Dorothea Dix was born on April 4, 1802. She was born in Hampden, Maine. Even though she grew up less fortunate and in a broken home, she managed to get an education and become internationally known for her kindness and assistances to the mentally ill population. She started off as a simple school teacher but ended up changing the world by contributing to the medical field. Her work was known international.
Dorothea Dix’s early years can be described as miserable. She had 2 brothers Joseph and Charles. She left home at the age of 12 because she was neglected by her parents. Both Dorothea Dix’s parents were alcoholics. Her dad was also very abusive to her and to her two brothers. When she left home to live with her grandmother, her grandmother was 70 years old. Her grandmother was quite wealthy and provided for her. She lived in Boston, Massachusetts. Her grandmother sent her to school and there she got herself an education. Dorothea went to a school called “A Little Dame School.” (4) Two years later she was already employed and expected to be married soon. Dorothea became engaged at a super young age. Her fiancé was Edward Bangs. He was also the person to assist Dorothea get into “A little Dame School”. (4) At the very young age of 14, she was already teaching in a school for young girls. This school was located in Worcester, Massachusetts. Teaching was her passion for many years.
When Dorothea Dix was 39 she spent her Sundays volunteering at the east Cambridge jail, she would teach Sunday school for women. When she was there, she saw that special individuals were in unheated, unfurnished, and in a foul-smelling place. This place was for individuals who were mentally challenge. She wanted to do something abo...
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...ea Dix received recognitions in 2006. A mental health institute was renamed to “Dorothea Dix” Psychiatric Center. The United States Navy transport ship that was serving in the World War II was named for Dix. The ship served from 1940-1946. It received five battle stars for her service during the war. The Bangor Mental Health Institute was renamed in August 2006 to Dorothea Dix Psychiatric Center.
In conclusion, a lot can be said about Dorothea Dix but the Dix Psychiatric Center described her best. They described Dorothea Dix as a persistent human being who was also a very generous and independent individual. If Dorothea had never had the heart she had no one would have stepped up and decide to help the mentally ill people around the world. Society is very fortunate that Dorothea had the attitude to help people even though she came from a broken home.
http://www.webster.edu/~woolflm/dorotheadix.html. The website is an excellent source that chronicles Dix’s early life. As a child she lived in a household with a mentally unstable mother and an alcoholic father. This site details her first career as a teacher, then her second career as a social reformer. The Webster site gives an abundance of specific detail about how Dix influenced people and how passionate she was about her beliefs. The last portion of the website biography laments the fact that Dix and her accomplishments are sadly under-reported in most history and psychology textbooks, but that this fact would sit very well with Dix herself, as she preferred to not be in the spotlight.
Dorothea Lynde Dix was born on April 4th 1802 in Maine and the first of three children of Joseph and Mary Dix. Dix’s home life was less than pleasant because her mother was mentally unstable and her father n abusive alcoholic (Gollaher, 1995). Dix’s troubles through the course of her childhood may have been one of the reasons she developed an altruistic social role; a passion capable of changing the treatment of others. Although her father was violent toward Dix, he did teach her how to read at a young age and this sparked interest in teaching and assessment (Bumb, 2008). During the early 1800’s women lacked permission to attend school but could be privately educated by other women; therefore Dix decided to embrace this approach. Dix ran a school near her grandmother’s home for three
Born in Cederville, Illinois, on September 6, 1860, Jane Addams founded the world famous social settlement of Hull House. From Hull House, where she lived and worked from it’s start in 1889 to her death in 1935, Jane Addams built her reputation as the country’s most prominent women through her writings, settlement work and international efforts for world peace. In 1931, she became the first women to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
Born on November 8th, 1897, in New York City, Dorothy Day was a writer, editor and social reformer. She was born into a family of seven to her parents, Grace and John, who were both journalists. For the job of her parents, the Day family moved to California when she was only six years old, and later lived in Chicago. Dorothy worked for such social causes as pacifism and women’s suffrage, as a radical of her time. Day was intrigued by the Catholic faith for years, and converted in 1927. She co-founded The Catholic Worker, a newspaper that promoted Catholic teachings. This newspaper became quite successful and triggered the Catholic Worker Movement, which undertook issues of social justice directed by its religious principles.
Dorothea noticed that the mentally ill were placed in prisons because people didn’t know what else to do with them. Her early family life, which consisted of an abusive alcoholic dad and a mother that was not in good mental health, was very troubling and led to Dorothea’s guardianship of her brothers. Dorothea became a teacher and then centered her life on prison reform and the creation of asylums and homes for the mentally
Born in Maine, of April, 1802, Dorothea Dix was brought up in a filthy, and poverty-ridden household (Thinkquest, 2). Her father came from a well-to-do Massachusetts family and was sent to Harvard. While there, he dropped out of school, and married a woman twenty years his senior (Thinkquest, 1). Living with two younger brothers, Dix dreamed of being sent off to live with her grandparents in Massachusetts. Her dream came true. After receiving a letter from her grandmother, requesting that she come and live with her, she was sent away at the age of twelve (Thinkquest, 4). She lived with her grandmother and grandfather for two years, until her grandmother realized that she wasn’t physically and mentally able to handle a girl at such a young age. She then moved to Worcester, Massachusetts to live with her aunt and her cousin (Thinkquest, 5).
The contrast between how She sees herself and how the rest of the world sees Her can create extreme emotional strain; add on the fact that She hails from the early 1900s and it becomes evident that, though her mental construct is not necessarily prepared to understand the full breach against Her, She is still capable of some iota of realization. The discrimination encountered by a female during this time period is great and unceasing.
Dorothea Dix was born in Hampden, Maine in 1802. Her mother was not very mentally stable and her dad was an abusive alcoholic. The Dix moved from Maine to Vermont just before the British War of 1812. Then, after the war they moved to Worcester, MA. While in Worcester, the Dix had two more children, both boys. The family would eventually break apart because of the mother’s mental state and the father’s drinking.1
Her mother was sick and suffered a bit of mental illness, while her father was an abusive alcoholic. She was twelve years old when she moved to Boston to live with her wealthy grandmother in 1814. Dix started to take an interest in education because of her grandmother. In the early 1800s, Dix built an academy in her grandmother's mansion for affluent young girls and a free school for the poor (Dorothea Lynde Dix 1). Some time later, she established public schools in Boston and Worcester; creating her own educational program and administer classrooms as a teenager and young woman (History.com Staff 2). At the age of fourteen, Dix decided to open a small school in Worcester for young children. Where she taught them basic reading and writing skills in the range of three to four year old children (Breaking the Chains 239). She was very strict in her discipline, but her tactics were appropriate, necessary, and wise (Breaking the Chains 255). Because of her establishing public schools around Boston and Worcester, the destitute children could have an education. Several years later, a student from Harvard Divinity School had asked if Dix would take a job to teach the inmates at East Cambridge prison (Breaking the Chains
When the economy crashed in 1929, the majority of all Americans lost their jobs, money, and hope. With this great turn in economic stability Americans faced the harsh reality of bankruptcy or homelessness. As a result, citizens in need filled every street corner. Dorothea Lange, a young photographer at the time, found inspiration in the sad eyes of the needy. Through photos such as “Migrant Mother”, Lange captured the desperate sentiment of the decade that no words could demonstrate so clearly. Born on May 26, 1895, Dorothea Lange grew up in Hoboken, New Jersey. As a child of education advocates, Lange attended school, but never with much interest. After completing her academic education, Lange studied art form at Columbia University in 1917. Years later, she apprenticed with numerous well known photographers and eventually opened her first photography studio in California. Before photographing depression-era pieces, Lange focused on Native American culture. Howev...
Dorthea Dix was born in Hampden Main, in 1802. She started teaching charity schools and writing textbooks at age 14. She became a social reformer, and her loyalty to the welfare of the mentally ill led to a widespread of international reforms. After seeing all the horrifying conditions at a Massachusetts prison, she spent the next 40 years lobbying U.S. and Canadian legislators to initiate state hospitals for the mentally ill. Her efforts affected the building of 32 institutions in the United States. In 1861, when the Civil War broke out she provided her services and eventually was named superintendent of United States Army Nurses. She was accountable for setting up field hospitals, first-aid stations, drafting nurses, managing supplies, and managing training programs. Although she was very effective and concentrated, many people thought she didn't have the social skills necessary to navigate the militaries bureaucracy. Yet she stayed after the war, helping to track missing soldiers, write letters to families, and help soldiers secure their pensions.
Known as an American philanthropist and reformer, Dorothea Dix transformed living conditions in prisons and established institutions for the mentally insane in 20 states, as well as Canada (“DIX”). Through her crusade for fair treatment of the mentally insane, Dorothea Dix exemplifies the ideals of her time – to protect the rights of all human beings, no matter their age, race, or mental capacity. On April 4, 1802 in Hampden, Maine, Dorothea Lynde Dix was born to Joseph and Mary Dix. Due to her mother's poor health, Dix assumed the household duties of tending to the house and caring for her two younger brothers from a very young age. Meanwhile, her father traveled as a preacher who sold religious books that Dix and her family stitched together.
Dorothea Dix was born in Hampden, Maine on April 4, 1802. Maine at the time was part of Massachusetts. Hampden was a very small town of only about 150 people. Most of those residents were very poor, including Dix’s family. Her father was Joseph Dix, a traveling Methodist minister. She very much felt the effects of her father’s strict religion. Her father had her sit for hou...
On December 10, 1830, in a town called Amherst, Massachusetts, Emily Dickinson was born (poets.org). Family and friends would come to know her as a loving individual, but to the rest of the world she would become one of the best known poets from the 19th century. Writing over 1,800 poems in all; however, few have been published. Many of her poems are used today to connect with everyday life. Taking a look at her family life will help you understand how she was able to write so many poems and also some of the major influences in life (“Emily Dickinson”).
We trace her struggles with personal grief, a restricted social life, socio-economic decline, and romantic misfortune, a long history of trauma and repression.”(445)