At this Meeting of the Directors and Agents of York Retreat we hear with pleasure that the Bloomingdale Hospital, the section of the Society of the New York Hospital devoted to the Treatment of Mental Diseases, is to celebrate next month the centenary of its foundation. The facsimile reproduction of the letter of Thomas Eddy which has been presented to the Retreat Library is specially interesting to us as it acknowledges the pioneer work at the Retreat and specially refers to correspondence with Samuel Tuke. We have pleasure in sending to the Governors of the Bloomingdale Hospital a copy of Samuel Tuke's classical work "The Description of the Retreat" in the belief that the principles therein set forth are of lasting importance. We send our hearty congratulations to the Bloomingdale Hospital on its century of good work and wish it every success in the future.
Signed,
Charles Weomans, Chairman.
Oscar F. Rumlen, Treasurer.
Transcript from the Visitors Book of The Retreat
EARLY AMERICAN VISITORS
1803. 3 mon 11th. Abrm. Barker, New Bedford, Massachusits, a young man (a Friend) on a tour; has been in Russia, Denmark, Sweden & Holland. (In William Tuke's writing)
1815. Nov. 30. John W. Francis, M.D. of N. York. J.W. Francis is not wholly ignorant of the State of the Lunatic Asylums in North America, and he has visited almost all the institutions for the Insane that are established in England. He now embraces this opportunity of stating that after an examination of the Retreat for some hours, he should do injustice to his feelings were he not to declare that this establishment far surpasses anything of the kind he has elsewhere seen, and that it reflects equal credit on the wisdom and humanity of its conductors.