Brunswick Home

A privately run facility in Amityville, Long Island, New York, was established in 1882 and served all classes of incurables except the insane. Opening in 1887, it would later become Brunswick Hospital facility, which now has care in the form of a psychiatric center, retirement home, rehabilitation and a general hospital. All together these services are provided to upwards of 3,000 patients at any given time.

Home, farm, private school, institution, school of adjustment, academy, hospital, psychopathic institute, psychological school, training school were all names for facilities where people with disabilities were sent. These places, if privately run, were often very expensive restricting services to the rich. The state-run facilities were what the working-class and poor could afford, causing a socioeconomic segregation in the care and treatment of the disabled. The difference in treatment had two major factors. The private schools were smaller and had better resources. Because they charged tuition, the private schools could afford better things than the tax-based funding of the public facilities.

Backward youth, retarded children, backward, defective, inefficient, subnormal, feeble-minded, needing adjustment are just some of the terms used to "diagnose" those with developmental disabilities.

Skip Navigation