THE Cleveland State Hospital, with a capacity of one hundred and two, was opened March 5, 1855, by Dr. L. Firestone, with about fifty patients, whose disabilities required the attention of but one assistant physician. The district Consisted of twenty-two counties, embracing about one-third of the state. The institution steadily increased in size and number of patients until September, 1872, when it was almost entirely destroyed by fire. But few lives were lost, however, and the patients numbering some three hundred, were temporarily quartered in the other public institutions of the city and state. An act providing for the re-construction of the building was passed March 18, 1873, and work was begun immediately. It was not completed, however, until January, 1875. Some years later the building was enlarged by the addition of six wards, and in 1893 two convalescent cottages were added, making our present capacity one thousand.

Eighteen hundred and ninety-six and 1897 saw the construction of a beautiful amusement hall on the grounds of the Institution. It has a improved system of bathing, lecture room, tailor shop, barber shop, etc. Religious services are conducted in the hall on Sunday, and a dance, in which both patients and employes participate, on Wednesday night of each week.

In 1897 the congregate dining-room was opened, in which six hundred patients are fed three times daily, during which time music is rendered by the orchestra.

As the years rolled by, customs changed and the city built up, the footprints of Time were nowhere more clearly marked than in the State Hospital. From the old-fashioned "Lunatic Asylum" it has slowly but surely developed into one of the most modern and well-appointed institutions in the country. We now have our own electric light plant, ice manufactory, training school for nurses, detention hospital, and in fact all the conveniences and appliances of modern times that tend to further the solving of the great problem of caring for the insane. In the meantime, owing to the rapid increase in the population of both the city and state, and the corresponding increase in the number of insane to be cared for, other institutions of a like nature have been erected in the state, in consequence of which the Cleveland State Hospital district now embraces but six counties, which gives a daily average of eleven hundred patients.

INTERIOR VIEW OF WOMEN'S COTTAGE - CLEVELAND STATE HOSPITAL.

Cleveland township in which the Cleveland State Hospital is situated, was not at the time of the opening of the Institution a part of the City of Cleveland, but constituted what was then a part of the village of Newburgh, an incorporation separate and apart from the city, and at the present time the souther city limit lies quite a distance south of the Institution.

The Hospital is situated on an elevated piece of land in the southern part of the township, the grounds occupying ninety-eight acres, the greater part of which is laid out in park. The stately building with its solemn grey stone walls can be seen for several miles, and is a noted landmark.