Oregon Hospital for the Insane

[1] At the time of admission into the union, the state of Oregon had a population of a mere 50,000 people[2] — fewer than 3,000 of whom lived in Portland[3] — and sparse medical resources to match.

Pioneer physician J. C. Hawthorne, and "surgeon" A. M. Loryea[4] determined to pool their talent in 1859 with the August launch of "Oregon Hospital," a facility in which both would reside.

[9] A contractual relationship was established in which the state of Oregon paid a set per capita fee for the housing of "indigent insane and idiotic persons" committed to the facility by the courts.

[11] Corporal punishment was forbidden at the facility in favor of what were considered in the day to be "kind but firm treatment," including the use of strait jackets and confinement to quarters.

[13] J.C. Hawthorne was particularly singled out for his efficiency in the hospital's operation, including his "uniform kindness to the large number whose maladies will never admit of cure, but whose management has been entrusted to his care.

[16] The $6 per week rate was regarded by some as grossly excessive, with the Salem Statesman opining that such a fee represented an "outrageous extortion," and that Hawthorne was effectively being granted a "life franchise of the Insane Asylum" by his legislative supporters.

[17] With a view to pushing the legislature to found a state-owned hospital for the mentally ill in Salem, hometown of the newspaper, the editorialist berated Dr. Hawthorne as "wholly unknown outside of Oregon" and prominent within the state's boundaries "chiefly through the enormity of his bills and the power and continuity of his suction as an official vampire.

Defenders of the status quo managed to defeat a series of proposals for construction of a new state-owned mental hospital until a shifting of the tide at the legislature's September 1880 session, spurred by the Marion County delegation's decision to focus action on passage of their "pet measure.

[24] The hospital was marked by empathetic medical treatment and concern for the health and well-being of patients by allowing them to work in the fresh air, raising vegetables and livestock, thereby helping them to maintain a sense of purpose.

[24] The bodies of destitute patients of Oregon Hospital for the Insane were interred at Lone Fir Cemetery in Portland, the final costs of which were borne by J.C. Hawthorne out of pocket.