O nce the largest mental health hospital in the world, Milledgeville’s Central State Hospital’s (CHS) history runs deep. Since it was founded in 1842, the institution saw major changes over the years. From advances in medical technology to patient care, a new exhibit aims to shine a spotlight on the some of the healthcare workers and their impact on the field of nursing.

The Georgia College Library has partnered with the Georgia Public Library Service (GPLS) to create a digital exhibit exploring the history of nursing at Central State Hospital (CSH) in Milledgeville.

In 2019, the library initially partnered with the Twin Lakes Library (TLL) in Milledgeville to undertake a community memory project. The group included Holly Croft, digital archivist, manager of facilities operations and planning Evan Leavitt, community engagement archivist Jessamyn Swan and Stephen Houser, former director of the TLL. The four were awarded an Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) grant to preserve the history of the institution by documenting CSH’s oral history.

At the time, Houser brought the GPLS Digital Exhibits (DigEx) pilot project to Croft and Leavitt’s attention. The project is designed to build capacity for public libraries through the use of digitized cultural materials available on the Digital Library of Georgia (DLG), placing the items in the context of their respective communities.

The team saw the perfect opportunity to share some of the history of CSH.

Over the hospital’s near 180-year history, the group looked at many topics and issues that could be examined. Since the pilot program requires participants to utilize materials available in the DLG, they investigated what related items could be used to build a narrative.

It turns out the most viewed item on the DLG in 2019 was the record book of the CSH School of Nursing, which was originally digitized and shared by the Twin Lakes Library.

“We felt building off of that public interest provided us with a good starting point,” Leavitt explained. “Once I began my research, I quickly learned that you could not talk about the school of nursing alone. There was a need to contextualize nursing at CSH within the evolution of nurse training in the United States.”

Dr. Shaundra Walker, director of the Georgia College Library, hopes to highlight materials in the library’s collection that will inspire researchers, but also help tell the story of CSH in a way that is inclusive of individuals and communities that perhaps haven’t been recognized. 

The exhibit highlights the work of African American nurses like Ruth Hartley Mosley and Ludie Clay Andrews. Hartley Mosley was the first African American head nurse of a patient ward at CSH, and went on to become a civil rights activist and philanthropist. Clay Andrews, a Milledgeville native and Georgia’s first black registered nurse, organized the Municipal Training School for Colored Nurses.

Because it is digital, the exhibit has its own unique advantages.

“Its reach is greatly expanded beyond those individuals who would only have the capacity to visit us in person,” Walker said. “Another advantage is that it can have a longer life.  We plan to rotate the exhibits that are currently in our galleries, but by virtue of this one being digital, it can stay up much longer and will have a longer life than a traditional physical exhibit.”

Even with its wide reach, the creators of the exhibit have kept the local community in mind.

Croft added that while CSH is part of Milledgeville and the state of Georgia, other states had institutions that addressed mental health. Many of the processes and procedures at CSH were similar to those of other hospitals located across the country, making the exhibit useful to anyone looking for information on how mental health has been addressed in the United States.

In addition to the group of faculty and staff at Georgia College who curated and designed the exhibit, an editorial team consisting of librarians and museum professionals from public, private, and academic organizations were assembled by GPLS. The editorial team guided GC faculty and staff through the construction of the exhibit from start to finish, providing valuable feedback throughout the process.

Croft and Walker credit Leavitt with the design and curation of the exhibit. Leavitt, having no experience with HTML or CSS, the coding languages used for the exhibit’s software, collaborated with other departments on campus.

“I relied on Joshua Smith in University Communications and Ashley Waddell in Information Technology, who graciously provided their knowledge and assisted in designing and constructing the custom footer for our exhibit site,” he said.

The exhibit runs in tandem with two other exhibits highlighting Georgia history. “Albany, Georgia’s Courthouses” from the Dougherty County Public Library, and “Ballard Normal School, Macon GA: African American Student Life in the 1930s,” from the Washington Memorial Library. Those exhibits, like the Central State exhibit, are the final product of the GPLS DigEx pilot program.

“If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a digital exhibit must be worth ten thousand words,” said Exhibit Curator Muriel Jackson of the Middle Georgia Regional Library Service. “These exhibits will represent our communities for years to come.”

The exhibit can be viewed online by following the link: https://georgialibraries.omeka.net/s/central-state-hospital/page/introduction