Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1913-02-27

know anything about its workings.
To most people 1t is just a collection
of buildings. where "crazy people,
are cared for and kept at the ex-
pense of the county.
Has Its Own Fire Department.
They do not know that there are
1880 patients there, beside 200
more people employed as nurses, at
tendants, cooks. firemen. farmers,
and, In fact, almost every class that
goes to make up a small village.
Overlook has its own fire Depart
ment and chief for it. 1t has its
own laundry, refrigerating plant.
meat coolers, which hold dressed
beeves in quantities; a bakery. whose
output is 700 loaves of bread a day,
all of which is consumed in the in
stitution, besides a storage house,
where everything from salt to
women's hats are kept.
They do not know that there Is
big amusement hall there for the en-
tertainment of physicians and other
attaches as well as the patients, nor
do they know that the patients in
the quiet wards very frequently en-
terrain the physicians and nurses
with entertainments conceived and
produced by themselves.
Nor do they know that in the in
stitution there is about mile of
underground tunnels and entirely en-
closed corridors connecting all the
different buildings. 1t is possible to
go from the administration building
in the centre of the group of sixteen
buildings to all the buildings that
constitute the asylum without once
going out into the open air.
This is a wonderful help in many
ways, one being in the transportation
of food from the main kitchen in the
basement of the administration build
ing to the furthermost dining-rpom,
distance of well-nigh half mile.
The food is piled in huge trucks in
the kitchen and by being rushed
through the closed corridors reaches
the dining-rooms smoking hot.
The amusement hall and male and
female attendants homes, on the OPP
posite side of Mount Pleasant avenue
from the administration building, are
also connected with the latter build
ing and with each other by tunnels,
doing away with the necessity of en-
ployees putting on outer clothes in
going from one building to the other
In the winter time or in stormy
weather
First Put in Receiving Wards.
Patients coming into the hospital
are first placed in the receiving ward,
where they are kept under surveil-
| lance for a period to enable the ply
| sicians to classify them.
There are six physicians attached
to the asylum, beside DR.. Payne, who
has general charge Three of the
physicians look after the female pa
! tents and a like number the male
The physicians are assigned to the
patients as they enter and thereafter
they are under the direct charge OF
that physician. The period spent in
the receiving ward, which is really an
| observation ward, varies, depending
on whether the case is an acute OF
chronic one.
If acute, the patient is then trans
| ferred to one of the disturbed" wards
and again kept under surveillance. A
| patient showing signs of recovery is
removed to a quiet" ward, and there
kept until cured and discharged or
until death.
Besides the three wards already
mentioned, there are tuberculaI
wards, epileptic wards for both sexes
and male criminal wards, where Grim
inal insane are kept. At present
there is juvenile ward, in which
nineteen unfortunate lads are kept
The lads do not properly belong a
Overlook, which is intended fol
adults only, but owing to the fac
| that the State Home for Feeble
Minded Children at Vineland is over
crowded and has a waiting list Of
over 100 names, patients that right
| fully should be confined at Vinelant
are at Overlook.
| The writer recently made triI
| through the wards at Overlook
In the mems ward the inmate.
were lolling at ease in big arm
| chairs or else playing cards or read
! ing. A number were playing billiards
| there being a billiard table and piano
| in each of the quiet" wards. I'm
promptu concerts are frequent, there
| being some very excellent pianist'
| confined in the institution
Radiators Are Wire Screened.
In the epileptic wards it was no
| ticeable that all steam pipes and radi-
ators were covered with wire screens
while all the inmates wore heavy
| padded skull caps, The screens ant
caps are an idea of DR.. Payne's an6
prevent the patients from fracturing
or injuring their skulls when seizet
with fit. An epileptic, it was point.
| ed out by DR.. Payne, almost inyari-
ably falls on his head when seizec
with fit.
In the wards devoted to idiotic pa
] tients there are only chairs an6
| benches in the corridors and sitting.
rooms, and it is pathetic to see the
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