112 WILLIAM M. EDWARDS 



the care of the patients is more efficient and the wards are 

 kept with greater neatness and taste. 



The Michigan asylum for the insane located at Kalamazoo 

 is the oldest state institution of its kind in Michigan. It has 

 1,640 patients. Its original building, having 720 feet front, 

 was constructed on the corridor type. When in 1870 an en- 

 largement became necessary, representatives of other com- 

 munities desiring a state institution for their own towns suc- 

 ceeded in having a provision attached to the bill appropriating 

 money for this extension, that none of it should be expended 

 for the construction of any building within forty rods of the 

 then existing asylum building. To comply with this, forty 

 rods were measured and a second large building of 540 feet 

 front was erected, which has since that date formed the main 

 department for men. In 1885-86 a further extension of asy- 

 lum accomodations at Kalamazoo was made in departing from 

 the previously recognized type of construction by the estab- 

 lishment of two colonies. The first colon}^ comprises a farm of 

 276 acres located two and one half miles from the parent insti- 

 tution. It was soon converted into a milk farm, a very large 

 dairy barn was constructed, and one house erected having ac- 

 commodations for 47 men patients. No additional houses 

 have been built at this place, known as the Brook farm. The 

 second colony, established in 1886, is located three miles in an 

 opposite direction from the Brook farm, and has always been 

 designated as the colony. Here are four large brick houses 

 having room for 263 patients. One of these houses is occupied 

 by men and three by women, and in addition there is a phy- 

 sician's residence and barns, stables, pig-pens, chicken houses 

 and all necessary outbuildings that are ordinarily found upon a 

 farm of 357 acres. In the administration of the asylum the 

 chronic, quiet working class of patients who can be entrusted 

 with a considerable degree of liberty are transferred to colonies. 

 There is no difficulty in finding sufficient occupation for men 

 in ordinary farm and garden work and in the dairy. Women 

 are engaged in various household duties. Under the direction 

 of a cook at each cottage they prepare their own meals, do 

 their laundry work, and in fact are employed much as they 

 would be in their own homes. When this colony reached its 



