Scope and Content: Programs and institutions for the mentally ill and retarded of Massachusetts were among the responsibilities successively of the Board of State Charities (St 1863, c 240), State Board of Health, Lunacy, and Charity (St 1879, c 291), and State Board of Lunacy and Charity (St 1886, c 101).  They were then the sole responsibility successively of the State Board of Insanity (St 1898, c 433), Massachusetts Commission on Mental Diseases (St 1916, c 285), Dept. of Mental Diseases (St 1919, c 350, ss 79-81), and Dept. of Mental Health (St 1938, c 486). The Dept. of Mental Health and its predecessors have had general supervision of all public and private institutions for the mentally ill, mentally retarded, epileptic persons, and persons addicted to alcohol and narcotics.
Arrangement: In two subseries: (1) Public institutions (2) Private institutions; Arranged within each subseries by institution, thereunder chronologically, then by patient no
Related Catalog Records:

Archivegrid
OCLC