Suitcases from asylum tell of lives long lost
I just came across this sad but fascinating story from the Village Voice:
"Craig Williams, a curator at the New York State Museum, drove four hours to visit Willard Psychiatric Center in the spring of 1995. The complex, located 65 miles southwest of Syracuse, was about to shut down after more than 100 years. Williams figured he would be able to pick up some artifacts
These suitcases bore the names of former patients. Inside were their long-forgotten possessions: snapshots, diaries, postcards, books, letters, news clippings. For Williams, finding these suitcases was the equivalent of stumbling upon a buried chest of gold. "You'd open these suitcases, and you could so clearly sense and feel a personality and a humanity," he recalls..."
[excerpt from 'What they left behind' by Jennifer Gonnerman at www.villagevoice.com]
Thanks to Dr Grohol's Blog of Psychology at PsychCentral for drawing my attention to this.
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