The Fog is Lifting

In 1956, a scrawny, 43-year-old man wandered down a busy New Jersey highway, and later was admitted to Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital. First thought as the delusional ramblings of schizophrenia, instead, the diagnosis was Huntington’s Disease, a degenerative neurological disorder. For five years, each week his wife escorted the man from “Wardy Forty” to “the Magiky Tree,” on Greystone’s grounds. As they shared a picnic lunch with their children, did they sing of redwood forests, endless skyways and golden valleys? Perhaps, for this was America’s Troubadour, Woody Guthrie, composer of “This Land is Your Land.”

Larry and I began our Salvation Army ministry in Dover, New Jersey, where we did holiday visitation at Greystone Park. The complex was huge, its continuous foundation design surpassed in size only by the building of the Pentagon. Opened in the 1870s, its population peaked at 7700 in the early 1950s, in part due to World War II veterans and PTSD. By our visits in the late 1970s, its census was rapidly decreasing, due to the nation-wide push for the deinstitutionalization of mental health patients.

The majority of the facility has been abandoned for many years, and neglect had taken such a toll that the cost of saving the grand old building was astronomical. Images of its demolition reminded me of Guthrie’s story and our holiday visits. As videos of the wrecking ball captured the structure’s demise, I thought of those we’d met as we caroled through the wards, sharing warm socks and new toothbrushes with people abandoned by the outside world. Over the years, some had come to Greystone for the hoped-for miracle cure of electroshock therapy or hydrotherapy, but over time, many lived out their years in its cloistered environment.

The rise and ultimate fall of the State Asylum for the Insane at Morristown, New Jersey (its earliest name) echoes that of similar institutions here in Ohio, illustrating much of the history of mental health services in our country. What Quaker physician Thomas Kirkbride believed to be innovative, moral treatment located in beautiful surroundings, quickly grew to massive institutions plagued by overcrowding, decaying infrastructure, and sketchy treatment of patients. By the time we visited, Greystone bore an eerie resemblance to Nurse Ratched’s ward in the 1975 film, “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”

As I attended a recent conference sponsored by the Ashland County Mental Health and Recovery Board (MHRB), I remembered those discomforting visits to Greystone, and caught myself humming the tune from the old Virginia Slims cigarette ads: “You’ve come a long way baby . . .” (great commercials except for the product they sold). The world of mental health treatment and support is light years away from the Greystones of our history. Amazing strides have been made in our understanding of mental health disorders, the development of effective medication, and the availability of effective treatments – although there is still much work to be done.

Here in Ashland County, the MHRB is tasked with ensuring the availability and accessibility of quality services that support recovery for individuals with mental illness and/or alcohol and drug addiction. In doing so, the local MHRB and its partners work to create an environment of hope. Through a focus on resiliency, empowerment and transparency, the mental health conversation is shifting from “what’s wrong with you?” to “what has happened to you?” University of Houston professor Brené Brown explains the premise: “Owning our story can be hard but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it.”

Perhaps Guthrie’s voice was prophetic as he sang, “I roamed and rambled and I followed my footsteps . . . a voice was chanting, the fog was lifting . . .” In the 1950s, there was little commitment to the Ashland County MHRB’s vision that “everyone is entitled to live a quality life in the community.” Thankfully, today the fog fueled by a lack of understanding, stigma and shame is lifting. Tuesday, our community’s continued caring at the polls will empower all of our neighbors to have community-based, compassionate options for mental health support here in Ashland County, helping Guthrie’s legacy to be true for all of us: “This land was made for you and me.”