The Poorhouse Story  
NEWSLETTER   

1/25/2005
(26th issue)

REFLECTIONS

by William Saslow

Hi Linda,

I hope this email finds you well.  A lot has transpired since our last discussion.

I was able to find a memoir from a resident at the Portsmouth Asylum and I’ve started public speaking on the subject of the Asylum both at work and in the community.

There seems to be a lot of interest in this era of our history.   At a discussion at the Portsmouth Public library, the attendees were rapt, attentive, asked thoughtful questions and provided some follow-up research.  One of them actually found a photo of the Portsmouth Asylum on a Providence Public Library website.  I’ve attached it [above] for your consideration.  If you use it on your website, please make sure to credit the Rhode Island Collection at the Providence Public Library.  The memoir and the picture add a few more puzzle pieces in the picture of how people lived at the Portsmouth Asylum.

The response I’ve gotten, sharing the story, has buoyed my spirits and I’ve been asked to speak to the Portsmouth Historical Society on November 8^th.   I feel more confident than ever that I can portray the scathing criticism of the State Commissioner of the Poor, for the Town of Portsmouth, tactfully and factually.  The crux of the story is the hijacking of compassion by deterrence.  A modern town of the time, fashioning itself as the birthplace of American Democracy, unabashedly took steps in the 1800s to marginalize the rights of the pauper poor and criminalize them in attitude and action.  This was not done in secret by a cruel keeper or corrupt commissioner, but with the approval of the majority of the populace and codified in rules and regulations. 

“Now admitting the extremity of poverty to be a crime – in the name and behalf of the pauper poor of the State, in all seriousness, I respectively ask you as conservators of the rights and privileges of the people of Rhode-Island, to define what the punishment of that crime shall be.  It seems there is one town, at least, in the State, who, in virtue of authority delegated by you to them to provide for the care of their own poor, have decided poverty to be a crime of so deep a dye, that any one found guilty of the offense within its jurisdiction, shall no longer be deemed worthy to partake of the inestimable privileges of an American citizen.”
Thomas R. Hazard, Report on the Poor and Insane in Rhode Island, 1851

[Thomas Hazard] “has presented a most melancholy picture of the treatment of the poor in the Portsmouth Asylum. For the honor of the town, if such be the painful fact disclosed, we would indulge the hope that an amelioration of their condition may at once be effected.”
Rev. Edward Peterson, History of Rhode Island, 1853

Ourselves, our times, our challenges; how much have we changed since?  Can a welfare-to-work system, overstressed by economic pressures, lead to modern workhouses?  Will our biology, given the same mix of compassion and deterrence, lead to the same inevitable excesses?  The more I research, the more real I view the players in the Portsmouth Asylum saga, the more I am pessimistic in our inevitable result.  Our history’s lessons stand before us as a warning of what we are capable of, and how we can delude ourselves into believing that deterrence and compassion can be served on the same plate.

Sincerely,
Bill Saslow
Middletown, RI

Hi Linda:

It's been a long time--boy how it gets away from me. The demolition is complete, and now, after months, the crew is back at completing the landscaping and finishing off the remaining part of the old section. I still don't know what is going to actually be done with the empty lot.

Some new developments:

1. Some of the old woodwork that was removed from the demolished section (I found out about this after the fact and second-hand) is being used in an art project at Verona High School which involves framing old documents and photos of the facility in that wood! They just received word that they will be receiving a grant for this, and expect to begin after the first of the year.

2. I met with Minda Powers of IlL a couple months ago. We visited the rural Verona residence where the 70+ "missing" gravestones were found from our cemetery. The owners are very cooperative and would like to see the right thing done with the stones--have them returned and restored to their proper place. We took some nice photos and Minda is considering this story for her book she is writing about cemeteries.

I get very little time to work on any progress with old documents. There still is the occasional genealogy researcher. Just this week I was able to provide quite a bit of valuable information to a lady in WA. I still feel so lucky to have all these documents preserved.

Hope you are fine...

Sandy Everson in Verona

FEATURED PROJECTS
(based on readers submissions)

Janet Lyman has done a wonderful service
for anyone searching for information about people who may have lived in this poorhouse!  

This is a great example of what information can be found in those old annual reports for towns or counties. 

Too often researchers become discouraged when they cannot find original poorhouse records. This is what can be found ... if someone is willing to go the extra mile!

FEATURED ARTICLES
(We didn’t create them; 
we just show them!)

photo from the article in The Mountain Laurel

(Click on their logo above to visit this
wonderful publication which will provide
a feast of stories and photos for those of you who love the tiny, personal details of history.)

(Click on the photo at the left to go to The Mountain Laurel's article.) 

We wrote an extensive article about two years ago when the cemetery for this poorhouse was dedicated and an historical highway marker was placed there by the state of Virginia.  But Sarah and Abner Bruce Graham have done incredible work since then ... further restoring and developing the old poor farm as a Living History Book museum of the institution and the details of the daily lives of people during that era.  This is the only such extensive poorhouse preservation effort we have heard of by private individuals.  You may also want to visit their own website to read about their latest developments. They are truly heroic in their dedication.
 

Here is another great transcription project!
Click on the title link to the right to see this spreadsheet page.

Source Information
These data were abstracted and transcribed from printed materials in the Wisconsin Historical Society, 816 State Street, Madison, WI 53706, in the WHS government documents section: The Annual Reports of the Board of Trustees, Superintendent and Physicians of the Rock County Insane Asylum & Home for the Poor, for the [fiscal] years ending June 30, 1909, 1910, 1911, 1913, 1919, 1920, 1921, 1923 (all years for which WHS records were available).

Transcriber's Notes
The data in this web page appeared first in the print in a RCGS Newsletter article: Herrick, Linda, Member News, The Newsletter of the Rock County [, WI] Genealogical Society, Volume 27, Issue 1, September, October, November, 2003, pp. 6-9. The original chronologically sorted data from this Newsletter was re-sorted by surname for ease of use in the table below.

NEW JERSEY

Bill's  website contains the list of all the names on this memorial, etc. Photos of the monument as well as the cemetery in general are available at www.graveinfo.com/maplegrove 

Click on these photos to enlarge them.

Below you can see some of the new
"official" photos of The Poorhouse Lady
in period costume ... which were taken
to accompany the new Poorhouse Story
"virtual presentation" DVD.

Clicking on them will enlarge them.

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