I grew up hearing the phrases, “They sent him off to Camp Butner...again.” “He belongs at Camp Butner” or, “Shush, don’t talk crazy like that, you’ll end up at Butner!” were common admonitions. Those remarks might be accompanied by mentions of “Dix Hill,” or if that worldview emanated from the western counties, of “Broughton.” African Americans went off to “Cherry” in Goldsboro. Once upon a time, these places were each associated with mental health in North Carolina. Such human challenges were mystified, often accompanied by ostracism, and generally spoken of insensitively in bygone days.
We all know, or ought to, that mental health care, defined widely, has never been well-understood or implemented. From genius to genuine distress, and everything in-between, successful coping by the state, community, family, and individual remains far from well-orchestrated or developed. We have to hope that progress will come. Medieval attitudes and practices are not that far behind us - nor even completely absent I suspect.
Camp Butner has been a lot of things. It was constructed originally in 1942 in Granville, Person, and Durham Counties as a World War II infantry training center. It was a work camp for German and Italian P.O.W.s during the war. “Today, the grounds house a variety of state and federal facilities including several mental health facilities, multiple correctional institutions, state-owned farms and a National Guard training facility.” A new addition at Butner is The Veterans Life Center — “a residential program for veterans in need of therapy, counseling, educational or life-skill development.”
One semester during my many, many years in college I took a Public Administration course taught by the Warden at the Butner Federal Correctional Institute. My class visited that lock-up and Warden Ingram led the tour. I’m pretty sure that prison wasn’t what people in Chatham were referring to when their quips featured Butner but rather facilities that dealt with substance abuse. To suffer from alcoholism in a dry and evangelically T-Totaling county brought forward many unique situations. Tar Heels laughed at Otis Campbell of Mayberry exactly because he hit so close to home. Such was the code being spoken. Warden Ingram also let us in on some internal Butner Federal code talk. It was over 40 years ago now when I made my pilgrimage so some of this is mildly historic.
It seems that at the penitentiary there were seven units and inmates were arranged in them by type of crime. In very North Carolina fashion each of those units were nicknamed after an Atlantic Coast Conference School (there were only seven in those days - good times!). The designations were clearly carefully thought-out. What I remember about that from the Warden is that the violent and vicious were in Clemson, sexual criminals went to NC State, scam artists were with Wake Forest, those who embezzled from the government were at Virginia, and those who pilfered from private enterprise were Duke. Those who committed unspeakable acts were put in Maryland, and of course drug dealers and moonshiners found their way to Carolina. There’s nothing quite like well-founded regional prison humor.
For more on the history of Mental Health Care in NC go here:
Psychiatric Hospitals
#OTD (March 13) in 1937 Major General Henry Wolfe Butner died. The camp was named for him. Read here:
Camp Butner’s Namesake, Henry Wolfe Butner
www.ncpedia.org
