STATE INSTITUTIONS DOCUMENTS: State Institutions by Institution

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The general category includes articles and speeches by institution staff, system-wide reports, and, chronologically, other documents relating to the state institutions in general. State Institutions: Future Planning includes individual proposals and reports and documents from joint planning efforts regarding future use of the state institutions. Welsch Documents includes orders in that action in the federal district court and related documents.

Annex for Defective Delinquents – Introductory Note

In 1945 the Minnesota Legislature authorized the transfer during the period from June 30, 1945 to June 30, 1947 of persons labeled “feeble-minded” and committed to state guardianship to a separate wing or section of the St. Cloud Reformatory. Minnesota Laws 1945, chapter 565, section 4.  https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1945/0/1945-565.pdf  This action was prompted in part to relieve pressure on the waiting list for admission to the School for Feeble-Minded and Colony for Epileptics at Faribault, but the action was also prompted by the almost "prison-like" conditions in which the men transferred were held at Faribault.  This unit at St. Cloud was designated the Annex for Defective Delinquents by the Division of Public Institutions. 

The initial authorization for transfer for a two-year period was reauthorized in 1947 (https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1947/0/1947-080.pdf ), 1949 (https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1949/0/1949-127.pdf ), and 1951 https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1951/0/1951-292.pdf .  In 1953 this law was amended to delete all reference to this separate wing or section at the Reformatory, but the Annex for Defective Delinquents continued to function.  Minnesota Laws 1953, chapter 255.  https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1953/0/1953-255.pdf  In 1955, the law was amended to authorize  a portion of the state reformatory  to be "set apart for the care of mentally deficient persons."

The law was also amended to provide that "any committed mentally deficient person may be placed at this facility if in the judgment of the commissioner of public welfare it is in the best interests of that person to receive care and training at this facility." There were no time limitations, such as the two-year period that appeared in the earlier laws.  https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1955/0/1955-244.pdf  In 1961 the statute was amended to require the consent of the commissioner of corrections for placement at the Annex.  Minnesota Laws 1961, chapter 750, section 14.  https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1961/0/1961-750.pdf 

A committee of the Minnesota State Bar Association recommended closing the unit on the basis that it was inappropriate to confine persons in a prison who had not been convicted of a crime.  The language in the law authorizing operation of the Annex at the St. Cloud Reformatory was stricken in Minnesota Laws 1963, chapter 215.  https://www.revisor.mn.gov/data/revisor/law/1963/0/1963-214.pdf

Introduction – State Board of Corrections and Charities

In 1883 the Minnesota Legislature established a six-person State Board of Corrections and Charities to investigate the condition and management of "the whole system of public charities and correctional institutions" and to publish a report of their findings every two years. Minnesota Laws 1883, chapter 127. The Legislature expanded these duties during the years that followed. In 1901, the Board was abolished and replaced by the Board of Control. Minnesota Laws 1901, chapter 122. With an Eye to the Past includes excerpts from the Biennial Reports which relate to the School for the Feeble-Minded at Faribault. These Reports are available at the University of Minnesota and the Minnesota Historical Society libraries.

Introduction – Reports to the Board of Control

From 1901 to 1939 institution superintendents in Minnesota submitted biennial reports to the Board of Control established by Minnesota Laws 1901, chapter 122. In addition, the Faribault School for the Feeble-Minded, at least for the years 1922 through 1936, and perhaps other institutions as well, submitted an annual report to the Board of Control that showed the number of "inmates," the number of employees, and detailed reports on crops and livestock. With an Eye to the Past includes copies of these which were found in Box 127.H.8.2 (F) in the State Archives at the Minnesota Historical Society Library.

Introduction–Faribault Task Force

In August 1955 the Minnesota Department of Administration under the leadership of Commissioner Art Naftalin started a process to analyze the administration of state agencies called the Minnesota Self-Survey project. This effort was prompted in part by the need to find economies and efficiencies in state agencies so that a new pay plan adopted by the 1955 legislature could be implemented. The initial phase of this project included 33 Task Forces, including a Children's Institutions Task Force. These task forces followed a detailed work manual to prepare reports submitted in 1956. The Reports of the Operational Task Forces and Summary Evaluation: The Minnesota Self-Survey published in 1958 provides further background. Some task forces, including the Children’s Institutions Task Force, also met in 1959. A brief summary of the process is provided here in the task force meeting minutes for November 20, 1959.

With an Eye to the Past includes material relating to Faribault State School and Hospital from the initial phase of the self-survey and material submitted to and minutes of the task force meetings at Faribault in 1959 and 1960. Records from the initial phase of the Minnesota Self-Survey are available at the Minnesota Historical Society. Complete records from the task force meetings at Faribault in 1959 and 1960 are in Box 127.H.6.2 (F) at the Minnesota Historical Society.

Introduction – Monthly Department and Service Reports

The State Archives at the Minnesota Historical Society include copies of the internal monthly reports submitted to the administration at the Faribault State School and Hospital by various departments or personnel at that institution. With an Eye to the Past includes all of these reports for May 1960 and most of the school department, patient activities, and rehabilitation therapies reports from 1952 to 1966. It also includes a few of Superintendent Engberg’s monthly reports to the Commissioner of Public Welfare.

These internal Faribault reports are in Boxes 127.H.6.2 (F) and 127.H.6.1 (B) in the State Archives at the Minnesota Historical Society Library.

Introduction – St. Peter State Hospital Documents

The first persons with developmental disabilities in Minnesota who were sent to a state institution were sent as children to the Minnesota Hospital for the Insane at St. Peter.  From the time that institution opened in 1866 through November 31, 1879 there were 56 persons admitted, most of them children, who were labeled "idiots" or "imbeciles." A few of these children were sent home or, as was done to a girl in 1868, carried back to the county they came from on the basis they were not fit subjects for an insane asylum. 

In his annual reports in 1869 and 1875 the Superintendent objected to the practice of committing these children to the institution. His report and statements by the Superintendent of the School for the Deaf and by the State Board of Health prompted the Legislature to appoint a commission to examine the patients there and to determine whether they were appropriately placed.  Minnesota Laws 1877, chapter 42. https://www.revisor.leg.state.mn.us/data/revisor/law/1877/0/1877-042.pdf  That commission identified 70 persons who should be sent back to their home counties, including adults who did not require treatment as well as children variously described as idiots, imbeciles, or feebleminded.  Most of these persons were not actually removed from the institution, for the Legislature did not require that action for counties "where the crops have been seriously damaged or destroyed by grasshoppers, until one year after the grasshoppers shall have disappeared from such counties" and permitted counties which had "no proper facilities for the care of such weak minded or demented patients" to keep these persons in the institution at county expense. The Commission further recommended that a separate school be established for the "feebleminded" children. 

In 1879, the Legislature appointed a second commission to identify the children who should be sent to a new school to be established at Faribault. Minnesota Laws 1879 chapter 31.  https://www.revisor.leg.state.mn.us/data/revisor/law/1879/0/1879-031.pdf  That Commission identified 14 children, who were transferred to the new school on July 25, 1879. Six more children were sent from the Hospital for the Insane to the Faribault school later that year.

Records of persons admitted to the Hospital for the Insane at St. Peter from 1866 through 1881 are in the St. Peter Casebooks in boxes 108.I.18.1B-1, 108.I.18.1B-2, 108.I.18.2F-1, and 108.I.18.2F at the Minnesota Historical Society. 

In 1968 the Minnesota Valley Social Adaptation Center, a unit for persons with developmental disabilities, was established as part of St. Peter State Hospital and continued until 1997.

The documents in With an Eye to the Past are, generally, limited to those from prior to 1881 and after 1968.