Geri Joseph (Part 2)

Reporter for the Minneapolis Morning Tribune, who did a series of articles on the institutions in 1948 and 1950

Geri Joseph Looks Back at 1948 Conditions

(Run time 1:21)

They often would be as poorly dressed, as disheveled as the patients. It was… and, as I said, the lack of training at that time was really… you just couldn't figure out how in the world they were running these places.

And you never would have thought they were hospitals. They simply were not hospitals. In hospitals you envision kind of spick and span, very clean.

The nurses and doctors… nowadays I guess they don't wear uniforms anymore, but at that time they did, always sparkling clean. Well that was not the way with these hospitals.

In addition, because they were so short of staff, they used patients for most of the work around the place. And, of course, they also said this was therapy. Well, I think with therapy you need also to have guidance and training and direction. This was not that kind of therapy. This was just work.