Gypsy Heart
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Cattaraugus Pauper's Farm
1857 INVESTIGATION:
This house is built of wood, thirty-six by thirty-eight feet long. Connected is a farm of 200 acres, yielding a revenue of $1000. There are no basements. There are nine rooms or wards warmed by stoves and without ventilation. The number of inmates is thirty, one-half males. Twenty-three are of native and seven of foreign birth. Four are under sixteen years of age. There is a complete separation of the sexes; they are under the care of a single keeper. The average number of inmates is thirty-five, supported at a weekly cost of $1.40 each. The paupers are employed on the farm and in domestic avocations. The house has not been inspected by the supervisors during the year. The house is partially supplied with bibles, and there is a church near, where the paupers attend if they choose. The children attend the district school. The superintendents furnish supplies and regulate the government of the house, and prescribe the system of diet. The fare is plain and wholesome. A physician is employed by the year at a salary of $65, who attends when called. During the year have occurred three births and two deaths. No contagious disease has prevailed. Of the inmates three are lunatics, all males, and all paupers. For the accommodation of the insane are two small houses; one an old and dilapidated one, very cold in the winter from its loose construction and much decay, and at all times particularly offensive from the accumulation of filth; the other is a new structure, though an inferior one, and illy planned. This, from some reason, is very little used. In these cells the insane sleep on straw, with very little clothing, the straw becoming filled with filth before being changed. Two are confined in these cells. The insane are attended by a male pauper. None during the year are improved or cured; they receive only the same medical attendance as the remaining paupers. No application has been made for admission to the State asylum. In the house is one idiot and one blind person. Intemperance is the cause of one-half of pauperism here. The house is a poor one, and the poor, especially the insane, are illy cared for.
Stone House will be opening soon to the public. It will house the Cattaraugus County Historical Museum, along with a Cattaraugus County Health Department branch. Not exactly sure what date it will open, but I believe it's around October 13th. [2004
http://www.poorhousestory.com/CATTARAUGUS.htm
1857 INVESTIGATION:
This house is built of wood, thirty-six by thirty-eight feet long. Connected is a farm of 200 acres, yielding a revenue of $1000. There are no basements. There are nine rooms or wards warmed by stoves and without ventilation. The number of inmates is thirty, one-half males. Twenty-three are of native and seven of foreign birth. Four are under sixteen years of age. There is a complete separation of the sexes; they are under the care of a single keeper. The average number of inmates is thirty-five, supported at a weekly cost of $1.40 each. The paupers are employed on the farm and in domestic avocations. The house has not been inspected by the supervisors during the year. The house is partially supplied with bibles, and there is a church near, where the paupers attend if they choose. The children attend the district school. The superintendents furnish supplies and regulate the government of the house, and prescribe the system of diet. The fare is plain and wholesome. A physician is employed by the year at a salary of $65, who attends when called. During the year have occurred three births and two deaths. No contagious disease has prevailed. Of the inmates three are lunatics, all males, and all paupers. For the accommodation of the insane are two small houses; one an old and dilapidated one, very cold in the winter from its loose construction and much decay, and at all times particularly offensive from the accumulation of filth; the other is a new structure, though an inferior one, and illy planned. This, from some reason, is very little used. In these cells the insane sleep on straw, with very little clothing, the straw becoming filled with filth before being changed. Two are confined in these cells. The insane are attended by a male pauper. None during the year are improved or cured; they receive only the same medical attendance as the remaining paupers. No application has been made for admission to the State asylum. In the house is one idiot and one blind person. Intemperance is the cause of one-half of pauperism here. The house is a poor one, and the poor, especially the insane, are illy cared for.
Stone House will be opening soon to the public. It will house the Cattaraugus County Historical Museum, along with a Cattaraugus County Health Department branch. Not exactly sure what date it will open, but I believe it's around October 13th. [2004
http://www.poorhousestory.com/CATTARAUGUS.htm
