One of the stops on my recent trip to Great Falls was the Cascade County District Court Clerk’s office. I went there to request any records related to my 2nd great grandmother’s involuntary commitment to the Montana State Hospital at Warm Springs.

Ada Murphy Muir is the ancestor who got me hooked on family history research. When I started doing genealogy, it was “just a work thing.” As a reference librarian, I receive requests from patrons looking for help with their own family history. When I recognized that I need to do more for them than show them how to log into Ancestry Library Edition, I took a beginning genealogy class at the local adult education center. I had no intention of researching my own family.

Oops.

Eight years later, I find myself doing (at least a little bit of) family history research every day, presenting genealogy programs at my library, and leading the Montana State Genealogy Society.

But back to Ada. I knew that she had died in the State Hospital. Family lore said that she “lost her mind when she went through the change of life.” As a woman in my mid-forties, I find this story plausible. And also incredibly interesting.

So I started by researching Ada in that beginner genealogy class. It didn’t take long to find her death certificate, which confirmed she had, indeed, passed away at the mental hospital in Warm Springs.

The cause of death? General Paralysis of the Insane.

Well okay. That makes a certain amount of sense for someone in a mental hospital, right? Sort of antiquated, perhaps, but she died in 1926. Maybe “general paralysis of the insane” was some kind of early twentieth century generalization, a socially acceptable way of saying that someone kicked the bucket in the looney bin.

Mmm, nope.

A wee bit of further research revealed that general paralysis of the insane is the end result of untreated syphilis. An bacterial infection drove my second great grandmother insane, resulting in her involuntary commitment to the Montana State Hospital, where she died sixteen years before penicillin was used to treat infections in the United States.

Now that’s interesting. And my passion for family history research was born.

I’ll admit that further research into Ada’s life has languished a bit, but my recent trip to Great Falls provided an opportunity to revive it. The criminal records clerk at the District Court office was very helpful. Unfortunately…

…my request was denied. But! The denial included instructions for requesting mental health records of family members from the Department of Public Health and Human Services. The process involves providing “legal documentation that establishes kinship.”

Right up my alley. To be continued.