[Image: The only Native psychiatric facility that was funded by the U.S. Government, The Hiawatha Insane Asylum for Natives. Opened in Canton, South Dakota in 1903.]
[Image: A sign located on the east side of Canton, South Dakota. The bronze plaque tells a brief history of the Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Natives.]
[Image: A metal memorial plate on concrete, located close to where the Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Natives used to reside. The memorial lists 121 names of Natives who died in this institution and are now buried at this cemetery space.]
[Image: The only Native psychiatric facility that was funded by the U.S. Government, The Hiawatha Insane Asylum for Natives. Opened in Canton, South Dakota in 1903.]
Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Natives
In 1903 in South Dakota, the first psychiatric federal institution for an ethnic group was built and called the Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Natives (the word actually used is Indians). This facility imprisoned over 400 Native Americans and is where over 100 of them died. Natives were involuntarily committed from all over the country and from more than 30 different tribes.
This facility was built on the belief that Native Americans were too different from the rest of society, and so their treatment needs to be isolated. It was justified that this place was better than any other asylum, hospital, or jail because of the Native Americans' “distinct” mental health issues.
Oftentimes, the reasons for committing anyone here had no relation to mental illnesses. Prisoners were commonly diagnosed with dementia, alcoholism, epilepsy, syphilis, melancholia, and sometimes just plain insanity. While the institution claimed to address dangerous mental health afflictions, people were usually here due to physical health issues, the refusal to stop practicing Native rituals/ spirituality, and even for just arguing with a reservation agent or someone else who possessed the power to incarcerate them.
In 1933, the institution was shortly closed after Secretary Harold Ickes ordered it to be due to a reform in mental health institutions. It was found that the experiment in institutionalization and what was done to Native Americans inside the walls, was unethical. Currently, this facility is now a golf course where a small cemetery resides.
Works Cited
Benson, Heather. “Keepers of the Canton Indian Asylum Share History.” SDPB, 7 June 2018, www.sdpb.org/blogs/arts-and-culture/keepers-of-the-canton-indian-asylum-share-history/.
Gevik, Brian. “Canton’s Hiawatha Indian Asylum.” SDPB, 20 Nov. 2019, www.sdpb.org/blogs/images-of-the-past/the-hiawatha-asylum-for-insane-indians/.
“The Hiawatha Asylum for Insane Indians: The First Federal Mental Hospital for an Ethnic Group.” American Journal of Psychiatry, 1 May 1999, ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/ajp.156.5.767.
“How the U.S. Government Created an ‘insane Asylum’ to Imprison Native Americans.” Berkeley News, Annie Brice, 19 Nov. 2020, news.berkeley.edu/2020/11/19/using-disability-to-imprison-native-americans#:~:text=They%20decided%20on%20a%20psychiatric,with%20having%20a%20mental%20illness.
Joinson, Carla. Vanished in Hiawatha: The Story of the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians. University of Nebraska Press, 2016.
Pigeon, Steven. “Preserving Dark Past Becomes Mission for Keepers of Hiawatha Asylum’s Story.” Pigeon 605, 13 Nov. 2023, pigeon605.com/preserving-dark-past-becomes-mission-for-keepers-of-hiawatha-asylums-story/.
“WayMarking.” Hiawatha Asylum Cemetery – Canton, SD - out of Place Graves on Waymarking.Com, The Federation, 13 June 2012, www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMEM9T_Hiawatha_Asylum_Cemetery_Canton_SD.
Wild Indians: Native Perspectives on the Hiawatha Asylum ..., Pemina Yellow Bird, power2u.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/NativePerspectivesPeminaYellowBird.pdf. Accessed 18 Apr. 2024.