PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS, BOARD OF VISITORS:

The biennial reports of the Minnesota State Board of Visitors for Public Institutions, while not complete for the entire history of the board, do contain a wealth of information on the care, management, and conditions at Minnesota’s charitable and correctional institutions. The reports vary in length from 16 to 99 pages and center on humanitarian concerns, leaving financial concerns to the State Board of Control. All reports include a list of board members, subcommittee assignments, and office staff; a general introduction to the board’s work for the past two years; a financial statement; inspection reports; and general recommendations for the legislature. Most of the larger reports contain a report of the librarian, photographs, and an index.

Many board members felt that the name State Board of Visitors was unfortunate, since they were really unpaid inspectors of the state’s charitable and correctional facilities as well as of selected county and municipal institutions. Their visits or inspections were unannounced, in the hope that they would find conditions as they really were rather than spruced up for a scheduled annual visit. Their inspections were thorough, from inspecting bedding and linen to tasting food and interviewing residents about their lives.

All state correctional and charitable facilities, from the Anoka State Asylum for the Insane to the State Sanitarium for Consumptives at Walker, were under the review of the Board of Visitors. The Governor also could order special investigations of any facility, and many of these reports are included in these biennial reports. County jails and poorhouses as well as private facilities such as the Women’s Christian Home of St. Paul also were inspected from time to time.

Some of the Board’s recommendations (often made more than once) included having the counties build and run facilities to relieve overcrowding in state institutions (a 1909 recommendation that really was the essence of the Welsch Consent Decree 70 years later), better fire proofing and fire insurance for buildings, state pensions for staff at state hospitals and prisons, establishment of a department of psychological research at the University of Minnesota, indeterminate sentencing of criminals, medical certificates for marriage, and of course pleas for enlarging the Board’s powers and increasing its funding. Other topics discussed included juvenile delinquency, child labor (the newsboy problem), public dance halls (alcohol control), and the influence of organized communism among juveniles (see the 1925 report).

Rich Arpi, April 2001

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Availability:

The collection is open for research use.

Preferred Citation:

[Indicate the cited item and/or series here]. Minnesota. State Board of Visitors for Public Institutions. Biennial Reports. Minnesota Historical Society.

See the Chicago Manual of Style for additional examples.

Accession Information:

Accession number: None

Processing Information:

Catalog ID number: 990017039190104294

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Another set of these reports is cataloged separately as part of the MHS book collections.

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This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the Minnesota Historical Society. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should search the catalog using these headings.

Topics:

Charities -- Minnesota.

Prisons -- minnesota -- Inspection.

Public institutions -- Minnesota -- Inspection.

Functions:

Inspecting.

Supervising.

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