by Mary Horodyski
Winnipeg
Like other provinces in Canada, Manitoba began institutionalizing people labelled with intellectual disability in the late-19th century. [2] In 1890, the Manitoba government opened the Home for Incurables in Portage la Prairie and this institution, later known as the Manitoba Developmental Centre, continues to operate today. In view of the almost 125 years of provincially-run institutionalization in Manitoba, it seems unusual that so little is known about this government endeavour. Disability history has risen in prominence over the past decades, but historical study of the experiences of people with intellectual disability has not received the attention it deserves and this population has sometimes been described as “invisible.” [3] However, this “invisibility” is not due to lack of effort by this community. Institution survivors have argued that they have told their stories of institutionalization but have not been heard or believed. [4] Scott Klassen, an institution survivor from St. Amant, argues that societal devaluation of people with intellectual disability means that even if the public and our government do know about the harms of institutionalization, we somehow rationalize it. Klassen, as reported in an Institution Watch newsletter, says “Society seems like it doesn’t even know the wrong they are doing with institutions. I don’t believe it. I think they know. Society knows but I think they don’t have a tone of remorse in their voice.” [5]
Although a few noteworthy projects, such as The Freedom Tour documentary, have successfully documented some degree of institutional survivor testimony, in general insufficient efforts have been made in Manitoba to systematically collect information about institutions from survivors or from their families and advocates. [6] Understanding the history of institutionalization is further prevented by provincial privacy legislation that restricts access to most of the relevant archived records. [7] While historical case files and other personal health information rightly should be protected, research methods and ethics protocols could be employed that anonymize data and protect individual privacy. In this way, researchers could have increased access to the records and the subsequent publication of findings would allow for greater public understanding of how our government has confined and treated people with intellectual disability within the practice of institutionalization. [8] However, even without using restricted records, it is possible to piece together a preliminary sketch of the provincial institution’s history using publicly available sources such as newspapers, annual reports of government departments, Ombudsman reports, Hansard, the publications of the institution, and a few non-restricted archival sources. These sources show that despite whatever good intentions existed to provide for the needs of people with intellectual disability, consistent levels of underfunding to the institution resulted in overcrowding, often dismal conditions, and mere custodial care at best. [9] Further, these publicly available sources show that the government, and frequently the general public, were aware of the often deplorable conditions that people confined to the Manitoba government-run institution have endured.
Nurses in one of the wards of the Manitoba School for Mental Defectives at Portage la Prairie, c1930s.
Sources: Archives of Manitoba, Portage la Prairie - Buildings - Provincial - Manitoba School for Mental Defectives 19, N14745
The intention of this article is to illuminate some aspects of institutionalization in Manitoba with the hope that further study will ensue. One important area that should be pursued is understanding the demographics of the population confined during the history of the institution and how this population changed over time. As only, a small percentage of people labelled with intellectual disability were institutionalized, what were the conditions that led to institutionalization? [10] What educational or training opportunities existed for inmates? Did all inmates experience institutional life in the same way? [11] What role did institutional inmates play in the surrounding communities and how did communities interact with the institution? Some of these answers will be in the hundred linear feet of restricted case files held at the Archives of Manitoba. [12] Other answers will be held by survivors, their families, staff and community members. Additional answers will be found by making freedom of information requests to the Manitoba government. [13] As shown in sociologist Claudia Malacrida’s examination of the Michener Centre in Red Deer, Alberta, as provincial institutions grow, government attention shifts to the ongoing preservation of employment for government staff as an important consideration for keeping institutions in operation. Malacrida illustrates how that in the case of Red Deer, and this article briefly does the same for Portage la Prairie, economic benefits that are bestowed on nearby towns and cities by the operation of the institution weigh heavily in favour of keeping institutions open even in the face of trends of deinstitutionalization. [14] Examining these issues and questions will be important projects to pursue for researchers, journalists and historians, with the support of people with intellectual disability and the support of the advocacy group People First of Canada. Finally, it should be understood that although this article focusses on the conditions of the institution, rather than the ethics of institutionalization itself, it does not mean that institutionalization is assumed to be justified. As the Ombudsman stated in 1988, “insisting that an institution … be properly run” doesn’t negate the belief that people labelled with intellectual disability should be free to live in their chosen communities. [15]
The institution began in 1890 with the name “Home for the Incurables” for the purpose of “alleviating the sufferings of an unfortunate class of our community.” [16] Asylums had already been built in Brandon and Selkirk for people with mental health disorders. Before the construction of these institutions, people with intellectual disability and mental health disorders were cared for by their families or friends, incarcerated in prisons, or “wandered at will.” [17] The Home for Incurables was designed by Winnipeg architect Charles H. Wheeler and was built by the Manitoba government in Portage la Prairie, not far from the town’s centre. [18] As in the UK in the 19thcentury, rural locations for institutions were preferred partly due to the “idealized vision of rural purity in contrast to the pollution and degeneration of the city.” [19] The new Home was described as “magnificent” and the grounds were “beautifully treed [with] flowered lawns.” [20] It had spacious and well-lit halls and was equipped with an elevator. The building also had balconies extending across its width on both the ground and second floors “so that plenty of the life-giving ozone of the prairies may be obtained.” [21]
Although the pastoral area was meant to be beneficial to the patients, these institutions were also meant to push services and industry toward rural areas as shown by the province’s construction of psychiatric asylums in Selkirk and Brandon. The agricultural location was additionally important for the production of vegetables, grains and livestock so that the institution could be as self-supporting as possible. Expenditures were saved, as from the very first years of the institution; patients as well as local prisoners were used as unpaid labour. [22] In later decades, nearby farmers also benefitted from the institution by using free or very cheap labour performed by the institutional inmates. [23] The segregation of the institution’s residents into one rural location removed the resident from their home community and restricted the degree of influence or connection the family had with their confined family member. [24] The treed expanse, while offering beauty, also had sinister aspects as former institutional residents have stated that the woods are where they would be taken to be beaten by staff. [25]
The institution opened its doors in June 1890 and by the end of December had thirty-eight patients. Some of these had been transferred from the asylums in Brandon and Selkirk in the expectation that Portage la Prairie would provide more appropriate services. [26] By 1891, from the number of patients who applied for admission, the Home was said to already have “proved to be one of the best and most needed Institutions of the country.” [27] At the end of the following year, the Home had thirty-seven people (fifteen females and twenty-two males). [28] This number brought the institution already fairly close to capacity, as there was room for “forty-eight or fifty patients at most.” Dr. Thomas M. Milroy, the presiding physician, noted that since the patients were “incurable” and unlikely to leave except by death, it was expected that the “Home” would soon reach its limit and be unable to meet the demand of additional applications. [29] In fact, by the very next year, capacity was reached when 49 patients were in residence. The Inspector for Public Institutions, John W. Sifton, noted the need for expansion but also recognized that the “limited Revenue of the Province will not permit of any additional expenditure in this connection.” [30]
That the people confined in the institution in Portage la Prairie were not typical patients is baldly spelled out in the name of the medical facility: The Home for Incurables. [31] The 1890 legislation said:
The institution shall have for its object the fostering and care of persons afflicted with incurable diseases of a non-contagious and non-infectious nature, and of persons unable to care for themselves on account of bodily or mental affliction. [32]
In 1891, when the Home was inspected by Sifton, he found that the institution was being “conducted in a methodical, careful and satisfactory manner.” [33] As with legislation for other institutions and asylums, the Home for Incurables included a clause to protect the residents and stated that any officer or employee
Who shall abuse, neglect, or ill-treat any person therein, shall on conviction be punished by imprisonment in a common goal for not more than one year, or by a fine not exceeding one hundred dollars… [34]
At this early date, complaints about the facilities and lack of sufficient staff had already begun. Dr. Milroy mentioned that the heating was inadequate and needed a “thorough overhauling” and that “another attendant will be required in a short time.” Dr. John P. Young, the Superintendent, noted that while improvements had been made to the laundry, the lack of pipes with heating meant that the laundry could not be used in cold weather. [35] Perhaps surprisingly, given that the patients were described as “incurable” and “unfortunate,” they were still considered able-bodied enough to be “profitably employed … in garden and other work.” [36] The term “profitably” referred to the institution’s benefit, as the inmates were not paid for their work despite the fact that payment for outside labour was minutely detailed in the Public Works Report. [37]
In 1898, the Home had ten patients over capacity and a long waiting list. A new wing was built that doubled the accommodation capability. [38] Dr. Milroy declared that while the first building was “very imperfect” the new addition established “an Institution which in regard to construction and equipment is one of the best in the Province.” [39] This addition allowed for the administration to separate the people with intellectual disability from the other patients. [40] However, by 1900, it was noted that “most of the wards were taxed to their utmost” and some children were forced to sleep two to a bed. [41] In 1901, the Public Works report recommended that the people with intellectual disability should be entirely separated to a different building, as it was hard to keep them or their living spaces clean and this “offensive and unhealthful atmosphere” pervades throughout the whole house. [42] More staff were also asked for, especially at night, as the sole night watchman was forced to look after patients as well as perform his own duties. [43] By 1913, another new wing was built and the original population more than quadrupled to 275.
The early promise of the institution was soon seen to have crumbled. In September 1918, two members of the Canadian National Committee for Mental Hygiene (CNCMH) travelled to Winnipeg and visited several institutions, including the Home for Incurables with the “full sanction and approval of the Manitoba Government.” [44] Regarding the Home for Incurables, the CNCMH reported that “It is almost inconceivable that such a state of affairs as we met there could exist in the present age” and blamed these conditions on the lack of “adequate inspection and supervision.” They described the “cruelty of herding these poor creatures together in small rooms, without occupation, without classification or the slightest attempt to inject a single ray of happiness into their lives.” [45] The committee noted the use of seclusion rooms that they described as nothing more than “black holes” and stated that “the cringing attitude of many of the patients gave us food for thought.” [46] One cause of the deteriorating conditions was likely the “stringencies placed upon the staff and because of tight finances” occasioned during the First World War.
Although the Committee had harsh words concerning the conditions of the Home for Incurables, by no means were they averse to institutionalization and segregation of people with intellectual disability. Indeed, the Committee felt that “the problem of the defectives is perhaps the most important of all social questions.” While they considered that there was a “humanitarian” aspect to the care of people described as “insane, feeble-minded and epileptic,” this “care” was also intended to deal with the problems of crime, prostitution and venereal disease. According to the Committee, the majority of criminals and sex workers could be categorized as “mentally defective.” Since the Committee believed that women who did sex work were “accountable for fully seventy-five percent of the venereal diseases rampant” it was “so important to segregate defectives in colonies, at an early age” presumably before they took up sex work. Further elements of contagion were attached to children with intellectual disability, as according to the Committee, they should be weeded out of schools since “even two or three defectives of certain type in a large school is apt to demoralize a number of the pupils.” [47] By 1920, the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) felt convinced that Manitoba was taking a better route and had moved on from the “very mediaeval” conditions witnessed by the 1918 tour. The CMAJ noted that since then, “the government realized the situation, and to-day, Manitoba is in the process of having the most up-to-date system on this continent for caring for their insane and mentally defective.” [48]
In 1924, the name of the institution was changed to the Home for the Aged and Infirm by an act of Legislature. [49] The description of the people cared for was the same as described in 1890 but now with the addition of people for whom “supporting and caring for themselves” was too difficult due to old age. [50] In 1928, “An Act to Provide for Mentally Defective Persons” separated people with intellectual disability from those with solely physical disorders or old age. This legislation further separated people with intellectual disability into the “classes” of “idiots,” “imbeciles,” “morons” and “moral deviates.” [51] Over the next two years, the people classed as “seniles” and “incurables” were moved to other institutions. [52] As noted in the 1920 CMAJ, the advice of the mental health committee to provinces was to create “a state institution on the colony plan, with a department for the feebleminded and one for the epileptic.” The colony plan, also called the cottage plan, is a type of asylum architecture that uses central buildings for administration and a variety of buildings for the inmates. The inmates are usually housed according to categories devised by the institution or asylum. The dispersal of buildings also helped to control disease and played a role in segregating the sexes as well. [53]
In 1930, the institution appointed its first medical superintendent, Dr. Henry S. Atkinson. [55] The 1930 report of the provincial psychiatrist, A. T. Mathers, notes that it was “a pleasure to transmit the first report of the reorganized institution” and that Dr. Atkinson “has made many changes for the better and is heart and soul in the work.” However, the report also states that “the problem of making a first class school for the mentally defective out of an institution poorly planned, poorly maintained and originally intended for another purpose, is almost staggering.” [56] The unsavoury aspects of life at the institution reported at this time included bedbugs, wet mattresses without sanitation processes, and “disgraceful” states of disrepair. [57] Although the bed bugs were unable to be eradicated despite efforts, the cockroaches “which had been very bad for some time” were conquered at the significant cost of $613.00. [58] It seems that previous to Atkinson’s arrival, residents did not have sufficient clothing to go outside in the winter as it was noted that “with change in policy” larger quantities of “underwear, rubbers, shoes, overcoats, etc.” would have to be purchased so that residents could be “taken out for exercise and recreation in the Winter months.” [59] Atkinson described the dental condition of almost all the residents as “deplorable” and noted the children “do not present a general picture of good health” due to the overcrowded and insanitary conditions of the institution. [60] The “serious overcrowding” presented fire hazards and Atkinson warned of the possibility of “a disaster.” [61] He noted that illness was spread rapidly as residents “rub elbows” in the dining and sitting rooms and “their beds are not much less than one sneeze apart.” [62] He worried about the spread of tuberculous and said that “it would not be straining the truth to say that [tuberculosis] is rife among the mentally deficient.” [63] Atkinson reported that 55 people had died during the year. Seven of the deaths were due to epilepsy and, as they all occurred at night, he believed these deaths could have been avoided if there was sufficient staff at night. [64]
Between 1937 and 1938, the original Home for Incurables at left was expanded with a new four-storey wing at right that provided accommodation for 84 more patients.
Source: Archives of Manitoba, Portage la Prairie - Buildings - Provincial - Manitoba School for Mental Defectives 26, N14775
Despite the overcrowding, seventy-two new admissions were made (forty males and thirty-two females) who ranged in age from five to eighty-nine. Of these admissions, more than half were classified as “cases of Mental Deficiency”. The remaining people were categorized as cases of “Epilepsy”, “Seniles”, and “Incurables” (one, twelve and twenty people respectively). [65] Not surprisingly, sixty-one of the admissions were single, widowed or separated thus showing that people who did not have family often had to rely on government support. [66] As part of Atkinson’s ongoing improvements to the institutional care, a full-time physician was appointed. With the professionalization of the institution, better patient records began to be kept. [67] Other changes proposed were an “attitude of kindness” toward the residents and the belief that entertainment and recreation had value for the residents. Sometimes the residents’ own efforts and funds were used to provide these recreational services, as when the residents built a skating rink for both their use and the staff’s, or when a movie projector was purchased from the Patients’ Endowment Account. [68] Changes also included a medical library, a laboratory and dispensary, and occupational therapy. [69] While waiting for a staff member trained in occupational therapy, Atkinson initiated his own methods by involving residents in many aspects of the institution’s day-to-day functions. This kind of “therapy” had obvious benefits for the institution. For example, female residents cared “for their less fortunate sisters,” cleaned, waited on tables and sewed. A few “boys” were trained to perform the milking thus allowing the institution to cease the paid employment of the two milk women. [70] The patients were put to such use that it was only on Sunday afternoons that they were not required to work. [71] By the next year, 156 of the 446 residents, or just over one-third, were “employed”. [72] The issue of unpaid labour in institutions as well as the practice of hiring out inmates to surrounding farms and families has been explored by Claudia Malacrida and Geoffrey Reaume in regard to other provinces’ institutions but has so far has not been examined in Manitoba. [73] It is noteworthy that Atkinson observed that after only one year of this “therapy” residents were able to “accomplish duties and enter into activities hitherto thought impossible” thus confuting the idea that people with intellectual disability cannot be economically productive. [74]
Although Atkinson stated that this type of “training” for the residents was “practically new to the Institution,” patient labour at the institution was mentioned from its very first years. It may be possible that what was new was the relabelling of labour as “training” or “therapy” and having more residents take part. That this increased emphasis on patient labour may have also increased the training duties of paid staff is evidenced by Atkinson’s comments that the success of this “therapy” depended on “instill[ing] into the staff the worthiness, humaneness and practicability of such a program.” He further spelled out that staff who “lack sympathy and patience or who do not show the zeal to improve the conditions of those less fortunate” should realize that there would “be no room” for them in the “great family of this Institution.” [75]
Henry Sheridan Atkinson (1901–1965) was Superintendent of the Manitoba School for Mental Defectives from 1930 to his death.
Sources: University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections, Nan Shipley fonds, MSS21 PC21 A79-014, A05-82
The cost of providing care for people with intellectual disability and mental health disorders was of concern to the Manitoba government. Dr. Mathers, Provincial Psychiatrist, stated provincial money for people in care was going to “people who will never be of any economic value to the state.” Mathers warned that people with “mental and physical infirmities” were on the increase and advised that “every measure now available for curtailing this particular group of our population, and we particularly refer to certain types of mental disability and disorder, should be taken to restrict the increase.” [76] In regard to people with intellectual disability, he said that if “voluntary sterilization was legal there is no doubt that provision could be made to release from twenty to twenty-five of the inmates of the Institution.” [77] The statement is critical to note as it shows that the role of the institution was not only to provide for the needs of people with intellectual disability but to segregate them so to reduce their chances of procreating. [78] Mathers’ views of the utility of sterilization were not unusual. In 1933, a clause regarding sterilization of people considered to have intellectual disability failed to pass by only one vote in the Manitoba Legislature, due to the significant Roman Catholic presence in the province and the religion’s ban on sterilization. [79] That the legislation failed by such a slim margin shows that public support for sterilization was considerable. Even the students of the University of Manitoba Debating Union had sterilization of the “unfit” as their debating topic in 1933. The side arguing sterilization won. [80] As will be discussed later, despite the lack of provincial legislation, sterilization of people with intellectual disability continued to be considered, and indeed practised, to at least some degree.
The economic depression during the first part of the 1930s curtailed plans for enlarging “the scope of services to the mentally retarded by instituting travelling mental health clinics, supervised centers for the training of ‘high-grade mental defectives,’ and extensive out-patient service to the surrounding district.” [81] Near the end of the decade, resources improved and in 1937, a residence for nurses was built on the grounds and this “eased somewhat the chronic overcrowding” for the nursing staff. Before this residence, nurses lived in rooms attached to the residents’ wards. The new nurses’ residence allowed for the “setting up of sewing rooms and other special activity rooms.” In 1939, the institution held the first graduation exercises for nurses who had earned a diploma in “mental nursing.” Male attendants also began to attend lecture courses that year. [82]
The Second World War brought a number of changes to the institution. Beginning in 1939, the institution provided X-ray and laboratory facilities and “psychiatric services” to a military training centre and two air-training schools near Portage la Prairie. Superintendent Atkinson took a leave of absence from 1940 to 1946 and became a member of the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps. [83] He was replaced during his absence by Dr. Morval Bristow who later went on to work at the Brandon mental hospital. [84] By 1941, twenty-eight other staff members enlisted in the armed services. Walmsley reported that “the war years saw a 100% turnover in the female nursing staff, which made consistently good service to the patients very difficult.” [85] As interim superintendent, Dr. Bristow sought out conscientious objectors to fill vacant staff positions. [86] Archivist Conrad Stoesz, in his article on conscientious objectors, says that government wage cuts contributed to staffing shortages. Roland Reimer, a conscientious objector stationed at the Portage la Prairie institution, recalled many times when against prescribed policy he was alone with over fifty patients, including times when he was assigned to Ward 8 where the “combative” residents were confined. Two of the conscientious objectors noted that their training consisted of shadowing a nurse for only one day. [87] However, once the war ended, “steps were taken to remedy the urgent demand for increased facilities and staff.” [88]
Patients at the Manitoba School for Mental Defectives at Portage la Prairie had little to no privacy, as illustrated by this lavatory.
Sources: Archives of Manitoba, Portage la Prairie - Buildings - Provincial - Manitoba School for Mental Defectives 26, N14775
The 1950s saw the emergence of advocacy groups created by parents. [89] In May 1950, a group of parents who regularly met on the train travelling from Winnipeg to the institution in Portage la Prairie “talked about their mutual problems and…disturbed by the paucity of reading material on mental retardation and by the fact that family physicians were unable to provide much information on the subject, they evolved plans to assist the Manitoba School in meeting the needs they had become aware of during their visits to the School.” [90] One of these parents was H. L. Softley who was a founding member, and later President, of the Greater Winnipeg Council of the Manitoba Association for Retarded Children. [91] According to Walmsley, the Institutions Committee of MARC continued the work of the Auxiliary until “a separate organization renamed the Manitoba School Auxiliary was again set up.” As Walmsley rightly notes, “it would be a story of its own to describe the work carried out by the auxiliary from the original provision of party treats to the purchase and building of a lakeside resort on the shores of Lake Manitoba for summer camping for the residents of the Manitoba School.” [92]
The professionalization of institutional staff in Manitoba that began in the late 1930s saw increased recognition by the 1960s. The Psychiatric Nurse Training Act was passed by the Manitoba government in 1960, allowing students to receive a Certificate of Registration after completing three years of study and passing provincial examinations. The first class of students received provincial licensing in 1963 and Walmsley states, “this was obviously a turning point in the care of the mentally retarded.” [93] The impetus for increased training of staff may partially have been driven by the growing population of the Manitoba School. The decades of the 1950s and 1960s saw the highest population numbers at the institution. In 1957, the institution had 907 residents (adults and children) and by 1962, the residents numbered over 1,100 and there were 425 staff, including five doctors. In the late 1960s, the number of residents reached a peak of 1,240. [94] In part, this was due to increased life expectancy for the residents. In 1950, the life expectancy of people with “severe mental retardation” was only about fifteen years. Within the decade, this life expectancy increased to 25½ years. By 1970, life expectancy reached 36½ years. While a life ending in the mid-thirties is still very short, it is important to note that within two decades, the life expectancy of many of the residents of the institution was doubled. [95] As the institutions had not been built to hold these numbers of residents, they became overcrowded, with a corresponding drop in living conditions. The other significant factor in overcrowding was the lack of sufficient supports outside the institution. Walmsley notes that at this time, two social workers were employed to travel throughout Manitoba seeking community arrangements for residents that included foster homes, employment and training. As Walmsley pointed out, many institutional residents “should have been living in the community had there been appropriate support services available.” Indeed, the lack of community services meant that, as the social workers travelled around Manitoba seeking community placements for residents, they spread the word about the institution to communities and applications to the institution increased. [96] Beginning in the mid-1960s, reports about the appalling conditions in institutions began to be publicly released. In 1965, Senator Robert Kennedy toured New York State’s Willowbrook School and infamously described it as a “snake pit.” [97] Boston University professor Burton Blatt and photographer Fred Kaplan toured five institutions in four northeastern states in December 1965 and clandestinely took photographs within wards generally unseen by the public. Their findings were published in a book titled Christmas in Purgatory of which thousands of copies were distributed freely to legislators, community leaders and parent advocacy groups. [98] In 1967, a version of the findings was also published in Look Magazine, an American magazine with a circulation of millions. The photographs and accompanying text showed horrifying conditions but, as Blatt later wrote, “our pictures could not even begin to capture the total and overwhelming horror we saw, smelled, and felt.” [99] Blatt and Kaplan linked much of the abysmal conditions to “the extraordinary shortage of staff in practically all of these dormitories.” [100] Likewise, in Canada, in the early 1960s, Pierre Berton wrote a column for the Toronto Star describing the conditions of Ontario’s Huronia institution. He said that “prisoners in reformatories have better facilities” and described the institution as a “fire trap” with beds “crammed together” and having an “appalling stench.” [101] Soon after Berton’s visit, Ontario’s CCF leader toured the institution and declared it to have “intolerable conditions” and that it was more a place of “human storage” than a hospital. [102]
The laundry at the Manitoba School for Mental Defectives at Portage la Prairie.
Sources: Archives of Manitoba, Portage la Prairie - Buildings - Provincial - Manitoba School for Mental Defectives 25
In Manitoba, the Junior League reported on institutional conditions in the province when it toured the Manitoba School and St. Amant in 1967. Regarding the Manitoba School, the Junior League reported: “Conditions therein were so amazingly antiquated that it is necessary in this report to draw attention fully to both the obvious and hidden reforms that must be instigated if we are to be proud of the kind of community in which we live.” Although their remarks concerning St. Amant were much more favourable, the League’s general conclusion was that “Manitoba is merely housing retarded people in the easiest, cheapest, way possible.” [103] Another rare glimpse inside the Portage la Prairie institution is provided in a memoir by Nicola Schaefer, a Winnipeg mother of a daughter (Catherine) with disabilities. Schaefer visited in the early 1970s and wrote: “The whole place smelled of excrement ineffectively masked by a pungent disinfectant, but the smell became a stink as I approached the room…. It wasn’t very encouraging.” [104]
In 1965, Dr. Glen H. Lowther began his long term as Superintendent after Dr. Atkinson died suddenly in a car accident. [105] Like Atkinson, Lowther brought renewed purpose and professionalism to the institution. Although he was not able to eradicate all the “antiquated” conditions at the Manitoba Development Centre, he brought in one new endeavour that garnered him professional accolades, while bringing mixed results to the residents. In 1967, Dr. Lowther invited University of Manitoba (UM) professor Garry Martin, and four of Martin’s undergraduate students, to visit the institution and develop a behavioural training or “operant conditioning” program. This initial program was deemed to be successful and, for the next seventeen years, Martin was involved in creating behaviour-modification programs for the institution. By 1972, 550 UM undergraduates had participated at the institution as “experimenter-therapists” and 380 residents underwent experiments. [106] Some of the reinforcements used in the training were relatively benign, such as bestowing tokens, Smarties candies or Froot Loops, but other reinforcements involved punishments such as hand-slapping (including “a sharp slap”), time-outs in a seclusion room, application of cayenne pepper, withholding of meals, electric shock, restraints and other unspecified punishment. [107] Although there seems to have been some criticism of the program and its methods, both Lowther and Martin considered it to be a great success and it was widely recognized. [108] Martin also took the program to St. Amant and in 1971 published an article describing a series of experiments that gave electrical shocks and hand-slaps to two boys aged five and six. [109]
Glen Harrison Lowther (1926–2019) took over from Henry Atkinson as Superintendent of the Manitoba School for Mental Defectives in 1965.
Source: University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections, Winnipeg Tribune fonds, PC18 A81-012
To combat the increasingly negative images of institutions held by advocacy groups and the general public, Lowther and Walmsley (who was then chaplain), began publication of a quarterly newsletter titled the Manitoba School Journal. As they wrote in 1972, “The staff of the Manitoba School is more than a little perturbed by the current program of vituperation against institutions in general.” They admitted that the “Manitoba School is overcrowded and understaffed” but felt that efforts spent in criticizing the institution would be better spent advocating for more resources. [110] This newsletter, published from 1969–1973, outlined improvements to the institution, described the operant-conditioning program, provided portraits of staff, and detailed outings and activities of the residents. Some of the improvements were cosmetic but still welcome as some wards were outfitted with bright curtains and bedspreads in an effort to make them seem more home-like. The newsletter also described Christmas preparations and included descriptions of festive menus and visits from Santa. However, contained within these pages meant to celebrate and promote the institution, were often descriptions of the “lamentable lack of staff”, “scarce supplies”, a 200-person “backlog” of applications and the over-crowding and “ill design” of the institution. [111] One “cottage”, containing thirty boys ranging in age from nine to sixteen, had only one staff member on duty in the evenings. [112] Atkinson also wrote that some of the older wards of the institution, such as Northgrove, Eastgrove and Westgrove, had been built as “medical barracks” and were “quite impervious to change.” It was hoped that this kind of barrack living would be eventually phased out, although the population would have to drop dramatically for that to occur. In 1972, he complained that current staffing levels allowed for only “70% of what is considered to be the optimum level of nursing care and training.” The institution needed about 200 more nursing staff, which would be acquired over the next four years. [113]
In the 1970s, concerns about sterilization re-appeared. Although it is commonly believed that the revelations of eugenic practices carried out in the Second World War by the Nazis tarnished North American beliefs in the ethical validity of sterilizations for people with disabilities, in fact sterilizations in Canada and the United States increased post-war. [114] As noted by Robert Wilson, scholarship in Canada has focussed on sterilizations “performed under the authorization of explicitly eugenic legislation” rather than sterilizations performed privately by individual doctors, hospitals, or institutions and this has led to an important gap in the understanding of sterilization practices in Canada. [115] A 1973 review of eugenic legislation in Canada notes that “some hospitals formed sterilization committees” but historical scholarship that examines these committees, or examines sterilizations performed by individual doctors, does not seem to exist. [116] In 1979, L. R. “Bud” Sherman was asked about sterilization of people with intellectual disability but the answer he gave seems somewhat contradictory. The Free Press reported that Sherman said while the “issue of sterilization hasn’t surfaced in Manitoba” at the same time “he doesn’t believe the operations are being done extensively … [and] he is not sure how many retarded individuals have been sterilized in the province.” In the same article, Dr. Lowther was reported to say that it was a “‘terrible mistake’ to sterilize mildly retarded children who could ably raise their own children given the chance.” However, he is also reported to have said that “sterilization is warranted” under certain circumstance and that indeed sterilizations have been performed through the consent of “overly-anxious parents and doctors”. Dr. George Dagleish, who was a medical adviser in Manitoba’s health department, said that he did not feel there were “an excessive number of sterilizations” being performed in Manitoba. [117] The sterilization of people with intellectual disabilities in Manitoba is an area that warrants close scrutiny but will be difficult, as even the 1990 Law Reform Commission discussion paper on sterilization noted that “the past incidence of non-therapeutic sterilizations performed on Manitobans legally incapable of consent is difficult to determine, because (as in other jurisdictions) there exists no readily accessible source of comprehensive or objective statistics.” [118]
By 1973, the institution had 1,066 residents—this was 230 over their legal capacity of 836 residents. The “comfortable capacity”, according to Lowther, was 750 people. In November 1973, to help relieve some of this severe overcrowding, residents began to be transferred to a new institution opened up at the recently closed tuberculosis sanatorium at Ninette, Manitoba. The name of this new institution was Pelican Lake Training Centre (PLTC) and the grounds covered about 170 acres with both wood and stone buildings. [119] Although a significant portion of its funding came from the government of Manitoba, and it also received advisory services and staff training from the Portage la Prairie institution, PLTC was under the governance of the Sanatorium Board of Manitoba. It was expected that 150 residents would eventually be transferred to PLTC from Portage la Prairie, but the first group numbered only 18. [120]
Beside the purpose of relieving overcrowding at the Portage institution, the PLTC was also initiated as a way for the Sanatorium Board to use the facilities formerly occupied by the Ninette tuberculosis sanatorium and as an economic replacement for the TB sanatoria in the surrounding communities. [121] The PLTC was initially intended to “train” individuals in “personal care, and household and elementary workshop skills” so that they could move out of the institution and into foster or group homes in the community. It was expected that most individuals would be ready for community living within six months to a year, although others might take up to three years. Lowther said that,
The single and double-room accommodation at Ninette is ideal for training people to go into private home settings. At Portage there are only dormitories, and they’re a terrible way to prepare people for life in a home setting. [122]
Individuals who were not considered able to meet the training expectations were sent back to the Portage institution. David Stewart, in his history of the Ninette Sanatorium, says that between 1975 and 1994,
there was a good deal of movement of residents:—from Portage to PLTC, and some in the opposite direction. Many went to communities, but about a quarter of them had to come back. About twenty of the seventy have been there since the centre opened, and for them and many of the others it is the only home they can remember. [123]
Up to about the mid-1990s, about 100 residents in total moved to community locations. By 1996, the purpose of the Centre changed to provide primarily custodial care and the name of the institution was changed from Pelican Lake Training Centre to simply Pelican Lake Centre. [124]
On 21 April 1977, tragedy struck at the Portage la Prairie institution when a fire, started by a fourteen-year-old resident, caused the death of eight other residents. The victims of the fire were men between the ages of twenty and forty-one who were living in Eastgrove, one of the “medical barrack”-type buildings that had been built seventy years previously. These deaths brought increased public and political scrutiny of the institution. Dr. Lowther admitted that the residents had never received fire-safety training and that one of the exit doors of the ward had been locked during the fire. He also noted that residents were unable to leave through the windows, as the windows had been restricted in the amount they could open so that residents could not escape during regular circumstances. [125] The Eastgrove building did not have a sprinkler system or a smoke alarm. Lowther said the smoke alarm was unnecessary because the ward was under 24-hour-supervision. However, at the time of the fire, the two on-duty staff were not present and did not notice the fire until it had already progressed significantly. [126] A four-day inquest resulted in the blame being placed on the institution, as they had not complied with a 1974 assistant fire commissioner’s report. At the inquest, Dr. Lowther, who had been the superintendent in 1974, said that he did not know about the fire commissioner’s report. [127] The Minister of Public Works said a decision had been made in 1974 to spend the money on another area of the institution that had greater need than Eastgrove’s fire safety. [128] Although this was a tragic event, almost ten years later the government was seen to be balking again at providing adequate fire-safety standards at the Northgrove building. [129]
Although as early as 1973, Dr. Lowther wished to have the name of the institution changed to reduce stigma, it was not until 1984 that the name “School for Retardates” was changed to the more progressive “Manitoba Developmental Centre”— the name that remains today. [130] The name change, however, did little to alter the ongoing issues of overcrowding, lack of staff and resources, and the “antiquated buildings that should have been abandoned long ago.” [131] This period brought renewed scrutiny of the institution from the public, MLAs and the Ombudsman. The nationwide move toward deinstitutionalization, as well as the continued need to reduce the institution’s population, led to the much-heralded but not entirely successful “Welcome Home” program that saw about 200 residents move out of MDC. The first decade of the 21st century saw the closing of Pelican Lake, increased action against institutionalization and a human rights complaint filed against MDC. The farm operation also began to wind down as the population in the institution aged or became otherwise unable to participate as labourers and the government found it cheaper to purchase goods. [132]
In 1985, the Ombudsman was asked to review the case of a 36-year-old male resident of MDC who had been taken to Portage General Hospital after he had suffered trauma to his abdomen. The man had a perforated duodenum and remained in the hospital for five weeks. As the circumstances of his injury could not be determined even by an internal review of staff and an RCMP investigation, the Ombudsman Gordon Earle was asked to begin an inquiry. After an initial review, the Ombudsman said that this incident, as well as other issues that had been brought to the public or Ombudsman’s attention over the last few years, indicated that a broader scope of inquiry was warranted. [133] He was led to conclude that the “current situation at The Manitoba Developmental Centre is a less than desirable one for the residents.” In particular, Earle focussed on the rise of patient injuries, many of which had “unexplained causes.” He believed that there was a “direct correlation” between the injuries to the residents, and staffing levels that remained insufficient even though the institution’s population had decreased. Other concerns uncovered by the inquiry were “the lack of programming and training opportunities available to the residents” and the “very congested” living areas. The inquiry also investigated the use of psychoactive drugs and found that an “unreasonably high” percentage of residents (45.7%) at the institution received psychoactive drugs. [134] It was later determined that this high level of drug administration was a method of behaviour management used in lieu of adequate staffing and resources. [135] The Ombudsman’s conclusions were that while the majority of staff and management of MDC exhibited “compassion, care and concern”, the lack of sufficient resources resulted in the institution being unable to “fulfill its stated mission ‘to assist clients to attain the highest developmental level possible,’” and that it could not meet its own objectives for “physical care, training and education”. He further noted that some physical aspects of the institution, such as air-conditioning, were inadequate. While he did note that a new recreation centre was under construction on the grounds, he stated that “it would not appear to alleviate all the concerns over lack of adequate programming and activities.” [136] Neil Upham, the executive director of MDC at the time, agreed that “the government doesn’t have the bucks to give us all the staff we require” or allow the institution to meet its mandate to develop the residents “to the best of their abilities.” [137]
The Manitoba School for Mental Defectives at Portage la Prairie as it appeared in an undated aerial photo.
Source: Archives of Manitoba, Portage la Prairie - Buildings - Provincial - Manitoba School for Mental Defectives 3, N34133
In March 1987, the Ombudsman provided eight recommendations to Muriel Smith, Minister of Community Services, in the areas of drug administration, education, incident reports, and air conditioning. [138] The staff-to-resident ratio was noted by the Ombudsman to be a “very serious matter”. He pointed out that while at first glance the numbers provided by the province appeared to show that there was one staff member for each resident, once the figures were broken down into work shifts and categories of employees who worked directly with residents, the numbers told a much different story. At this time, the Ombudsman felt that “appropriate” response to his report had been taken, or was in the process of proceeding, although he said he would continue to “monitor the implementation” of his recommendations. [139] The Ombudsman’s satisfaction did not last long and his next two annual reports show an increasing frustration with the government and MDC. In 1988, the Ombudsman contacted the Minister of Community Services to express his concerns that “programming issues, overcrowded living areas and staffing levels” still were not reaching MDC’s stated objectives. [140] Incidents of injury to residents had also increased by almost 19% to an astounding number of 701 in 1987, which meant that on average 58 incidents happened per month. The Ombudsman noted that while the Director of Nursing suggested this increase was due to changes and reductions in medication and also to the reactions of residents to internal transfers among the wards, he wrote that “one must also wonder whether the staffing patterns and over-crowded areas are not a significant contributing factor.” [141]
In his 1988 report, the Ombudsman said he did not believe “any significant gains” had been made to “improve the quality of life for the majority of residents” at MDC. Reported incidents of injury to residents leaped to 1,181, which was a 68% increase from 1986. While the Ombudsman conceded that some of this increase might have been due to a higher standard of record-keeping and reporting, he said “I have stated before and I still maintain that concerns around staffing and overcrowding must be dealt with systemically” as he felt these factors were closely linked to resident injury. In his concluding report on MDC in 1989, he noted that the government had announced an $8-million allocation for physical upgrading of the institution, that a Manitoba Developmental Centre Advisory Board had been established, and that MDC had applied for accreditation. Although these were positive steps, the Ombudsman still was not satisfied that the government had made inroads on the issues of programming and staffing. He frankly stated that “I do not believe that the residents at the Manitoba Developmental Centre are receiving the level of care and quality of life to which they are entitled.” Although the Ombudsman argued for conditions to be improved at MDC, he specified that this did not mean that he supported institutionalization. He said that he
firmly supports the concept of programs aimed at integrating and assisting the mentally handicapped to become a meaningful part of the community. The fact that I am insisting that an institution…be properly run in no way contradicts nor negates my belief in other viable and necessary programs. [142]
He dealt with the question of insufficient governmental resources by stating:
The Government whom we elect is responsible for establishing program priorities and allocating resources. Therefore it is the Government’s responsibility to make decisions and to take the steps necessary in order to continue to improve the conditions at the Manitoba Developmental Centre. [143]
The province responded to the Ombudsman that resources were being prioritized for the Welcome Home Program. This three-year program, beginning in 1985 and ending in 1988, created opportunities for about 220 residents of MDC to leave for community placements. It was noted to be Manitoba’s “first program that officially supported the notion of de-institutionalization.” [144] The resulting reduction in population at MDC was expected to increase the ratio of staff to resident. [145] The program was also linked to the need to move residents out of the old Northgrove building, which was closing in order to avoid “extensive expensive renovating to meet fire safety codes.” [146] Unfortunately, the Welcome Home program had a number of problems associated with it, including a lack of sufficient community supports for the individuals who moved out of the institution. [147] Other criticisms accused the government of badgering individuals and their families to move out against their wishes. [148] The worst, and most damning, event was the 1987 death of Russell Smith, a twenty-seven-year-old man who was moved from MDC to a group home. The inquest and government report that followed showed that Smith’s death could have been prevented had proper supervision in the group home been administered. [149] Other problems surfaced with group homes that were not properly vetted, such as the Amba home that was run by people who had no experience and were reported to have had instructions to punish residents “in ways that wouldn’t show, such as letting them sit in their own urine and excrement and slapping their hands.” [150] The death of Russell Smith sparked the government to begin measures to improve training and standards within group homes. [151]
During this same period of the mid-to-late 1980s, as the Manitoba Developmental Centre marketed itself as a “progressively residential facility” with “rehabilitative” programming aimed to have the “client return to the community”, other descriptions were not so complimentary. [152] In 1987, during a legislature session, Ed Connery, MLA for Portage la Prairie named the conditions at the institution “deplorable” and cited a letter sent to him from some unnamed employees that said that the closing of Northgrove and the subsequent move of residents to Southgrove resulted in overcrowding and unbearably high temperatures in the Southgrove building. The employees wrote that “whoever is instructing all these changes, is obviously trying to make the Manitoba Developmental Centre into a hell hole and to look like one. It’s absolutely inhuman.” [153] The next day, the Free Press reported that MDC was described as a “hell-hole”. [154] Newspaper reports described the living conditions at MDC as “oppressive” and reported that a former medical director, Dr. Fischel Coodin, described windows that “weren’t washed for years” and a lack of privacy for toileting. [155] The decline of institutionalization in Manitoba had finally begun as, from the mid-1980s onward, very few people were newly admitted to MDC. Re-admissions though were more numerous and included some of the Welcome Home people who had been previously released. [156] Population rates declined at twenty or more people a year. Although community discharges became regular occurrences, the aging population meant that death played a larger role in separations from the institution. For example, from the period of 1996 to 2014, there were 350 deaths compared to 141 people discharged to the community. [157]
A caravan of People First members went across the prairie provinces in August 2007 calling for the closure of institutions. This protest was made into The Freedom Tour documentary.
Source: www.peoplefirstofcanada.ca
A few significant events occurred in 2004 that had lasting repercussions for MDC. In February, a man named Dennis Robinson died at MDC as a result of being forgotten in the institution’s van after an outing with seven other residents. [158] The inquest completed in 2007 revealed not only a number of serious shortcomings involving the care of the residents during this outing but that these failings were routine. [159] In December 2004, the New Democratic Party government in Manitoba announced a $40-million commitment to MDC for renovations. [160] This announcement was met with a mixed response: some families felt relief that the institution would continue to house their family member while disability advocates and some former residents of MDC expressed outrage. Rallies against the government decision were held in front of the legislative building, prominently featuring activists from People First, a self-advocacy organization for people with intellectual disabilities. [161] As also seen in Alberta when the closure of the Michener Centre was announced, the provincial government employee union opposed the closing. Concerns for the economy of Portage la Prairie were also expressed. [162] The NDP decision provoked two major responses. The first was a caravan of People First members who went across the prairie provinces in August 2007 calling for the closure of institutions. This protest was made into The Freedom Tour documentary. The second major response was a human rights complaint launched by the Association for Community Living Manitoba in 2006 against the Government of Manitoba, the Executive Director of the Manitoba Development Centre and The Public Trustee. The complaint was settled in 2011 through a mediated agreement. This agreement outlined that the government must move 49 of the 250 people still confined in the institution into the community by 2014. It also allowed “for the first time” to give Community Living Manitoba “the opportunity to present MDC residents and their families other community living options including the opportunity to visit and experience various community living settings.” [163]
In 2010, despite nationwide and worldwide trends to close institutions, Gord Mackintosh, then Minister of Family Services, said that “MDC will not be closing any time soon, if ever.” [164] It is clear from Manitoba government press releases, as well as from newspaper articles, that significant concerns for the government are the continued employment for government staff and the economic welfare of Portage la Prairie. [165] While a committee was formed to discuss the future of MDC, the results of this committee decisions are not yet known. In 2014, a Winnipeg Free Press editorial complained that “the province has refused to shed any light on its intentions, saying only it is waiting for the report of a working group.” [166] The government has still not announced the closure of the institution. At the end of 2017, there were 163 residents living at MDC, including one new admission and two readmissions. [167]
This article has brought forth only a few strands of the complex and controversial history of institutionalization in Manitoba and so much more needs to be examined. However, what has been made clear is that persistent underfunding by the Manitoba government increased the indignities suffered by people with intellectual disability who were confined within the provincial institution’s walls. Further, although too much of the institution’s history has remained hidden due to access barriers to archival records, an insufficient focus by historians and researchers, and too often public indifference or ignorance, there yet have been times when the conditions of the institution have been clearly and publicly broadcast. Further, since the 1990s, successful class actions against provincial government institutions have been concluded in Canada and public awareness has grown. Governments, such as Ontario and British Columbia, have apologized to the people they institutionalized. In Manitoba, in 2018, David Weremy as the representative plaintiff, brought a class action against the Province of Manitoba alleging physical, sexual and psychological abuse at MDC. [168] The Manitoba government has thus far denied the allegations. [169]
Regardless of the outcomes of the lawsuit, and as stated in the beginning of this article, the voices and experiences of former residents need to be systematically gathered and preserved and the history of institutionalization in Manitoba is an area that should be thoroughly examined and understood. A preliminary examination shows the history of MDC to have many similarities to Alberta’s Michener Centre and a more detailed examination of institutionalization in Manitoba in relation to institutionalization across Canada and the United States would be useful. For example, are all aspects of MDC characteristic of the practice of institutionalization or are there particularities that are specific to Manitoba? Finally, as recommended by historian Nic Clarke, any history of institutionalization should also be countered with the historical narrative of community living. As mentioned earlier, contrary to popular belief, only a fraction of the people with intellectual disability in Manitoba lived within an institution. [170] A deeper look into archival records and a dedicated and collaborative effort in collecting and preserving the life experiences of individuals with intellectual disability is in order.
Appreciation is extended to Dr. Zana-Marie Lutfiyya, Dr. Thomas Nesmith, Dr. Greg Bak and the two anonymous reviewers for their comments and encouragement. Thanks also to the skilled staff of the Legislature Library. Any errors or omissions are my own.
1. In the mid-1980s, while investigating the Manitoba Developmental Centre, the Provincial Ombudsman described aspects of the operation of the institution as “a very serious matter.” Summary of The Ombudsman’s Report on The Manitoba Developmental Centre, 1987, page 17.
2. In this article, I use a variety of terms to describe those who were institutionalized such as “residents,” “institutional survivors,” “inmates,” “individuals,” and “people.” Susan Burch and Hannah Joyner note that terms used to describe people who have been institutionalized “are fraught with political and social meaning.” In their book, they chose to “employ many of these terms throughout as a way of both complicating and honoring the many experiences of people ‘on the inside.’” Susan Burch and Hannah Joyner, Unspeakable: The Story of Junius Wilson, Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2007, page 5. The historical literature for the Manitoba institution includes the terms “inmates,” “residents,” and “clients.”
3. Two important review essays on disability history are Catherine J. Kudlick, “Disability History: Why We Need Another ‘Other,’” The American Historical Review, 108, no. 3 (June 2003), pages 735-762 and Geoffrey Reaume, “Disability History in Canada: Present Work in the Field and Future Prospects.” Canadian Journal of Disability Studies 1 (Jan. 2012), pages 35-81. On the perceived invisibility of people with intellectual disability, see for example, photographer Vincenzo Pietropaolo who writes, “Like many Canadians, I had become accustomed to not seeing, not hearing about, not being personally aware of many people with intellectual disabilities. They have been a largely invisible part of the population, hidden inside the impenetrable walls of infamous institutions…The more out of sight they were, the less one had to carry the weight of thinking about them, the less need to make adjustments to the routine patterns of living, the less need to reconsider prejudicial and criminal attitudes, the less need to be bothered with human rights or social justice.” Vincenzo Pietropaolo, Invisible No More: A Photographic Chronicle of the Lives of People with Intellectual Disabilities, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2010, page 14.
4. See especially Chapter Three of Josée Boulanger, “Look, listen, learn: Collaborative video storytelling by/with people who have been labelled with an intellectual disability.” Master’s thesis, University of Manitoba (2013).
5. Klassen, Scott. “Living large in the community.” Institution Watch (Spring 2011), pages 2-4. Klassen’s full quotation on this subject is: “Society seems like it doesn’t even know the wrong they are doing with institutions. I don’t believe it. I think they know. Society knows but I think they don’t have a tone of remorse in their voice. Most people are bigots. They don’t want to see what is happening.”
6. In Manitoba, the most important documentation of survivor testimony is found in the film The Freedom Tour. This documentary is the first to be co-produced by people with intellectual disability. The Freedom Tour, DVD. People First of Canada (2008). It can also be viewed online at the People First of Canada website, http://www.peoplefirstofcanada.ca/the-freedom-tour. For discussion on the creation of the film, see Josée Boulanger, “Look, listen, learn” and JoséeBoulanger, Susie Wieszmann and Valerie Wolbert. “The Freedom Tour documentary: An experiment in inclusive filmmaking,” Diane Driedger, editor, Living the edges: A disabled women’s reader, Toronto: INANNA Publications and Education Inc., 2010, pp. 305-322. Additional testimony is found in a few newspaper articles including: Mary Agnes Welch, “More voices calling for end to MDC,” Winnipeg Free Press, 17 May 2010 and Elisha Dacey, “Class-action lawsuit alleges rape, abuse of patients; seeks $50 M for Manitoba Developmental Centre clients,” Global News, 19 December 2018, https://globalnews.ca/news/4776648/class-action-lawsuit-alleges-rape-abuse-of-patients-seeks-50-m-for-manitoba-developmental-centre-clients and Laura Glowacki, “$50M lawsuit alleges intellectually disabled residents were sexually abused, starved at Manitoba institution,” CBC.ca, 19 December 2018, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/manitoba-developmental-centre-class-action-1.4898001.
For survivor testimony about the Michener Centre in Red Deer, Alberta see the work of Claudia Malacrida, especially her book A Special Hell: Institutional Life in Alberta's Eugenic Years, Toronto: University of Toronto press, 2015. See also Leilani Muir’s memoir A Whisper Past, Victoria, BC: Friesen Press, 2014. Survivor testimony about the Huronia institution in Ontario has been documented throughout media coverage of the class action suit. A creative non-fiction book about Huronia based on testimony and archival records is published by Thelma Wheatley, “And Neither Have I Wings to Fly”: Labelled and Locked Up in Canada’s Oldest Institution, Toronto: INANNA Publications and Education Inc., 2013. In BC, the Ombudsman reviewed and reported on the records of the Woodlands School after media reported survivors’ stories. See Dulcie McCallum, The need to know: Woodlands School report: An administrative review, submitted to the Ministry of Children and Family Development, Provincial Government of British Columbia, August 2001. Richard McDonald, in conjunction with the Royal City Writers, wrote his memoirs including his experience at Woodlands in My Story, New Westminster: Royal City Writers, 2012.
7. For more information regarding the barriers to accessing restricted archival records, see my thesis, particularly Chapters Four, Five, and Six. Mary Horodyski, “Society seems like it doesn’t even know...”: Archival records regarding people labelled with intellectual disability who have been institutionalized in Manitoba,” Master’s thesis, University of Manitoba (2017), https://mspace.lib.umanitoba.ca/handle/1993/32118.
8. For an example of how archival records containing personal health information can be anonymized, see Geoffrey Reaume, Remembrance of Patients Past: Patient Life at the Toronto Hospital for the Insane, 1870-1940, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.
9. It did not seem to matter which particular political party was in power. For example, when the NDP government in 1986 was under fire for conditions at the institution, Muriel Smith retorted “I repeat my outrage that accusations of poor safety and overcrowding are coming from members of a government that did nothing while they were in power to improve the situation.” Hansard, 13 June 1986, page 880.
10. In 1977, for example, it was estimated that 30,000 people in the province could be labelled with intellectual disability, and 900 lived at MDC.
11. The Manitoba institution had different wards with different living arrangements. These ranged from “barrack”-type dormitories to smaller rooms shared by only a few people. As described in Claudia Malacrida’s A Special Hell, inmates at Michener were “graded” into different levels. These levels affected their living arrangements and degree of privacy;for example, some “grades” had no privacy in the toilets and had to shower together en masse. Malacrida, A Special Hell: 75.
12. The categories of information in the case files can include age, sex, race, religion, address of previous community, diagnosis, comments on health, drugs, physical therapy and patient behaviour, information on payment. Records contained in the case files include admission records, psychological reports, school reports, medication records, seclusion (solitary confinement) and incident reports (reports of harm), consent forms for surgery and correspondence. I reviewed approximately 20 feet of case files and the size of the files varied from 2 to 266 pages. For more information, see Chapter Seven of my thesis.
13. For a description of my experiences making FIPPA requests for restricted archival records to eight government departments, please see Chapter Six of my thesis.
14. Malacrida, A Special Hell.
15. The Ombudsman argued that while government resources should be spent on integration into the community, it is important that this resource allocation also “not detract from the greatly needed upgrading of institutional resources for those residents remaining at The Manitoba Developmental Centre.” Summary of The Ombudsman’s Report on The Manitoba Developmental Centre, 1987, page 17.
16. Sessional papers (No. 13) 1892, page 30.
17. Kurt Refvik, A History of the Brandon Mental Health Centre, Brandon: Brandon Mental Health Centre, 1991, page xi.
18. Public Works Report, 1892, page 20.
19. Mathew Thomson, “Sterilization, segregation and community care: ideology and solutions to the problem of mental deficiency in inter-war Britain,” History of Psychiatry 3, 1992, page 481.
20. Portage la Prairie, City of Portage la Prairie, n.d., https://digitalcollections.lib.umanitoba.ca/islandora/object/uofm%3A2404278#page/1/mode/2up, page 4.
21. “The Home for Incurables” Winnipeg Daily Tribune, Saturday Evening, 14 June 1890, page 4.
22. For other examples, see Ivan Brown and John P. Radford, “The Growth and Decline of Institutions for People with Developmental Disabilities in Ontario: 1876-2009,” Journal on Developmental Disabilities, 21, no. 2 (2015), page 14 and James Trent, Inventing the Feeble Mind: A History of Intellectual Disability in the United States, Oxford University Press, 2016, especially Chapter 4.
23. For a description of “work probations” to Manitoba farmers, see Manitoba School Journal (hereafter cited as MSJ) 2, no. 1, (March 1970), page 25. For a description of “vocational work training” with “token payment” and “exceedingly small” pay, see Manitoba School Journal, 2, no. 3 (September 1970), page 8. See also Chapter Seven of Malacrida’s A Special Hell.
24. The 1933 “An Act Respecting Mental Deficiency” c. 24 s. 32 specified that parents or guardians could visit the institutionalized inmate “as often as once in every six months.” These visits could be refused by the superintendent if “he considers it would be detrimental to the defective to permit the visit” although the superintendent could also allow more frequent visits. The institution also served as the only location for services available for northern, remote, or other rural communities. Dr. J. C. Clarkson, in his commissioned report on institutions in the province of Manitoba noted, “The Manitoba School for Retardates draws residents from all of Manitoba. This discourages visiting by parents and other relatives and friends. Contact tends to be lost and this becomes perpetuated through the life of the resident.” J. C. Clarkson and M. D. T. Associates, Mental Health and Retardation Services inManitoba, Province of Manitoba: Department of Health and Social Development, 1973, page 87. In 1972, it was reported that 85-90% of the residents came from Winnipeg. Mental Retardation: A Five Year Plan, Winnipeg, Manitoba Dept. of Health and Social Development, Division of Research, Planning and Program Development, 1972, page 4. A 1977 newspaper article reported that “some families visit, many do not.” The article also reported there was little community involvement with the institution. Allan Wilson, “Manitoba School for Retardates,” Winnipeg Free Press, 28 December 1977, page 74. The Ombudsman reported in 1986 that the residents were “seldom visited by relatives.” Ombudsman 1986 Annual Report, page 18.
25. David Weremy and Wayne Beever, cited in The Freedom Tour. See also Jane Sims, “Child development worker Greg Simard sentenced to 20 years in prison for beating autistic boy,” The London Free Press December 17, 2013, https://lfpress.com/2013/12/17/child-development-worker-greg-simard-sentenced-to-20-years-in-prison-for-beating-autistic-boy/wcm/d7af5fd9-3da3-8f60-4ce5-000fac16ad3a.
26. For example, a train car came from Selkirk “containing the incurable patients sheltered at the asylum but who are now being removed.” The Winnipeg Daily Tribune, Saturday Evening, 28 June 1890, page 8. An article from July said that nine more arrived by train and were disembarked with “considerable difficulty.” Portage la Prairie Weekly, 16 July 1890, page 8.
27. Sessional Papers, No. 34, (1891), page 101.
28. Thirty-seven was the total after eleven patients had been transferred to the Brandon Asylum, nine had died and one had been discharged Sessional Papers, No. 13, (1892), pages 30-31, 37, 41.
29. Sessional Papers (No. 13), 1892, page 45.
30. Sessional Papers (No. 10), 1894: 215. In 1893, the provincial government was operating four institutions, three hospitals, one orphanage and one home each for women and children. The total expenditure in this area was $231,509.19 of which the Home for Incurables received $10,599.52 or just over 4.5%.
31. Anne Collier, in her commemorative book for Portage la Prairie’s centenary, describes the name of “Home for Incurables” as “unattractive” but apt. Anne Collier, A History of Portage la Prairie and Surrounding District, Altona, MB: City of Portage la Prairie, circa 1970, page 163.
32. “An Act Respecting the Home for Incurables,” c. 10, 1890, page 37. At the time of the institution’s opening, the Tribune described it as “A home for idiots[,] obstinate drunkards, consumption and numerous ills that human flesh is liable to.” This description seems more colourful than accurate as the legislation specified that “habitual drunkards and persons afflicted with contagious or infectious disease shall not be admitted.” The physical diseases felt to be “incurable” is related to contemporaneous medical understanding. For example, the 1930-1931 annual report describes a man who had asthma and heart disease as “an incurable.”
33. Sessional Papers, No. 12, 1892, page 37.
34. “An Act Respecting the Home for Incurables,” Cap. 10, 24, 1890, page 40. This clause was slightly altered in the 1933 legislation. See “An Act Respecting Mental Deficiency” c.24, s.39 and s.41. For an example of this clause in another institution, see “St. Boniface Home for the Aged,” (1932) c.41, s.20.
35. Sessional Papers, No. 13, 1892, pages 45, 47-48.
36. Public Works Report, (1892), 20. See also Ruthie-Marie Beckwith, Disability Servitude, Springer Nature, 2016. James W. Conroy writes in the foreward (xi) “Grossly underfunded by our legislatures, there was never enough staff to properly support everyone even in a custodial care sense. Instead, a large number of the people living in these settings were ‘allowed’ to work” in the institution. See also the testimony of institutional survivors in The Freedom Tour and also Leilani Muir, A Whisper Past. It should also be noted that patients, or their families, were required to pay maintenance to the institution.
37. For example, James Walsham was paid for 15½ days of plowing, T. C. Silverthorne for “Work on Bus House” and J. W. Thomson for making a storm porch. Public Works Report, 1892, page 267.
38. Reverend S. A. Walmsley, “History of Mental Retardation in Manitoba, 1890-1976,” A Historical Perspective and Service Report: 1876-1976, Antusa S, Bryant and William A. Funari, eds., Minneapolis, MN: Region VIII, American Association on Mental Deficiency, 1976, page 2. Walmsley was an ordained minister of the United Church of Canada. See Gordon Goldsborough, Manitoba Historical Society, “Memorable Manitobans: Sidney Arthur ‘Sid’ Walmsley (c1924-2003),” accessed 2 October 2019, http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/people/walmsley_sa.shtml.
39. Cited in Collier, pages 161-162.
40. Public Works Report, 1899, page 32.
41. Public Works Report, 1900, page 33.
42. Public Works Report, 1901, page 382.
43. Public Works Report, 190?, page 379.
44. http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/archives/clarkehincksreport.shtml. Accessed 23 August 2019. The Canadian National Committee for Mental Hygiene (CNCMH) was formed by Dr. C. K. Clarke, Dr. Clarence M. Hincks and Clifford W. Beers. The aims of the organization were to deal with the “vexed problems of crime, prostitution, pauperism, and unemployment” for which “mental factors are of primary importance.” It also hoped to deal with issues of the recently returned “mentally abnormal soldiers as well as those raised by immigration.” They further wished to raise the publics’ consciousness regarding the “millions of dollars [that] are being uselessly spent and wasted in the custodian but unscientific care of the insane.” The problems of overcrowding and waiting lists were also addressed. CMAJ, (June 1918), 8 no. 6, pages 551-552.
45. http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/archives/clarkehincksreport.shtml. They also noted that people with intellectual disability were also housed “in almost every institution examined—gaols, homes, schools, industrial schools, etc.”
46. Clarke, C. K. and Hincks, C. M., Report of the Canadian National Committee for Mental Hygiene,(Manitoba Public Welfare Commission, 1918), not paginated.
47. http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/archives/clarkehincksreport.shtml They recommended that the removal of children with intellectual disability from schools should be undertaken by the State with “intelligence and courage.” They also noted that the presence of people so labelled in Industrial Schools “simply negatives any attempts made to achieve results worth working for.” Indeed, it would only be after 1965 that children with intellectual disability were allowed in public schools.
48. “The Value of Psychopathic Hospitals,” CMAJ 10/1 (January 1920), page 74.
49. “An Act respecting the Home for the Aged and Infirm,” Chapter 85, page 627. The act brought together the Home for Incurables and the Old Folks’ Home as one institution.
50. “An Act respecting the Home for the Aged and Infirm,” Chapter 85 (6), page 628.
51. The first three categories were deemed to be unable to receive “proper benefit from the instruction in schools” and required “care, supervision and control for the protection of themselves and others.” However, “moral deviates” were deemed to be those who “from an early age display some permanent mental defect coupled with strongly vicious or criminal propensities and who require care, supervision and control for the protection of others.” “An Act to Provide for Mentally Defective Persons,” Chapter 24 (3): 153-154. “Medical practitioners” made these categorizations after examining the individual but it was the provincial psychiatrist who had the authority to place the individual in an institution. (9) and (11), pages 155-156.
52. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 2.
53. See the Asylum Projects wiki “Cottage Planned Institutions,” accessed 22 September 2019, http://www.asylumprojects.org/index.php?title=Cottage_Planned_Institutions.
54. That the institution was renamed “School for Mental Defectives” does not mean that anything resembling a comparable education to Manitoba’s public schools was available to the children or adults confined within. For an analysis of how education, training and labour are “blurred” within an institution, see Malacrida, A Special Hell, especially pages 145, 149, and 155.
55. Previous to this appointment, V. J. O’Brien acted as Bursar and Superintendent from about 1915-1930. After 1930, the positions of Superintendent and Bursar were separate. Annual report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 106. Collier remarks that “many people remember and praise Dr. Harry Atkinson for the forward strides made at the Home.”Collier, page 164.
56. Annual report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, pages 5-6. Atkinson noted that there are two types of economy – “one with little expenditure over a long period with deterioration of the Institution which always means a day of reckoning; and one with the minimum of expenditure but still keeping the buildings in good condition. Undoubtedly we are now dealing with the reckoning of the first type of economy.” Annual report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, (1929-1930),103.
57. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 129 and Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 104-105.
58. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 135.
59. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 133.
60. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, pages 97-98.
61. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 100. He also recommended installing fire escapes that could accommodate residents with mobility issues. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 103.
62. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 120.
63. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 98.
64. Annual report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 99. The following year, it was reported that deaths related to epilepsy dropped to one. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 118.
65. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, pages 96-97. It is likely that the people with epilepsy who were admitted also exhibited signs of intellectual disability as Atkinson argues in the report against admitting people with epilepsy who did not have “psychosis” or “mental deficiency.” He held that “mixing of these types” would “be seriously detrimental to all concerned.” Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 100. The 1930-1931 annual report mentioned that it was difficult to find suitable placement for people with epilepsy who did not have intellectual disability. In many cases, the report noted, the individuals had remained at home until such time as parents or caregivers aged and were unable to continue to provide support. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 30.
66. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 97. Some of the annual reports also described admissions by ethnicity and nationality. References were also made to immigrants who could be deported if deemed to have intellectual disability.
67. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, pages 117 and 121. Although Walmsley says that records were only kept from about 1930 onward, he may have been referring to the quality of the record-keeping as clinical files held at the Archives of Manitoba date from 1890 when the institution was first established. Walmsley, page 2.
68. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 127.
69. Walmsley, page 2. See also Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, pages 98 and 102.
70. The report of the Farm Superintendent says that “instead of paying two or three women for this service, all of it is being done by the patients.” Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 11. In the 1930-1931 report, it was reported that the annual savings were $660 and that the work was performed better by the residents. Annual Report,Department of Health and Public Welfare, (1930-1931), 126. Although Atkinson says “boys,” the residents may also have been grown men as it was commonplace to call male residents, regardless of age, “boys.”
71. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 101.
72. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 145.
73. Reaume, Remembrance of Patients Past, especially 133-180 and Malacrida, A Special Hell, especially page 150-172.
74. Annual report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 125.
75. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1929-1930, page 100.
76. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 2.
77. Annual Report, Department of Health and Public Welfare, 1930-1931, page 11.
78. The Manitoba government also used the term “segregation colony” to describe the original intent of the institution. Mental Retardation in Manitoba: A Five Year Plan, Manitoba Department of Health and Social Development, 1972, page 4. However, as shown in Malacrida’s work about the Mitchener Centre, people were not always released after undergoing sterilization. See Malacrida, A Special Hell, page 220. See also J. H. Landman, Human Sterilization, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1932, page 38. Landman writes “The practice of sterilizing the feeble-minded does not increase, by and large, the number of patients who are returned to society on parole.”
79. Bernard Starkman, “The control of life: Unexamined law and the life worth living,” Osgoode Hall Law Journal 11 no. 1, 1973, 183, ftnt. 42. Opposition to sterilization in Manitoba was led by Antoine D’Eschambault, a priest (later Chancellor and Monsignor), historian, and president of the St. Boniface Historical Society. In the years leading up to the sterilization vote, his arguments were presented “to many and widely different audiences.” Antoine D’Eschambault, Eugenical Sterilization, Winnipeg: Canadian Publishers, 1936, page 13. The blocking of sterilization legislation by Roman Catholics was not unique to Manitoba. Roman Catholic opposition to sterilization is listed as one of three factors influencing policy. See Randall Hansen and Desmond King, Sterilized by the State, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013, page 19.
80. Their debate attracted “wide interest because of the prominent place the subject of sterilization of the mentally defective has occupied in public discussion in recent year.” “U.M.D.U. Sterilization Topic Debaters Announced,” The Manitoban October 20, 1933, 1. “Sterilization Is Upheld In Second Regular Tilt of U.M.D.U. Wednesday,” The Manitoban, 27 October 1933, page 1.
81. Walmsley also notes that plans were curtailed because “the expertise in the field was exceedingly limitedm,” Walmsley, page 2.
82. Ibid.
83. Collier, page 164 and Walmsley, page 2.
84. Collier, 164. Dr. Bristow “practiced at the Manitoba School for the Mental at Portage, then at Brandon for thirty-five years, being retired January 31st, 1966.” See Kelwood Centennial Committee, Kelwood Bridges the Years 1890-1967, Altona, MB: The Kelwood Centennial Committee, 1967, page 1889.
85. Walmsley, page 2.
86. Conrad Stoesz, “‘Are you prepared to work in a mental hospital?’: Canadian Conscientious Objectors’ Service during the Second World War,”Journal of Mennonite Studies 29 (2011), page 63.
87. Stoesz, pages 64 and 66.
88. Walmsley, page 2.
89. Walmsley, page 3. See also Christopher Adams, “Advocating for Manitoba Children with Mental Disabilities: Parent Associations in the 1950s and 1960s,” Manitoba History 61 (2009), pages 20-24.
90. Walmsley, page 3.
91. Manitoba Historical Society, “Memorable Manitobans: Harry Lorne “King” Softley (1905-1969).” accessed 8 July 2019 http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/people/softley_hl.shtml.
92. Walmsley, page 3.
93. Walmsley, page 3.
94. Adams, 21.
95. Annual Report, Health and Social Development, 1977, page 47.
96. Walmsley, page 3.
97. To view a short video clip of Robert Kennedy’s comments, see the Minnesota Government website, “Robert Kennedy Visiting Institutions in NY,” accessed 2 October 2019, http://mn.gov/mnddc/parallels/five/5b/bobby-kennedy-snakepits.html.
98. The book continues to be freely available as a PDF. Burton Blatt and Fred Kaplan, Christmas in Purgatory, Syracuse: New York, 1974, accessed 2 October 2019, https://mn.gov/mnddc/parallels2/pdf/undated/Xmas-Purgatory.pdf.
99. Blat and Kaplan, unpaginated introduction.
100. Blat and Kaplan, page 13.
101. Pierre Berton, “What’s Wrong at Orillia: Out of Sight – Out of Mind,” Toronto Daily Star, 6 December 1960. This column was reprinted in the Toronto Star, 20 September 2013.
102. Cited in Dolmage v. HMQ, 2013. This quote was also reported in The Globe and Mail, 7 January 1960.
103. Archives of Manitoba, Junior League of Winnipeg fonds, “Mentally Retarded Children,” 1966-67, P2303/3.
104. Nicola Schaefer, Does She Know She’s There? Toronto: Fitzhenry & Whiteside Limited, 1999, page 138.
105. “Atkinson Dies Of Injuries,” Winnipeg Free Press, 19 October 1965, page 12 and “Appointed Head Mental Hospital,” Brandon Sun, 24 December 1965, page 1.
106. MSJ 4, no. 1, March 1972, page 14. For the number of residents who were the recipients of these techniques, see MSJ, 4 no. 1, March 1972, page 4.
107. MSJ 3, no. 2, June 1971, page 9-11, 16. For withholding of meals, see MSJ 4, no. 1, March 1972, page 21 and MSJ 4, no. 2, June 1972, page 16. For Smarties, see MSJ 4, no. 1, March 1972, page 8. For Froot Loops and “shocker”, see MSJ 4, no. 1, March 1972, page 31. For another example of electric shock, see MSJ 4, no. 2, June 1972, page 17. For time-out rooms, see MSJ 4, no. 2, June 1972, page 16.
108. Manifred Jager, “MD Foresees Many Retarded Moving Out Of Institutions,” Winnipeg Free Press, 13 September 1973, page 3.
109. Alfred S. Kircher, Joseph J. Pear, and Garry L. Martin, “Shock as punishment in a picture-naming task with retarded children,” Applied Behavior Analysis 4 (1971), pages 227-233. In this article, the two children who received electric shocks were six and five-year old boys who lived at St. Amant. This experiment also involved slapping the children’s hands.
110. MSJ 4, no. 2, 1972, page 17.
111. See MSJ 1, no. 4, December 1969, page 8, MSJ 2, no. 1, March 1970, page 37, MSJ Journal 4, no. 1, March 1972, page 17, MSJ 4, no. 4, 1972, page 2.
112. MSJ 4, no. 1, December 1969, page 24.
113. MSJ 4, no. 1, March 1972, pages 2-3.
114. Hansen and King, pages 23-25. See also Molly Ladd-Taylor, “Contraception or Eugenics? Sterilization and ‘Mental Retardation’ in the 1970s and 1980s,” CBMH/BCHM, 31, no. 1 (2014), pages 189-211.
115. Robert A. Wilson, “The role of oral history in surviving a eugenic past,” Steven High, ed., Beyond Testimony and Trauma: Oral history in the aftermath of mass violence, Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2014, page 137, ft. 14. Wilson points to Karen Stote’s work on the sterilization of Indigenous women in Canada as an example of research that looks beyond sterilizations performed by eugenics boards under provincial legislation. Rebecca Kluchin’s research shows that coercive sterilizations continued for poor women and women of colour throughout the 1970s in hospitals. Rebecca Kluchin, “Locating the Voices of the Sterilized.” The Public Historian 29, no. 3 (2007), pages 131-144.
116. Starkman, pages 175-185.
117. Pamela Fayerman, “Sterilizing all retarded called ‘terrible mistake,’ Winnipeg Free Press, 11 June 1979, page 8. A parent named Kathlene Hargeaves was cited in the article as saying that she knows other parents are seeking sterilizations for their children although she was opposed to the practice.
118. Manitoba Law Reform Commission, Discussion Paper on Sterilization of Minors and Mentally Incompetent Adults, 1990, page 2. The 1992 report subsequent to the discussion paper noted that “no relevant statistics” were kept by the Manitoba government to track non-therapeutic sterilizations. However, the Law Commission reported the demand for sterilizations existed both pre- and post-1986 and that they even heard “disturbing rumours” that some Manitoba doctors were willing to perform sterilizations on individuals on the basis of parental consent, despite the legal prohibitions on this following the 1986 Supreme Court Eve decision. Manitoba Law Reform Commission, Report on Sterilization and Legal Incompetence (1992), 23 ft. 12 and 13.
119. Lyndenn Behm, “Group seeks provincial aid,” Brandon Sun, 31 August 2001, page A3.
120. “Ninette training centre open,” Winnipeg Tribune, 30 November 1973, page 10. Although it was hoped that the centre could house up to 150 residents, the refurbishment of the sanatorium buildings proved to be too costly and the residents never numbered more than 70. “Pelican Lake Centre to celebrate 25 years,” The Gazette-News, 23 June 1998, page 2.
121. “Pelican Lake Centre to celebrate 25 years,” The Gazette-News, 23 June 1998, page 2.
122. “Ninette training centre open,” Winnipeg Tribune, 30 November 1973, page 10.
123. Stewart, pages 131-132.
124. “Pelican Lake Centre to celebrate 25 years,” The Gazette-News, 23 June 1998, page 2. Stewart says that “recognizing that the training aspect of the centre had accomplished all it could, the word training was dropped and it is now [ca. 1998] just The Pelican Lake Centre.” Stewart, page 132. The Centre closed in 2000. For information on the closing of Pelican Lake, see Zana-Marie Lutifiyya, Dale C. Kendel and Karen D. Schwartz, “The Community Inclusion Project in Manitoba: Planning for the Residents of the Pelican Lake Training Centre,” Untold Stories: A Canadian Disability History Reader, edited by Nancy Hansen, Roy Hanes and Diane Driedger, Toronto: CSP Books, 2018, pages 345-255.
125. George Jacub, “Didn’t know fire’s danger…”, Winnipeg Tribune, 23 April 1977, page 1.
126. George Jacub, “Patients didn’t understand fire,” Winnipeg Tribune, 23 April 1977, page 5.
127. Stephen Riley,“Inquest judge raps government,” Winnipeg Tribune, 17 September 1977, page 5.
128. Robert Matas, “Doern defends himself, deputy,” Winnipeg Tribune, 20 September 1977, page 1.
129. Hansard, 8 July 1987, pages 3699-3670.
130. Manfred Jager, “MD Foresees Many Retarded Moving Out of Institutions,” Winnipeg Free Press, 13 September 1973, page 3. The article reports that Dr. Lowther hoped to soon have the name changed to “Westholm.”
131. The College of Physicians and Surgeons, cited in Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1987, page 51. This report said that “even the newest buildings are not well maintained.”
132. Hansard, 25 June 1986, page 3325 and Hansard, 14 April 1987, pages 983-984.
133. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1986, page 15. The issues were described as “fire safety, overcrowding, and the closure of the Northgrove Building.” The Ombudsman also noted a complaint that his office received from a MDC teacher who alleged that children at the institution were being denied their educational rights.
134. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1986, page 20. This figure included P.R.N. “as needed” orders such as when staff determined that a resident needed an immediate dose of drug.
135. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1987, pages 48-49.
136. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1987, page 49. The Ombudsman also cited that the College of Physicians and Surgeons review of MDC that said that the lack of staff and programming mean that “the residents face endless, empty hours” and that the care provided by the institution was only “custodial.” The issue of physiotherapy services was described in the Legislature as only amounting to fifteen minutes of activity per day due to the shortage of staff. Hansard, 23 February 1988, page 231.
137. Dan Lett, “Chronic care dilemma,” Winnipeg Free Press, 22 October 1988, page 54.
138. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1986, pages 15-17. See also Barbara Aggerholm, “Son’s injury at centre remains unexplained,” Winnipeg Free Press, 30 October 1985, page 1. The injured man was not able to communicate verbally.
139. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1986, page 17.
140. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1987, page 48.
141. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1987, page 50.
142. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1988, page 12.
143. Ombudsman’s Annual Report, 1989, page 15.
144. Dan Lett, “Chronic care dilemma,” Winnipeg Free Press, 22 October 1988, page 54.
145. “Legislative Digest,” Canadian Social Work Review/Revue for Social Work Education 4 (1986), page 254.
146. Dave Haynes, “Program for retarded ready to roll,” Winnipeg Free Press, 20 February 1985, page 25.
147. Maria Bohuslawsky, “Foes say Welcome Home is ill-planned, dogmatic” Winnipeg Free Press, 27 December 1986, page 33. This article also reported that some parents who had never institutionalized their children were in “horror” that people leaving the institutions were now given priority in day programs. This lack of programming often pitted parents and families against each other in vying for services. Even the assistant deputy minister of community services, Joe Cels, agreed that “’Not all the programs were in existence.’”
148. For example, see Hansard, 13 June 1986, page 880.
149. Report of the Investigation of the Death of Mr. Russell Smith, Resident of Winnserv Home, 146 Wordsworth Way, Winnipeg, Winnipeg: Manitoba Community Services, 8 February 1988.
150. Maria Bohuslawsky, “Province checking home director’s past,” Winnipeg Free Press, 3 August 1986, page 4.
151. See for example Hansard, 24 February 1988, page 257; 6 September 1988, page 1019-1023; and 13 September 1988, page 1227-1229.
152. “Unit Program Co-ordinator” employment ad, Winnipeg Free Press, 28 December 1985, page 54.
153. Hansard, 14 April 1987, page 983. Connery stated that Westgrove had twenty people over capacity and that another ward, probably Southgrove, had twenty-eight people over capacity.
154. “Legislature,” Winnipeg Free Press, 15 April 1987, page 8.
155. Catherine Mitchell and Murray McNeil, “MDC dogs government,” Winnipeg Free Press, 27 June 1987, page 52. This article also said that five individuals had ran away from MDC within a one-month period, including one who was later found in a “weedy slough”.
156. Manitoba Community Services, Annual Report, page 22. See also Julia Necheff, “Committee to probe Welcome Home returnees,” Winnipeg Free Press, 23 May 1987, page 3.
157. Manitoba Family Services, Annual Report, page 50.
158. He had lived there for 46 years. He had entered as a child of six years and was labelled with “profound mental retardation, most probably due to post-natal infection.” As an adult, he developed epilepsy. This was not the first time a resident had been forgotten in a vehicle following an outing. The inquest noted that in 2002 a resident had been left in a vehicle for two hours. In that instance, the staff member received a Letter of Discipline and a one-day suspension. The Provincial Court of Manitoba, Dennis Robinson inquest, 26 March 2007, page 11.
159. Dennis Robinson inquest, page 17. Also, “it was commonplace for staff both not to follow policies and fail to report in such regard,” page 24.
160. Government of Manitoba website, “News Releases,” https://news.gov.mb.ca/news/index.html?item=27448&posted=2004-12-10.
161. See Schwartz, “‘We can’t close it yet’: How discourse positions people with intellectual disabilities,” Critical Disability Discourse 2 (2010), pages 1-15 for a review of the debates in the newspapers. See also Boulanger, “Look, Listen, Learn,” for a description of the protests, pages 80-83.
162. Jordan Maxwell, “MGEU worried about the future of MDC,” Portage Daily Graphic, 3 May 2012. See also John Robson, “Strategy for disabled offensive,” Winnipeg Free Press, 22 October 2005, page A15. See also Malacrida, A Special Hell, especially pages 151-152 and 171-172. See also “Union plans rally to keep Michener Centre open,” Red Deer Advocate, 7 April 2013. In regard to the MDC, see for example a 2014 Winnipeg Free Press editorial that says “With well-paying union jobs at stake in the rural community, however, critics have said the government doesn’t want to make a decision that might upset both the town and organized labour.” “Resolve MDC’s future,” Winnipeg Free Press, 4 June 2014. In 1973, Clarkson also noted the importance of the institution to the economy of Portage la Prairie and the town’s residents. He said “the institution is a major, if not the major employer” and that Portage la Prairie was “vulnerable and dependent on the institution.” He noted that the institution employed 2.5 times more people than the next highest employer in Portage la Prairie (the Campbell Soup Company.) He also noted that the concentration of a regional social service in a small section of the province went against “the operation of any modern social services program” and called for the services to be decentralized “so that facilities and programs more reasonably coincide with natural market and service regions.” Clarkson, pages 32-34.
163. The Manitoba Human Rights Commission, Annual Report, 2011, page 3.
164. Cited in Braun, “A Room of Own’s Own.” This Magazine (September/October 2010), page 32. In comparison, Newfoundland and Labrador announced in 1982 a policy of deinstitutionalization. Nova Scotia also had large deinstitutionalization efforts in the 1980s. In British Columbia, Woodlands closed in 1996. In 2009, Ontario closed its last three large institutions. In 2012, the Saskatchewan government announced it would close Valley View.
165. Malacrida also discusses the importance of the Michener Centre for Red Deer’s economy and the unionized employees. Malacrida, A Special Hell, especially pages 151-152 and 171-172. See also “Union plans rally to keep Michener Centre open,” Red Deer Advocate, 7 April 2013. These concerns were also raised during the 2019 provincial election in Manitoba. For example, Michael Blume, “Election Issue: Repurpose MDC to Maintain Economic Drive,” Portage Online, 23 August 2019, https://www.portageonline.com/local/repurposing-mdc-to-maintain-economic-drive
166. “Resolve MDC’s future,” Winnipeg Free Press, 4 June 2014.
167. Annual Report, 2016-2017, page 39.
168. Koski Minsky LLP website, https://kmlaw.ca/cases/manitoba-development-centre-class-action.
169. Laura Glowacki, “Manitoba denies widespread abuse at institution for people with disabilities,” CBC News, 19 February 2019, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/manitoba-developmental-school-rcmp-1.5021316.
170. For example, Brian Pallister has said “In the old days, the way we handled intellectual disabilities is that we institutionalized everybody”. Kacper Antoszewski, “PC Leader Brian Pallister visits Thompson as election campaign gets underway,” Thompson Citizen, 22 March 2016, https://www.thompsoncitizen.net/news/thompson/pc-leader-brian-pallister-visits-thompson-as-election-campaign-gets-underway-1.2213871.
See also:
Historic Sites of Manitoba: Home for Incurables / Home for the Aged and Infirm / Manitoba School for Mental Defectives / Manitoba School for Retardates / Manitoba Development Centre (3rd Street NE, Portage la Prairie)
Page revised: 12 December 2024
