History
Copyright © 2006, The Ladd School.com - Written by Ladd Curator

Founded in 1907 by Dr. William Gleason, Chairman of the Providence School Committee, the Rhode Island School for the Feeble Minded was established as a farm colony in Exeter, RI, modelled after the then Massachusettes School for the Feeble Minded, better known today as the Fernald State Institution in Waltham, MA. It's original purpose was for the schooling of mentally retarded as well as socially and morally delinquent individuals, in domestic sciences, factory and farm work, for their eventual integration into public society, by their placement in foster homes and work programs. Admittees were usually youths, committed to the institution by their parents at the suggestion of a doctor, a school teacher, or by order of a judge in juvenile court in the wake of unlawful infractions. Oftentimes, in the institutions earliest decades, adolescents of relatively normal intelligence were admitted to the Exeter School for such behaviors as sexual promiscuity (resulting, usually, in illegetimate pregnancy), hyperactivity, epilepsy, truancy from school, physical handicaps, and other perceived and decided "defects" as dictated by the times.

Despite increasingly inadequate funding and staffing, the Exeter School population grew exponentially for several decades, resulting in severe overcrowding. As the institution continued to expand in both size and number, it evolved to serve an entirely different purpose than that for which it was originally established, serving rather for the long-term custodial care of the mildly and severly retarded. Gradually losing sight of it's function as an educational facility, the Exeter School increasingly adopted a stance more akin to that of a penal institution rather than an educational one, enforcing strict policies governing the detention, parole, and discharge of it's residents, or "inmates" as they were then called by all accounts.

Such policies as were enforced for more than half a century came under public scrutiny in the mid-1950's amid allegations of abuse and medical neglect, raised to public awareness by the Exeter School's first documented murder case in 1955, resulting in the forced retirement of Dr. Joseph Ladd less than a year later. Dr. Ladd was not only Exeter School's first and founding Superintendent, but - until this time at least - was also the institutions only liscened doctor. The population of Exeter School at this time was more than 900.

It wasn't long before Dr. Ladd's successor, Dr. John Smith, formerly of the Waterbury, Connecticut Training School for the Feebleminded, came also under scrutiny - this time, by the leaders of various State welfare organizations that had since come to play a greater role in the institutions administration by way of legislative bills and government mandates. Though under pressure from both hearings held before legislative bodies and picket lines formed by disgruntled institution workers demanding higher salaries and improved working conditions, Dr. Smith weathered well the days of the Civil Rights movement. Refusing to retire amid a barrage of accusations charging the institution's adminitration with misappropriated funds and continued medical negligence, Dr. Smith held his ground, seeing the Exeter School - now called the Ladd Center - peak at a populaace of over 1,000 inmates in the late 1960's.

Finally, in 1977, a State appointed commission of Doctors discovered the appalling conditions existent at the Ladd Center dental clinic, blowing the doors open on a legacy of physical abuse and medical negligence, resulting in a class action lawsuit against the State of Rhode Island by an organization called the Ladd School Parents Association. In the months to follow, Dr. Smith was releived of his position as Superintendent, and The Ladd Center was ordered by a Federal judge to dramatically reduce it's population to exceed no more than 335 in the ensuing decade. By this time, several organizations had begun to rise to the occasion of establishing a network of group facilities for the relocation of Ladd residents throughout the State of Rhode Island. Meanwhile, the institutions population dwindled, but slowly, missing two deadlines in the course of twenty years in the aim of closing the door forever on the institutionalization of the developmentally disabled.

In 1986, Rhode Island Governor Edward DiPrete once and for all announced the closing of the Ladd School, and, in the wake of continuing reports of negligence and abuse, the institution closed its doors for good eight years later, in 1994. During the 87 years of its operation, Rhode Island's School for the Feeble Minded - the Ladd School - called itself home to more 5,000 unfortunate souls. Though records exist documenting some cases, nobody will ever truly know how many there suffered.

The Ladd School left behind it a legacy of horrors; yet even today, this legacy lives on in those who are the former denizens of Ladd's dark past. They are the last tragic refugees of a dark chapter in Rhode Island history that has yet to close.

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