Patient Libraries in Hospitals for the Insane in the United States, 1810-1861

Most of the early hospitals for the insane in the United States established libraries for their patients. This paper investigates the origins, typical features, functions, and probable conditions of patient libraries in hospitals for the insane up to the Civil War. In assessing the significance of the libraries, it emphasizes the everyday purposes reading and libraries served for hospital authorities and patients within the enclosed world of the asylum over the early psychiatric profession's avowed belief in the effectiveness of reading as a treatment for insanity.