An exodus of enthusiasm: G. Alder Blumer, eugenics, and U.S. psychiatry, 1890-1920

Tracks the change of heart on the subject of eugenics experienced by notable psychiatrist G. Alder Blumer during 1890-1920. Negative eugenics, stressing the need to eliminate unfavorable traits through reproductive control, resulted in thousands of the mentally ill being sterilized. While working at the New York State Lunatic Asylum in Utica, Blumer became an enthusiastic proponent of negative eugenics. But upon moving to the more progressive Butler Hospital for the Insane in Providence, Rhode Island, Blumer came to believe more in therapeutic approaches to mental illness.