Mount Pleasant State Hospital
Originally known as the Iowa Lunatic Asylum, Mount Pleasant State Hospital opened in 1861. It was the first public asylum in the state of Iowa, and was built between 1855 and 1865 at a cost of approximately $400,000.
The Kirkbride building was designed in a relatively modest Elizabethan style by architect Jonathan Preston of Boston, Massachusetts. Apparently, Dr. Kirkbride himself recommended Mr. Preston to the Iowa state commission.
In 1936, a fire devasted most of the building, sparing only a kitchen services area at the back. There isn't really anything left of the original building. After Mount Pleasant was built, Iowa constructed three other Kirkbride asylums in the cities of Cherokee, Clarinda, and Independence, all three of which still stand and are in use today.
Other names for this hospital:
- Iowa Lunatic Asylum, Mount Pleasant
- Mount Pleasant Insane Asylum
- Mount Pleasant Hospital for the Insane
- Mount Pleasant Mental Health Institute
Forum Topics
Read more about Mount Pleasant State Hospital in the forum.
- Early Accounts Of The Asylum
- I always like reading contemporary descriptions of asylums when they were first...
Blog Posts
- Causes of Insanity
- Those familiar with 19th century asylums know all about the sometimes trivial or bizarre reasons people were "adjudged insane". If you do any kind of research into asylums or the...
- More Kirkbride Buildings
- In case you haven't noticed, I've been adding pages for Kirkbride buildings that no longer exist. If you go to the main buildings page and scroll down to the demolished...
- Kirkbrides in American Memory
- A while ago I came across some photos of Taunton State Hospital on the Library of Congress' American Memory web site. They're part of a collection of photos put together by the...
