Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum - Antonia Hylton

Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum offers a sweeping, deeply researched examination of the 93-year history of Crownsville Hospital in Maryland—once a segregated asylum for Black patients. Journalist Antonia Hylton blends personal narrative, archival documents, and oral histories to uncover how race, institutionalization, and mental health intersected in early 20th-century America. From forced labor and “industrial therapy” to medical neglect and social injustice, the book reveals how Crownsville became a microcosm of America’s long struggle with race, psychiatry, and freedom. Essential reading for anyone interested in history, civil rights, mental health, and how past systems still affect our present.