On Hall-18 and Hall-7 we had a social worker and weekly he would bring us stuff, like records, music, and for me strings for my guitar. I had a classical guitar, with cat gut strings and he bought me black diamond steel strings heavy gauge, I later found them in the drug store for 25 cents a pack, lol.
Well these steel strings made my fingers bleed, yep these were the worst strings you could ever have, but they were cheep. These strings also made my bridge come off my guitar. The staff took my guitar to the work shop in Building 36 in the basement to the wood department and the staff put a steel piece under the top of the body and mounted the bridge to it, well all this done was put more pressure to the top of the body and it warped up so it made the strings 1/2 inch above the fret board, and for the most part unplayable.
I became very depressed and somehow the word got to my parents. The next time I seen them they took me to town and to the music store in downtown Traverse City and in the basement they had the electric guitars...........
Note the Monkeys just came on TV and the guitar player Mike Nesmith, had this 12 string guitar with f-holes in it so it could be played with or without an amp, well I got one made by TEISCO and a small 25 watt amp, wow I was in heaven. I was the rock star, "In The Nut House".
I had to keep the amp in the barber room because it was one of the few places with electricity. The staff never used the guitar as punishment on me, but by this time I was no longer a problem for them, I did what I was told .... well most of the time.

I remember when the band Cream came out and the song White Room, I wanted to play it so bad that the social worker somehow got me the sheet music to it. I can still play In The "White Room" to this day.
I wish I could remember the social workers name, he was a nice guy.

Shop Class:
In the basement of building 36 was a wood working repair shop and 2 times a week we use to go there for shop class, the boys in Mr. Cooks High School Class. There were only a few of us.
The first thing we were taught was how to cut a piece of wood than using a hand planer cut it down to size, than we cut another piece the same size and repeated the process. We were than taught how to use the band saw to cut 1 of the pieces to a shape of the planer. Than screw the top cut piece to the bottom piece. We made a shoe for the planer which we got to send home. Next we made a boomerang bu gluing pieces of wood together and bending them in a steam process and using viced and clamps got them to bend 90*. Then we got a class in airplane wings lift and such. and we put this ideal to work on our boomerangs. I later found the boomerang among my stuff years later and gave it a throw, and yes it come back to me.
I was so good in wood shop that I was allowed to make a guitar, so I made a Mexican Bass well it never worked so good because my teachers did not know the mechanics of a guitar but I did complete it and got a A in shop class. Next To the wood working shop was a welding shop. I also took up welding and BTW I still do this for myself and own a nice welding ARC welder.
I went through all they had to offer in school, 5th to 12 grade. I was allowed to go to work in the print shop in building 36, we printed all the stuff used at the hospital and I worked there every afternoon until it closed to make it into a new cottage for boys when the children's hospital was about to open. I really liked working in the print shop, they had old hand printers, 2 of them and had to setup the type set, and I had a natural thing for me was to learn how to read upside down and back wards. They also had this Heidelberg printer for doing things the new way from a burnt metal insert we use to make in another machine. We also printed in multi colors. I really liked working in the dark room and the smell of them chemicals for processing pictures.
I think I was the only patient who ever worked in the print shop.

Thanks Ron: I always look forward to your updates to the blog

I guess my whole time in TCSH was like a boomerang in slow motion. It came back to me years later.

I never worked in the print shop, but I was there a couple times.
Like I said before, my privleges were always close the bottom level because I tried to escape so many times.
I guess I was considered a "flight risk" I wasn't allowed to got out as much as Ron or the others because they never knew when I'd take off. For that matter, I didn't either when ever I did, I just turned and walked away. It seemed like they almost always had someone waiting for me either before or shortly after I made it off the grounds.
I don't think they ever told my Mother about my escape attempts either.

I remember having a book with the center cut out to fit my transister radio in so noone else could walk off with it.

Thank you for your update also Mike.. I cant remember are you also helping with Ron's Book????

Not that I'm aware of. Ron would know that better than me.

Heidi Johnson(RIP) was in the process of writting a book with some of my history included, but she didn't have the chance to finish it.

Johnson(RIP) was in the process of writting a book with some of my history included, but she didn't have the chance to finish it.

Mike, do you have a copy of what you gave Heidi Johnson? Maybe you could write a book also. Ron could tell you how to get it published. You can add stuff that you have remembered since she passed away.

Hi everyone...and thanks for sharing so much.
I am 49 and I live in Manton, Mi - about 40 miles south of the TC hospital.
I have been looking for my grandmother who may have been in the TC hospital in 1930. Someone with the correct name - Helen Falconer is listed in the 1930 census there. According to my family history, Helen was 15 or 16 when she gave birth to my Mother in 1926. My mother said (she wouldn't talk about Helen often without getting angry) that she (Helen) was supposed to be a adopted child of my grandparents. Not long after she gave birth to my mother she was sent to the Home for the Feeble Minded in Lapeer because she wouldn't stop telling people that my mother was her baby. My heart broke when I heard this and I was very angry at my grandmother, who has been dead since 1969. Kind of hard to be angry at someone who's dead.
My mother didn't tell me any of this until 10 years ago and for the last 10 years I have been looking for traces of Helen.
I realize she would be dead now - I would only like to know if she ever released and where she's buried.
There is also a chance that she went to Eloise (by Detroit) the first year because when Eloise reopened in Sept. 1926 - the first residents were children from the Lapeer home.
There is no one left to give me any information, my mother passed 2007.
The first night I found this site I read 19 pages (all there was at the time) and was happy and sad all at once....thinking of Helen usually makes me sad.
I was at the TC hospital and took photos in 1996 and I have never felt a feeling like I felt there. Turmoil, discord...sadness. At the time, I didn't know about Helen or that she may have been there - maybe that was what I felt.
Anyway, on the brighter side...glad to have found this group.
More later....

"WELCOME" seekinghelen

I'll check around and see what I can find, but I can't guarantee anything.
If your grandmother was ever on SSI or SSDI, Social Security should have records on her being at TCSH.

off topic:
I remember the old Cadillc "Drive-in Theater" on old US-131, between Manton and Cadillac(my hometown)
Or was that on the south end of Cadillac? It's been so long I don't remember.
mk

Mike - so sorry I called you "Mark" in my post! I realize now it's because you show on this forum as "mkfarnum" and I unconsciously saw that as "Mark Farnum" - the name of the guy in Grand Funk Railroad! lol I loved that band growing up!

Anyway, I wish someone would make a documentary of the place. Get video footage before it's all renovated. Imagine that at the Traverse City Film Fest! You could incorporate info from Heidi, too. The longer time passes the harder it will be to get accurate information. I wonder if the current developers would have an issue with it. They probably prefer the secrets stay buried.

Oh - when I was there I went to a wine tasting at the winery there. It's called Left Foot Charley's and it's in the building that used to be the laundry. They share it with a coffee house. Both cool - wine & coffee are great and that and the old potato peeling building were the only buildings I was in that didn't have an unsettling feeling to them. Anyway, the winery has doors from building 50 as the front of it's bar inside - instead of wood panels they cut off parts of the doors so they are about 4-5 feet high and placed side-by-side all along the front. I was sitting on a stool and was in front of door #23. Though a bit creepy it was an interesting concept.

Hope you all had a great weekend~~

Rita, there's need to apologize, I knew you'd figure it out. I mean.... I wasn't planning on calling out the linch mob until you made a third mistake on my name.
There is a second mistake, and that's a mistake everyone makes on my name,....... but you'll figure it out.

Actually, the "K" stands for "Kathy". When I was choosing user names, "mfarnam" wasn't available. Come to find out my youngest sister Michelle, in Chicago, is using that.

BTW..there are videos and slide shows on TCSH...............

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SmPN_9gsVY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIclBHfgTYw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjkkS2PYO7c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGkeQ7RVpX0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8h6wm0Z_SI

The book, "Where Buffalo Roam" is a book about my life from 1965 until 1971, age 12 to 18.

seekinghelen,
I found some records archives,
Do you have an e-mail I can send them to?
mk

Hey Mike - yes, I realized after I posted the reply last night that I spelled your last name wrong - farnam not farnum. I was tired. Thanks for the videos - I'll check them out. I saw a few on You Tube.

Anyone know anything about Ypsilanti State Hospital? I just found out my Dad worked there for a short time while in college. It was a summer job, I think. My Dad is passed so I can't ask. I'm going to ask my Uncle what he knows.

Good Night!

click image for a full-sized view
When I see this picture it brings back more memories then I can write. The top floor of the big building which is the 3rd floor was our school. I have all my pleasant memories there. Looking at the right end was the High School, Mr. Cooks Class. Mr. martin use to sit in back of the class, both these men were the best, I have high praise for them.
I remember that C-3 was behind our class and I use to check out the new girls. One comes to mind, Sally, an out-spoken girl a redhead, lol. she had a crush on me and taught me the new lingo of the hippy revolution. She also slipped me an album by Iron Butterfly, In-A-Gotta-Na-Veda, I learned to play this long song sitting on break in Mr. Cooks class. We use to get a break in the morning and afternoon, 15-30 minutes and a long lunch break.
I fell in love in Mr. Cooks class. We had a bunch on censored albums hidden in Mr. Cooks class, like Cream, Blind Faith, Zappa. The un-censored records were like "Lightning Striking Again", and all of the Turtles and the Monkeys. Thou I really liked the Monkeys until it came out that only Mike could really play the guitar.
I recall the huge 3 foot globe of the world which sat in a frame of the world in Mr. Cooks class, thats how I learned where places were on our planet. We had 2 sets of encyclopedias World Book and Britannica, I liked World Book the best, it had color pictures.
When I look at the picture it reminds me on the time I was the person who raised the flag and took it down every day. I was let out 15 minutes before anyone else got to march to school, 2 by 2, and I was let out of school 15 minutes before the rest of the kids. I did this job for about 1 year until one day by mistake I put up the flag upside down, boy this was a punishable act.
I had sex for the first time in the 3rd floor closet. I wrote many of my lost songs on the 3rd floor. I learned to square dance there also. Most of all I grew up on the 3rd floor.