The Topeka state journal., 1911-09-05
GET RID OF Them.
Old People Now Being Sent to
Asylums.
Harry Bowman of Board of Con-
troll Talks of Custom.
SAYS 1T is GROWING.
Authorities Take Steps to Check
Practice.
Disgrace to the State Says the
Officer.
SAYS 1T is GROWING.

Harry Bowman, chairman of the
state board of control, speaking from an
experience of several years in the man
agement of the states institutions for
the insane, and from close observation
of the same work in many other states,
declares that there is an alarming ten
6ency nowadays to send old folks to
the asylums in order to evade the trou-
BILE of caring for them in their dotage
Time was,' said Mr.. Bowman, when
the old mother or grandmother sat
around the fire and dozed and knitted
stockings and the patriarch of the fam
lily smoked his pipe and talked of the
hardships of other days. Their whlms
and notions were humored and their
moods and fretfulness accepted as
matter of course and as due them for
what they went through for the young
folks.
But it is all different now. The old
folks are being sent to the asylums
in order to get rid of them and to
dodge the care of looking after them
in their age and lnhrmitieS. In most
of these cases the old mother or grand
mother is no more crazy than the rela-
tives that send them away. But they
soon become of unsound mind after a
short time spent among so many in
sane people.
I'VE have had so many of these ap-
plications lately that We have begun to
Investigate them closely and now we
are refusing to take any old person un-
she is dangerous or that the family is
absolutely unable to care for them pro-
perly.
MY inquiries in other states as to
this tendency to send the old folks to
the asylum resulted in the information
that it is as prevalent elsewhere as it
has become in Kansas. 1t is a shame
and it ought 20 be stopped"
Parents of Well to Do.
Mr.. Bowman's observations and the
\
to be past belief. That there are hun
dreds of well-to-do families in every
state in the west trying to send the
Parents ard grandparents to asylums
with the silly excuse that they are men
tally unbalanced is a strange comnIen-
tary on Christian communities In most
cases the mental powers decline with
age just as do the physical In his
dotage" is familiar expression, but
isn't raising a lot of irresponsible and
ungratful children enough to drive
parents to their dotage a few years
earlier than nature set the mark? If
folks could hear the board of control
chairman talk about the cases he has
turned down they would stare in amaze
ment as such heartlessness. Mr.. Bow
man has more Interesting facts for a
lecture course thon most
of the orators that visited the state
this summer. His stories are vital and
their truth shocks.
An Application Turned Down.
IT call to mind one case,'' said Mr..
Bowman, where both the father and
the mother were offered as sacrifice
to heartlessness. The children were well
off and had children of their own.
These young folks knew of their own
the burden and the care Of
children and the responsibilities they
bring. They knew the truth Of the old
story that no child ever pays for its
raising, and yet they were anxious to
send the old father and mother to a |
state insane asylum. They knew that
these old folks were not insane in the
sense of the word. An easy
chair on the porch or a settee by the
fire were all they wanted, and a little
attention and the little kindnesses
they had a right to expect from people |
upon whom they had lavished their all
when they were young.
1--WE refused this application and will |
continue to refuse all similar ones un-
less a proper showing is made of in
sanity. We are not conducting an old
folks home at Osawatomie or Topeka
The state cares for people who are af
9icted with a mental malady that
makes it impossible for them to be
cared for in a private home.''