Terrell State Hospital

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it: and it's a story worth the telling. Back in 1883, the Legislature of Texas put their name to an authorization, and from that moment the wheels were turning on something that would grow into a landmark unlike anything else west of the Mississippi River. The design fell to J.

N. Preston and sons, out of Austin, and a man named John McDonald picked up the hammer and built it. By 1885, the doors were open.

Terrell State Hospital was alive. Leading it from the start was Dr. D.

R. Wallace, the superintendent; and now, don't let that title fool you into thinking he was just a man behind a desk. The marker calls him an internationally recognized pioneer psychiatrist.

Internationally recognized. Out here on the Texas plain, a man at the frontier of his field, tending to minds when the whole world was still puzzling out how. In that first year alone, the hospital admitted 330 patients.

Three hundred and thirty souls through those doors. And the place kept growing, kept reaching; until by 1920 it was holding 2,300 patients, the largest hospital of its kind west of the Mississippi River. Let that number settle on you for a second.

The largest. Of its kind. West of the Mississippi.

Now here's the part that'll catch you quiet if you're not ready for it. Of everything that rose up on those grounds, every building that Dr. Wallace walked through, every hall that held those 2,300 patients, none of it is left.

Not one original building still stands. What remains, out there on the old hospital grounds, is a fountain in a circular park and a water tower. That's it.

Two things to mark what was once the biggest institution of its kind across half a continent. Sometimes the land remembers in small ways, even when the buildings don't.

What the marker says

Authorized 1883 by Legislature of Texas. Designed by J. N. Preston and sons, Austin. Built by John M'Donald. Opened in 1885 under administration of Dr. D. R. Wallace, superintendent, who was an internationally recognized pioneer psychiatrist. Admitted 330 patients during first year. Gradually enlarged with 2,300 patients by 1920; it was largest hospital of its kind west of Mississippi. No original buildings are left. Only the fountain in circular park and water tower remain from old hospital grounds.