New York Asylum For Idiots, Geddes, Onondaga County, New York

Notes:
Cannot find a Geddes in Onondaga County, New York; but there is one in South Dakota, Kentucky and Michigan.



1880 Census

Onondaga County, Geddes, Page 243B, National Archives Film T9-0905 Margaret Mabie F S W 14 NY Inmate Fa: NY Mo: NY



In 1880 it should have been located in



The New York State Asylum for Idiots was authorized by the New York State Legislature in 1851, acting upon a recommendation contained in the 1846 annual report of the New York State Asylum for Lunatics. Hervey B. Wilbur, M.D., was appointed the first superintendent and remained in that position until his death in 1883. First located on rented landed in Albany, it admitted its first "pupils" in 1851. The cornerstone was laid in 1854 for a new building in Syracuse, and the institution removed to Syracuse in 1855. After 1855 it was generally known as either the New York Asylum for Idiots or just the State Idiot Asylum

http://www.upstate.edu/library/history/hospitals.shtml

Hervey Backus Wilbur organized the first school for idiots at his home in Barre, Massachusetts in 1848. Wilbur developed a system for the education of the feebleminded that was eventually adopted in several similar institutions across the United States. He was persuaded to go to New York and help establish the Syracuse State School and later influenced the Newark State School. Wilbur was superintendent of the New York Asylum from 1851 until his death. Dr. Wilbur believed that those considered feebleminded could be taught and trained for assimilation back into the community instead of being segregated from the larger society.

http://www.museumofdisability.org/html/exhibits/society/exb_educators.html