Description:

On display in the Eckenhoff Reading Room: Like a path through a maze, medical and societal responses to mental illness in America have seen shifts and turns of imperfect progress. This exhibit explores both societal and medical treatments of mental illness in the US from the 18th century to today. It highlights institutional confinement, medical and pharmaceutical treatments, the development of child psychiatry, and the shift to police as mental illness first responders. Patterns of advancement and retreat carry through each case, showing the struggle to properly treat mental illness continues today. 

This exhibit was created to complement the National Library of Medicine’s traveling exhibit, Care & Custody: Past Responses to Mental Health, on display in the Galter Library atrium February 9-March 21, 2026. Details about that exhibit are available here.