Friends Hospital

Friends’ Hospital, which opened in 1817, was created to apply Quaker values to psychiatric care. Rejecting the punishment and physical restraint that were then commonplace in caring for the mentally ill, Quakers called for the “moral treatment” of patients. The original hospital building, attributed to William Strickland, and its pastoral setting on the Tacony Creek were designed to provide a restful, restorative atmosphere in which patients lived as a family, exercised, and worked together in the gardens and on the farm where they grew some of their own food. Its example was very influential.

Thomas Scattergood (1748-1814), a Quaker minister was the leading force in the creation of what was originally known as the “Friends' Asylum for the Relief of Persons Deprived of their Reason.”  While living in England in the 1790s, he had studied prisons, schools, and orphanages and visited the revolutionary new mental hospital, “The Retreat,” established in York in 1796 by fellow Quaker, William Tuke (1732-1822).  Unlike elsewhere, treatment at The Retreat was based on care and compassion. 

In 1811 Scattergood presented a proposal to the Philadelphia Friends Yearly Meeting for the creation of an asylum modeled on The Retreat, and in 1812 and 1813 the Friends created committees to put the plan into action.  Among the committee members were Scattergood, Samuel Tuke (grandson of William), and Isaac Bonsall (1765-1831), who would be the hospital’s first superintendent.  In 1813 they purchased 52 acres in rural Frankford, and the first patents were admitted four years later. 

Bonsall and his wife Ann, who served as matron of the hospital, had done Quaker missionary work among Native Americans, and they successfully implemented the idea of “moral treatment” in the new hospital. Staff and patients lived under the same roof, ate together, worked at daily tasks together, and participated in social activities together. Diet, sleep, and exercise were carefully but gently regulated. 

By the standards of the time, the hospital was very successful.  During the first year, nineteen patients were received, and at the end of the year, four had been discharged as cured and only three were reported as unimproved. There were no deaths. The Bonsalls worked at the hospital until 1823.

The main hospital building, later called the Thomas Scatterwood Building, was a large but simple house-like structure of stuccoed stone. Like the Retreat in York, the three-story central block contained the common rooms and the residences of the Bonsalls and other staff. Two flanking two-story wings contained bedrooms for men (east) and women (west). In 1827-1828 small additions were attached to the end of each wing to accommodate more violent and noisy patients.

The principal features of the original building are still visible, although a major remodeling in 1871 added a mansard roof (and an additional story) and attached three parallel wings to the rear of the building. The architect was Addison Hutton (1834-1916).

Friends Hospital continued to innovate, and its example continued to have great impact. Most notably, Dr. Thomas Kirkbride (1809-1883), the resident physician in 1832-1833, was strongly influenced by its architectural design and its treatment program in making his widely adopted recommendations for such institutions. More than 70 “Kirkbride Plan” hospitals were built in the United States. 

Additional purchases increased the site to its present 100 acres, and other architecturally interesting buildings were built. These include the carriage house (1885), farmhouse (1881), Greystone (steward's residence, 1910-1911), Hygeia (hydrotherapy building, 1911), and Lawnside (the superintendent's residence, 1859).