Person-Centered Behavioral Healthcare

Bournewood’s founder, Bostonian Henry Rust Stedman, MD, a Harvard Medical School-trained psychiatrist, created a private psychiatric institution for his patients. In 1884, he established Bournewood Hospital, initially called Woodbourne, on the Minot Estate in Forest Hills, a section of Boston. It was his goal to provide a nurturing environment where people in distress could rest and get back on their feet employing the then-novel idea of treating people with mental illness in a warm, home-like environment.

In 1895, Stedman relocated Bournewood Hospital from Forest Hills to its present site at 300 South Street in the Chestnut Hill section of Brookline, just outside of Boston. At the time, this new location consisted of 34 acres with three main buildings, which formerly made up the Dodge Farm Estate. This estate, prior to Bournewood relocating there, had been the home of Clara Bowden Dodge, who was the second wife of Civil War Colonel and historian and author Theodore Dodge. It is interesting to note that the hospital buildings on this site were designed by Boston architect William Ralph Emerson, who was known for his shingle-style houses and inns.

This new location of Bournewood Hospital, which is where the main facility remains today, provided a comfortable and family-like atmosphere for patients in need of care for psychiatric illnesses. In Stedman’s words, the facility served as a “model for our times,” both in terms of its plant, patient houses and service buildings, as well as its professional therapeutic approaches. Stedman wrote that Bournewood serves as a “…smaller establishment where the life and surroundings are of a more domestic and natural kind, and where the gradual steps to normal ways to living may be taken while the patient is still undergoing medical supervision.”

While the hospital was under Dr. Stedman’s leadership, he and his family lived in one house, along with an assistant and a medical student. The other two houses on the property were home for Stedman’s 16 patients. Each patient had a private room and his or her own companion, or mental health counselor.

Stedman made a point of viewing each patient in terms of his or her dignity and found useful activities to help promote healthful character development. In addition, those patients that were doing very well actually ate with the superintendent and his family twice a week in the dining room, which was common practice in asylums in those days. Further, after dinner, the family often played cards with the patients and developed long­ term friendships with some of the people during their stay.

Dr. Stedman led Bournewood Hospital until 1917. Near the end of his career, he hired Dr. George H. Torney Jr. to serve as his assistant. Dr. Torney was the son of Dr. George Henry Torney, who served as surgeon general of the U.S. Army. In 1917, the younger Torney took over as superintendent of the hospital.

Dr. Torney purchased Bournewood from Dr. Stedman in 1920 and led its operations until 1945. Even after passing on the ownership, Dr. Stedman continued to visit the hospital and take an active interest in his former patients.

Dr. Stedman passed away in February of 1926. Also in 1926, Amelia M. Earhart was employed at Bournewood Hospital for the summer months as a companion. This was two years before her historic flight.

Dr. Torney retired and psychiatrist Dr. Solomon Gagnon assumed leadership of Bournewood Hospital. One of Bournewood’s distinctions in this era that set it apart from other similar psychiatric institutions is that Bournewood made its facilities available to practicing psychiatrists in the area, giving them the opportunity to treat their own patients at Bournewood. Additionally, the hospital employed a full-time clinical staff that closely provided all therapeutic activities.

A series of difficulties led Dr. Gagnon to turn to local psychiatrist Dr. Nasir Khan of Newton, MA to take over Bournewood’s day-to-day operations. Dr. Khan formerly served as the superintendent of Danvers State Hospital, one of many large state psychiatric hospital operated by the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health. Interestingly enough, Bournewood’s founder Dr. Stedman had served as assistant superintendent of Danvers State Hospital before establishing Bournewood Hospital.

Dr. Khan succeeded in leading a turnaround for Bournewood as it regained its Joint Commission accreditation. At that time, Bournewood was one of the first hospitals in the country to be accredited under new Joint Commission standards had recently set at that time.

First Psychiatric Planners, Inc., which was led by Dr. Khan, took on the facility’s ownership. This group was a professional consortium of local physicians practicing at the hospital. Dr. Khan was only the fourth owner in Bournewood’s history. Of note, all four owners up until this era had all been psychiatrists, which is testament to the extraordinary commitment and dedication each brought to the facility.

1984 also marked Bournewood’s centennial celebration. In honor of this milestone, then Gov. Michael Dukakis proclaimed 1984 “Bournewood Hospital Year” in Massachusetts. In the proclamation, Dukakis said: “This fine hospital today, as ever, strives to maintain its professional leadership, quality care, confidentiality and recognition of the rights and dignity of individual patients and their families, while excluding no person from receiving services because of race, color, creed, handicap, national origin, sex or age.”

Under Dr. Khan’s leadership, Bournewood Hospital established the Caulfield Center as a separate off-site location in 2005. This center is part of the Choate Medical Center in Woburn, Massachusetts, and it was designed to provide additional outpatient and partial hospitalization services and support for mental health care.

Groundbreaking began on July 20, 2012 for a new building on the Brookline campus, adding 30 inpatient beds in a free-standing psychiatric unit to Bournewood’s capacity which grew to 90 beds.

The new building, named the Dr. Nasir A. Khan Building, opened to patients. Hospital staff joined in the ribbon cutting ceremony, attended by then Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis and his wife Kitty.

Dr. Khan passed away unexpectedly on April 9, 2014, at the age of 74. He is survived by his wife, retired Massachusetts State Representative Kay Khan, and their three children. He was highly respected in his field, earning many accolades.

Marcia Fowler, former Commissioner of Mental Health for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, was named Chief Executive Officer of Bournewood Health Systems.

Bournewood Health Systems was acquired by Alita Care LLC, joining The Meadows Behavioral Healthcare based in Arizona. Bournewood CEO Marcia Fowler continues to lead Bournewood in this new chapter.

Bournewood’s Brookline campus undergoes a significant reconfiguration with the addition of a new Intensive Treatment Unit in the Dodge Building. Named Dodge 1, the new unit increases Bournewood’s bed capacity to 102.

Maria Jackson, LICSW, assumes the role of Chief Executive Officer of Bournewood in April 2023, following the retirement of CEO Marcia Fowler.

Bournewood marks 140 years of continuous operation as a private free-standing psychiatric facility, continuing the legacy of excellence in behavioral health care and treatment that Dr. Stedman began in 1884.