Samuel Gridley Howe Library
Starting with the original building in 1913, up until the new building was built in 1917, the Howe library building has had a variety of uses. In 1913, the building was used as a recreation center for the employees of Fernald to socialize and go on dates under the supervision of Dr. Fernald. Also in 1913, the building had a secondary use as a welcome center for families and visitors of the school so that they would not wander off into the wards. In 1916, Fernald realized that they needed to have a real library instead of using the building as a recreation center. They requested money from the state for a new library building and in 1917, the new building was built. The firm that built the library were pioneers in hospital and institution architecture in Massachusetts. Another use that the library building served, was as a storage space for documentation. This was a clever use of the building because it was highly inflammable. Jump to 1924, Fernald requested more money for the library. This money was eventually used for expanding the library in 1926.
Dr. Walter E. Fernald, the superintendent of the school, thought there was a major problem among his female employees: he did not like them leaving work to go into Boston for dates, where they could fall under the influence of the “temptations of the city”. In the Annual Reports of 1913, 1914, and 1916, Dr. Fernald and the trustees wrote that they owed a service to their female employees to provide a safe building on campus for relaxation and fun. In reality, Dr. Fernald did not want them getting pregnant. We know this because male employees did not have the same restrictions, as the reports say, “On the other side of the recreation hall would be a smoking and billiard room for the male employees”. It is possible Dr. Fernald did not want the women to have sex in general, but he definitely did not want them caring for their own child instead of doing their job of watching over the residents of the school. In addition, the school was a terrible work environment because of the long hours and abuse, so Dr. Fernald wanted to make it more appealing by building a recreation center.
Fernald asked for funding for a recreation center from the state in the reports of 1913, ‘14, and ‘16, reminding the state that there was “urgent” need for a recreation hall which would also contain a much needed new library and laboratory. The recreation center and library were built in 1917, and appropriations for expanding the library were made in 1926 for 1927. The library was then renamed the Samuel Gridley Howe Library, after Samuel Howe, the founder and first superintendent of the school.
The recreation center had a pool table, a small kitchen, a table in front for the matron over watching the employees in the building, side rooms where the employees had a little privacy with their dates, and a card room for gambling.
Once the building started to be used as a library, it had a plentiful repertoire of texts. At the time, the Howe library was the largest library containing book on the topic of mental defects, and it was widely considered the best library in the United States for information on mental health. Dr. Walter Fernald was considered the expert on the subject and most people looked to him for answers to their questions. There were two main sections to the library: the Historical Book Collection and the Historical files. The two biggest collections in the library were the Historical Book Collection and the Rosemary and Gunnar Dybwad Collection. The Historical Book Collection consisted of about 4,000 texts ranging from the 1840’s to 1959. The texts were organized into 116 different categories. Some of these categories included mental retardation, psychiatry, and mental hygiene. Most of the titles in the library were written in English, however, some of them were in German, French, or other languages. The Rosemary and Gunnar Dybwad Collection had approximately 2,000 titles written in languages differing from French and Spanish to German and Scandinavian. The Rosemary and Gunnar Dybwad Collection had very similar content to the Historical Book Collection, however the Rosemary and Gunnar Dybwad Collection had sources from the National Association for Retarded Citizens (NARC) in their collection. Ironically, there are few sources on the library, given that the Howe Library had such a large collection of information on mental health.
Another use that the library served was as a laboratory. In the 1916 Annual Report, the school expressed their concern that they needed a new building for a laboratory. Throughout 1917 and 1918, Fernald requested the state that they provide funding for a new building. Since the current laboratory was in the basement of the library, the conditions were getting worse and they decided it could no longer serve as a laboratory. While the laboratory was in the library, they held clinical examinations, conducted scientific research, conducted autopsies and a variety of different experiments.
Today, the library is in much better shape than most other buildings at the Fernald campus. The building is made of brick, with a white entranceway. The walls are brown and the floor is a green carpet. The floor is covered in bits and pieces of beige plaster that fell from the ceiling, a giveaway of the school’s lack of maintenance. The pool table is still prominently set in the middle of the main room behind the welcome desk, both in good condition. Some of the shelves around the room still have books, but many are empty. To the right of the main room, the empty shelves have modern plastic labels with locations names, most of which are countries, but there is also Massachusetts, and some labels that are not a location. Evidently, the library needs to be swept up, but it could very well be used again.
Bibliography
Green, Alex. "Interview with Alex Green." Interview by author. September 2016.
Wallace, Anna M. History of the Walter E. Fernald State School. May 29, 1941.
Green, Alex. Building Synopses. 2015.
Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. Boston. Annual Report of the Trustees of the Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. December 1, 1915. Annual Report, Wright and Potter Co., Boston, MA.
Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. Boston : Wright & Potter. Annual Report of the Trustees of the Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. December 1, 1916. Annual Report, Wright and Potter Co., Boston, MA.
Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. Boston : Wright & Potter. Annual Report of the Trustees of the Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. 1918. Annual Report, The Fernald School for the Feeble Minded, Boston.
Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. Boston : Wright & Potter. Annual Report of the Trustees of the Massachusetts School for Idiotic and Feeble-Minded Youth. 1913. Annual Report, The Fernald School for the Feeble Minded, Boston.
D'Antonio, Michael. The State Boys Rebellion. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004
The Fernald School for the Feeble Minded. Building Request Packet. July 1925. The Fernald School for the Feeble Minded, Boston.
The Fernald School for the Feeble Minded. Historical Book Collection. January 8, 2000. The Fernald School for the Feeble Minded, Boston
O'Meara, Peter. Dybwad Collection. 1992
