Letter to the editor: regarding Overbrook

Editor, The Times:
Well, I’m glad that at least one person has read my columns on Overbrook and has purchased my book [regarding “Extermination facility” letter last week]. Thank you.
I am; however, dismayed to see such a negative picture painted of Overbrook in Cedar Grove and the Newark City Home in Verona. My research is based on first-hand accounts of people who worked or had been patients/inmates (NCH referred to the children as inmates) of both facilities, as well as the annual reports and collaboration with scholars at the archives of the University of Medicine and Dentistry in Newark.
Vocational training was provided to all who were able to partake in its benefits. That is not to say that there were not people who were precluded from advanced vocational work, such as participating in the print shop of the Newark City Home, which I portrayed in my column on the home and in my book.
Do you know why the mortality rate was so high at Overbrook? It was due to the fact that years ago the county asylums became the home to many elderly and those with Alzheimer’s. The statistics of the annual reports verify this fact. Nursing homes have now taken many of the types of patients which Overbrook once treated.
Lobotomies were not practiced on patients at Overbrook in the 1920s. At that time, it was primarily vocational activities, followed by hydro-therapy and diathermy. The annual reports will verify this if you take the time to examine them. A collection is available at UMDNJ in Newark.
As for the purpose of the railroad line, I think it was overlooked that said line was established in 1890, six years before the Essex County Board of Freeholders selected the 325 acres of farmland that was to become Overbrook. Actually, the freeholders considered one of the benefits in choosing this parcel was that it had rail access. Anyway, just to get the facts straight, the rail line came before Overbrook.
Both institutions, progressive for their time, benefited many people. Did bad events occur at both places? Absolutely. But I know that this world is a better place because those they existed.
To label Overbrook as an “extermination facility” is a great disservice to the many good people that worked there as well as those who benefited from their kind and understanding humanitarianism.
Robert Williams
Verona

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robert williams is the guy who might have the power to get you into overbrook. pat...you should try to contact him...it would be worth it.

LionelTrainGuy wrote: robert williams is the guy who might have the power to get you into overbrook. pat...you should try to contact him...it would be worth it.

I'm really thinking about it now. We need to act fast.