The Philadelphia State Hospital at Byberry: A History of Misery and Medicine (Landmarks) (PA)

by J. P. Webster

  The sixty-year-old superintendent had no problem admitting his desire for some leisure time. “I’m taking a long vacation,” he said. “I bought a boat a few months ago, and I’m going to take a cruise.”

  Dr. Charles Adam Zeller had earned himself a serious reputation in the mental health field long before coming to Byberry. He had plenty of experience as superintendent of Danville State Hospital before moving on to Farview State Hospital for Criminal Insane in Wayne County. Zeller’s father was a physician, and he sometimes took young Charles along on calls to their local asylum near Scranton. He claimed it was during one of these visits, at age twelve, that he decided he wanted to work with the mentally ill. Along with Zeller came a new clinical director, Dr. Eugene Sielke. Sielke had worked alongside Zeller before at Danville, and they made a great team.

  Appearing confident and knowledgeable as he placed a copy of the Philadelphia Record into the cornerstone of S-1 building at its opening ceremony, Zeller was showing signs of being a good administrator. While his sense of character reassured the board of his experience, the forty-three-year-old doctor gave the credit to Woolley. He said that the situation had been much improved by Woolley and that he merely had to maintain it. He was, however, realistic about what faced him. “I’m no magician,” he said. “And I don’t expect to work any miracles. It’s time to quit criticizing Byberry and instead to strive to build it up.” But the building plan barely reached a moving pace when the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor quickly washed Byberry from the headlines. Although construction continued, the positive public showcasing of the new hospital seriously lost its momentum.

  In 1942 the GSA broke ground for two new dormitories. Located in the North Group (Carter tract), these two large, four-story dormitories resembled hotels. They were spacious, attractive and contrasted boldly with the Colonial Revival cottages of the West Group, just feet away. They were designated N-6 and N-7. Pepper’s extensive plan called for almost fifty new buildings. The GSA approved funding for one or two buildings at a time, and N-6 and N-7 were the first patient buildings it chose to erect. The buildings’ numerical designations on Pepper’s plan simply signified the order in which he drew them, not the GSA’s construction sequence or level of importance. As a result, many buildings were never erected, such as N-1 or N-2. After a slow construction process, N-6 and N-7 finally opened for operation in 1944. After their official opening, further construction was halted due to wartime material shortages.

  By March 1944, the war had left Byberry with 127 less employees, from doctors to attendants to cooks. Dr. Zeller appealed to the draft board to take into consideration Byberry’s desperate need of attendants and spoke publicly of the devastating effect on his hospital. “The public must awake to the realization that something must be done for our state institutions,” he said. “The draft boards give us practically no deferments, and they recently told one of the few remaining male nurses we have that he must obtain essential employment or be drafted.” It seemed, however, that many had enlisted, perhaps to get away from the hospital, and only a few were drafted.

  The war affected Byberry in numerous ways. Construction came to a halt, and many of its young attendants were drafted or enlisted. The amount of the hospital’s low-wage positions went from few to almost none. But there were those who kept Byberry afloat: conscientious objectors. It was estimated that forty thousand men nationwide legally avoided combat through their religious beliefs and instead became conscientious objectors (COs). They were given civil service jobs and placed into positions to fill the void left by the war. The majority of COs from Philadelphia were Quakers, and about forty were sent to Byberry as attendants. In 1942, two such men, Warren Sawyer and Charles Lord, arrived and were immediately shocked and terrified by their new daily routine.

  As they began to adjust to their roles, they realized the severity of the situation at Byberry. They had never seen anything so barbaric. They witnessed attendants using brutal force to restrain patients and described some of their tools—pipes, broom handles and pieces of fire hose filled with buckshot. Other methods were also described, such as choking a patient with a wet towel. “It left no marks on them,” Sawyer recalled. He wrote letters home telling of dangerous encounters with violent patients. “I was in ‘B’ building, the death house,” he wrote. “Due to the shortage of cuffs and straps and restraint locks, one of the patients was able to get himself loose. He was a very dangerous fellow. He had a spoon that had been broken off at the end and was sharpened almost to a knife edge. After he was loose, he went to another patient and jabbed him in the side of the neck on top of his shoulder and drove the spoon down about one inch deep, just missing the jugular vein.” Sawyer and the other COs at Byberry were in a war of their own and not only with violent patients. The buildings of the East Group presented dangers themselves. Sawyer described his time in the “Rose Garden.” “In the incontinent ward, it took a few weeks before you were used to eating supper with the smell all through your clothes and everything.” He explained that even rigorous washing would not take the smell from his clothes.

  When Charles Lord was put to work in the “Rose Garden,” he immediately saw an opportunity. An amateur photographer, Lord began sneaking in his compact Agfa camera and documenting the disturbing sight. “I would try to fill the frame, you know, not just have little people far away,” he said. “I’d get up as close as I could. I was aware of composition, but the main thing was to show the truth.” Lord also photographed the violent patients in building B and, after filling up three rolls of film, showed them to anyone who would look. The Byberry COs formed an advocacy group of their own and, in 1945, arranged a meeting with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. Lord’s photos were presented to the First Lady, who doubted their authenticity. She believed the photos were taken in a hospital in the south where, as she said, such conditions exist. But when she learned that the photos were actually taken in Philadelphia, she pledged her commitment to reform the conditions. Lord’s photos were circulated around the country, and real awareness was finally achieved. Although he was not the first to capture Byberry’s chaos on film, Lord is credited as being one of the earliest photographers to successfully bring about national awareness through his work. Syracuse University professor Steven Taylor commented years later on the photos. “The immediate reaction by many people to these photographs were that they looked like Nazi concentration camps,” he said. “People could not believe that this was the way we treated people with mental illness. So it created a kind of mass uproar nationally.”

  When the material shortage was lifted in 1945, ground was broken for building N-5, the main dining hall for the North Group. It contained several large cafeterias for both patients and staff, modern kitchen facilities and staff lounges. It was also designed with a recreation room and a patient commissary. The building’s basement was connected to the tunnel system, providing passage to N-6 and N-7, and patients could easily reach the new cafeteria without ever going outside.

  Zeller held onto the reigns throughout the war years and through the completion of three new buildings. Because his years at Byberry coincided almost exactly with America’s time at war, Zeller’s progress went largely unappreciated, but not in the medical field. He was offered the position of Michigan Director of Mental Health, a position for which he was more than happy to leave Byberry. He submitted his resignation, effective February 28, 1946. His position would naturally be filled by his friend and colleague Dr. Sielke. Before he left however, Zeller warned of Byberry’s dangers.

  N-6 building nearing completion in 1944. Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

  “Don’t move away from the gaurds,” he told Record reporter Julia Shawell, as he led her on a tour through building B. “It’s a disgrace.” He made no attempt to hold back his recommendations for Byberry’s future, calling for new buildings and higher-paid staff. “There’s a criminal potential in every mental case, and there are thousands waiting for admission who should be committed,” he said. �
�The criminals and mental cases of tomorrow are in classrooms today.”

  Dr. Eugene L. Sielke took control of Byberry on March 1, 1946. A native of Bethlehem, Sielke was a graduate of Columbia University and had been working under Zeller at Byberry. During his first week, he pulled the press into the institution with him, appealing to the public to convince legislators to increase Byberry’s funding. Leading cameramen and reporters through the wards, he noted that only a small handful of devoted employees held the hospital together during the war. “Until Philadelphians realize what deplorable conditions exist,” he said, “and until they make the legislature take some sort of action, Philadelphia will never have a decent hospital at Byberry.”

  With a population of 6,110 patients crammed into buildings built for 3,500, Sielke was definitely justified in his longing for funds. He reported that 148 attendants were doing the work of 800, and 80 of them were COs who would be gone by May. “It is estimated that it would take about $46,000,000 to put Byberry into shape,” he said. “And this estimate was made three years ago. It would cost more now.” Between December 1938 and June 1942, the state spent $5,378,676.92 on the construction of S-1, N-6 and N-7.

  In April 1946, Sielke was interrupted by more press after escaped inmate Charles Watts caused a panic at the Liberty Bell Trailer Camp, about a half mile north on Route 1. In his second escape in two days, twenty-three-year-old Watts entered the trailer park and broke into a trailer. Inside he attacked a woman, tearing her clothes and scratching her face. The woman’s husband was able to subdue Watts with a hammer until two neighbors were able to tie his hands.

  In October, Furey Ellis was elected chairman of Byberry’s board of trustees, replacing Louis Spring. Ellis owned a real-estate company—Furey Ellis Inc.—and was a member of several other hospital boards. In January 1948, a renovation plan for the West Group was developed. Pepper and others worked on the improvements, starting with C-9 and C-11. According to Sielke, “We’ll tear out old flooring, rotting beams, broken plumbing and weakened steam pipes until about the only thing left will be the outside walls.”

  The decade from the close of the war to the mid-1950s was Byberry’s vacation period. The hospital ran just as good as any other—and better than some. The GSA was pouring millions into its expansive building plan, and the public was kept aware of its progress through large building dedication ceremonies and positive publicity. The new buildings all featured up-to-date facilities that were on par with, if not superior to that of, any other modern institution. Although still understaffed and overcrowded, the new buildings did more to help Byberry’s patients than anything else in its history. The hospital had the highest number of staff it ever would and was actually considered a modern hospital.

  The vital maximum security building for males, building N-9, opened in 1949. Its layout featured two enclosed courtyards and two large patient dining rooms with kitchens, one on each floor. The wards were designed on the latest recommendations of dignified mental health professionals. They were made up of dormitories and day rooms that featured four-foot-high walls separating the sleeping quarters. From the nurses’ stations at the ends of the wards, they could observe the entire ward over the four-foot partitions. The front of the building featured visitation cubicles and the administrative offices.

  Since 1947, Byberry officials had been pushing for a treatment building. The term “treatment” simply referred to a building built in such a way that it provided more for its inhabitants than custodial care, a building designed with patient luxury and rehabilitation in mind. Finally showing signs of having learned from the past, officials requested a building that “cured” patients and released them, rather than housing them until death. Furey Ellis fought hard for the new building, which he called a “hospital within a hospital” and an “active treatment headquarters.” He managed to get half of the funding with an agreement by the state to provide the rest. In September 1947, Ellis himself broke ground for the new $2.5 million “Active Therapy Building,” N-3. “The members of the board of trustees of the Philadelphia State Hospital expressed gratitude that the building program at Byberry is about to get underway,” Ellis said, “and the members are delighted to learn that the Governor has allocated this $8 million dollars to mental institutions. However, we hope that the House of Representatives and the Senate give us the thirty million we requested as the absolute minimum for the next biennium.”

  Patients in building B—the violent ward—in 1946. Temple University Urban Archives.

  N-3, the showcase of the state’s building plan, was dedicated in May 1950. The new building—Byberry’s tallest—was also probably the most important. As noted in its title, the active therapy building was the only building at the institution that was designed for the sole purpose of treatment, rather than simple housing. The four-story building had room for 250 patients, 125 of each gender. Located near the front of the property, next to the west (now central) group, its layout was rather simple. It was made up of one main corridor, which ran northeast to southwest, with two smaller wings protruding from the main corridor. The east wing housed patients who were selected for participation in treatment. Following the methods for dormitory construction introduced in building N-9, centrally located nurses’ stations provided staff with a clear view of each ward across four-foot partitions separating the patient sleeping areas. It also featured outdoor porches connected to the day rooms, activity rooms and brighter dormitory areas. Even the seclusion rooms were slightly larger and provided great views from their windows.

  The west wing was the “therapy wing.” It was only for staff and consisted of laboratories, testing equipment, a pathology department, treatment rooms, a library of medical textbooks and specimens and a 110-seat auditorium for staff lectures and presentations. The building would use student doctors and chemists to experiment with new drugs and other types of experimental therapy. On the roof there was a small “emergency laboratory,” which was a precautionary step. In the event that a developed drug caused too many patient deaths, further testing of the substance would take place on animals in the emergency lab. The basement of the west wing housed the pathology department. The large autopsy room featured stadium seating for medical students and a locker room. The adjacent mortuary contained a morgue with a capacity for ten. A progressive concept was certainly in place with the opening of N-3.

  Sielke’s press tour of S-1, 1946. Temple University Urban Archives.

  Escaped patient Charles Watts after apprehension in 1946. Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

  The Philadelphia-based company Smithkline/French (SF) became rather heavily involved with N-3, using the building as a training school for its employees. N-3’s labs, combined with Byberry’s patients, provided a ripe testing ground for new drugs. The company was one of a few who contributed to Ellis’s half of the financing and was therefore granted the right to use it. The company’s work in the building contributed heavily to the development of its wonder drug Thorazine. It was tests on Byberry patients in N-3 that allowed SF to perfect the drug. Ground was broken for S-2 building in 1947. It was a clone and neighbor of S-1 and had a designated capacity of 450. It opened a year later, at a cost of about $2 million. In December, building A (E-2)—the “Rose Garden”—completed its amazing renovation at a cost of $850,000. New shower rooms, day rooms and dormitories made it, as Sielke called it, one of the best buildings in the institution.

  Architect’s drawing of N-3. Pennsylvania State Archives, RG-23.

  After two years of construction, the new tuberculosis hospital, building N-10, opened in 1952. This sprawling structure was 540 by 300 feet in area, Byberry’s largest building. It was very modern and featured every conceivable amenity of a tubercular hospital. It had a capacity for three hundred, with male patients on one side and female patients on the other. It contained two enclosed and two open-ended courtyards for patient recreation. Tubercular patients had to be segregated from the population, and the new building was self-sustaining from t
he rest of the hospital. It contained three elevators, two cafeterias with modern kitchens and dishwashing facilities and a medical wing with dental, laboratory and X-Ray apparatus. Since tuberculosis was spread through clothing and other surfaces, staff were required to shower and put their clothes through the large autoclave sterilizer before leaving the building. Spacious showers and changing rooms were provided, and each staff member was given a locker, hundreds of which lined the building’s hallways, lending it the appearance of a high school. The basement contained a new pharmacy, an incinerator for soiled linens and two immense underground recreation areas built beneath the courtyards and rear wings.

  Following N-10 was N-8, a building for “over-active females,” which was dedicated in 1952. Its layout copied that of its counterpart, N-9. This building, designed by Lichty and Stopper, featured rooms with heated floors for patients who refused to wear clothes. The GSA’s plan required a new group of utility buildings to keep up with the small city’s growing needs. Located south of Southampton Road and west of the power plant, this group included a laundry, a warehouse and two vehicle storage buildings. The garages were capable of housing fifty vehicles. The new hi-tech laundry building opened in 1953. It was one of the largest institutional laundry facilities in the country, contained 75,000 square feet of space and was able to process 800,000 pounds of laundry a month. It featured $700,000 worth of modern equipment, such as its unique pneumatic delivery system. Using only air pressure, the pneumatic conveyor pushed the damp laundry through metal ducts to the irons and presses. It was capable of moving the clothes across the building at speeds of up to sixty miles per hour. The building also featured a section containing two dozen sewing machines and other equipment for clothing, mattress and linen repair.