniture for the increased number of inmates.

Deducting these items the entire cost of maintenance and clothing of the inmates did not exceed two dollars a week on the average. This amount is no more than the average per capita cost in the county poor houses of the State.

In accordance with the requirements of the Board of State Charities, a schedule is annexed showing the mode of expenditure of the amount above stated, namely, $15,168.23.

The death-rate for the year seems large; but many of the cases first sent were old and feeble on admission. The class generally are not long-lived. Several of the early committals were insane rather than idiotic.

The greatest difficulty in the management of the institution has come from the fact that a few of the cases sent were committed because they were wanton in their habits rather than lacking in intelligence. Such give trouble anywhere, and the county superintendents of the poor were only too glad to get rid of them when our asylum was opened. Their proper home is in a reformatory rather than in an asylum for feeble-minded.

Our experience with one of these, which has been made a subject of a special report to the Board of State Charities, should lead us hereafter to refuse their admission.

Of the inmates, generally, we may record a very marked improvement. Their general aspect is much better. They are more orderly and quiet. In the way of practical industry there has been marked progress. With a moderate paid working force in the establishment the house is in admirable condition, the inmates are well-clad and neat in person. In short, the main work of the whole establishment, including the manufacture of the clothing, is done by the inmates under the direction of employes.

Mr. and Mrs. Warner who have had the immediate charge of the institution continue to merit the approval of your committee. The credit of the economy of management as well as of the excellent household arrangements is due entirely to them. We have lately been fortunate in securing the services of a lady of large experience in institution life, to assist Mrs. Warner in the general oversight and management of the inmates.

Some of those committed to the asylum have some degree of intelligence. They are imbecile in part from poverty and neglect. In their previous surroundings there has been no opportunity for mental or moral improvement. In this undeveloped mental condition they have been only partially responsible, if responsible at all, for their bad conduct or misfortune. To such the better influences that may be brought to bear upon them in a well-managed institution, planned with reference to their needs, may come to them with regenerating power. The new home may be made not only comfortable but pleasant. They may not only be well cared for and protected, but taught to care for and protect themselves. Habits of industry may be encouraged. They may be led to see that, by their own labor, they are contributing to their own comfort and enjoyment as well as the welfare of others.

It will be no miracle if, under these better influences and with maturer years, more or less of the inmates become capable of taking care of themselves elsewhere and by their own efforts.

This custodial asylum for adult idiotic and imbecile females was established mainly though the suggestion of the Board of State Charities. The immediate charge of it was intrusted to this board of trustees, because the work was in some respects supplementary to our own. The trust has been fulfilled with two purposes in view. The first, to keep down the expenses of the inmates to a point not much in excess of the cost of their maintenance in the county poor-houses.

By that means, the burden of their support would be not much increased, while their condition was much improved. The second, to develop the intelligence and moral sense of the inmates.

The degree of success that has attended the discharge of this trust will be seen, on the one hand, in the financial statements of the asylum, presented from time to time; and on the other, in the testimony of the official visitors appointed by the State and the county superintendents of the poor.

The liabilities of the Custodial Asylum on the 3d of October, 1882, were merely the bills for the month of' September, amounting to about $1,300.

The cash assets at the same date were:

E. W. LEAVENWORTH,
N. F. GRAVES,
ALFRED WILKINSON,
H. B. WILBUR,
Special Committee in charge of the Custodial Asylum.