go back to bed. No follow up took place after the nighttime confession. It was not spoken about again. Later, Judith wondered if she had simply dreamed the whole thing.
Two years later, at age fifteen, Judith became a big sister again. This time Helen delivered a son, Wesley, named after Judith’s deceased father. By now the family had moved into a house in White Center, near Seattle, so that George could have a shorter commute to his work at Bethlehem Steele in Seattle. Judith retained no memory of the event, however, her mother later explained to her that once she was allowed to hold Wesley when he was a tiny baby. Unfortunately, Judith dropped him like a slippery bowling ball onto the floor when a seizure started. Years later Wesley accused Judith, tongue-in-cheek, of causing his own “grand mal seizure disorder.” In fact, his lifetime of seizures began at the age of ten after a passing car in front of their house had struck and nearly killed him.
Shortly after Wesley was born, with Judith’s temper tantrums escalating and deemed to be utterly dangerous to those around her, Judith’s parents admitted her to the Ryther Child Care Center in Seattle, November 23rd, where she would live and have round the clock care and monitoring. A clear message had been sent to Judith that she was now too dangerous to be around her own family.
Her parents had heard of the Ryther facility and decided they had no choice but to give it a try to see if something changed in Judith. The public school system would not take her back. She was becoming impossible to manage at home with her frequent seizure activity and horrible outbursts. And it was more and more difficult to keep her in the home, safe, with so many boys noticing her maturing, curvy, body and all. Judith thoroughly enjoyed mowing the lawn in her bathing suit, but Helen and George told her she could no longer do that in the front yard. It wasn’t right for a young lady to display herself in that way to the neighbors. Judith had been caught smoking cigarettes behind an abandoned building with boys. She was beginning to engage in sexual activities with young men—something respectable girls absolutely should not do. Judith was undeniably running wild. The Ryther Child Care Center, her parents were advised, had a reputation as being a home with firm, but loving discipline, and nothing but the best intentions for wayward youths. Helen and George were hopeful that this would be the winning ticket for Judith.
Founded in 1883, The Ryther Home was created by “Mother Ryther” (a.k.a. Olive Spore Ryther) who had a vision for a warm, safe home in Seattle where prostitutes, orphans, runaways, pregnant girls, and the like could live and be free from the dangers on the city streets. But the home was more than mere shelter. Mother Ryther insisted that everyone be responsible for household chores; she taught new mothers the skills needed to care for babies, and her ultimate goal was for every guest to reach a point of self- sufficiency. She encouraged everyone in the home to learn skills that would increase chances of finding employment.
In 1934, at the age of eighty-five, Mother Ryther died, having mentored over 3,100 children in her house. However, successors to Mother Ryther continued her work and the facility was open in 1960 when Judith’s parents checked her in. At the time of this writing, the Ryther Child Center remains open in north Seattle, funded by public and private donations, and serving adolescents with chemical dependency, mental disorders, and criminal histories. Prostitution, pregnancy, physical and sexual abuse, and general neglect cases are also admitted.
Judith lived at the Ryther Child Center for approximately twelve months. Most of Judith’s memory of the habitation is blurred by numerous seizure episodes. Judith did not know how long she would have to stay there. Even though she felt estranged from her family, she did miss them and longed to go home. It hurt her deeply to be sent away, but Mother and George had reassured her it was for her own good that they were doing this. Judith believed her parents thought they were doing the right thing. And they were faithful in visiting Judith on the weekends. Helen and George brought the little siblings, all dressed up. The family posed for photos on the sidewalk in front of the Ryther facility, trying to look like an ordinary family.
Judith recalls sharing a room with approximately five other girls, dormitory style. A separate boys’ dorm was on the other side of the home. She was required to attend high school classes. A heavy-set, black woman, named Chaney, worked as the cook for the facility. Judith instantly bonded with the woman, proclaiming she was the nicest woman in the whole world. Judith slipped away whenever possible to share a few moments of conversation and hugs with Chaney. Even on Judith’s darkest days, Cook Chaney could lift her up with kind words and loving smiles.
Judith ran away from the Ryther home on several occasions, only to be rounded up and brought back. She never stopped plotting to escape and go home. During one runaway episode, Judith attempted to hitchhike her way home, even though she wasn’t sure which direction home was. All she knew was that she was going home. A man picked her up at the roadside, and the next thing Judith remembered was trying to escape from his vehicle like a bunny rabbit from the open mouth of a wolf. Between the time of being picked up and crawling frantically out of a back window of the car in her escape, Judith’s memory had vanished. Judith was found and taken back to the Ryther facility. Later, she wondered if she had had a seizure in the car with the strange man. What had he done to terrify her so?
After twelve months of receiving counseling and attending classes at the Ryther Center, sixteen-year-old Judith gratefully went home to live with her family November 15th of 1960. But, by the next year, at age seventeen, her life was tumbling ferociously toward the edge of a cliff. She was about to receive yet another little sister, Lori, and a new home—Western State Hospital, a mental facility, where she would live, with no chance of escape, (it was assumed) for the next year.
Meanwhile, Judith’s parents and three young siblings moved to a larger home in Lake City, near Seattle. Living space was getting tight.
Western State Hospital, in Tacoma, Washington, a funny farm, a nut house, a lunatic asylum, was a hospital in the 1960’s where the very mentally disturbed were checked in and did not have the option of leaving. Established in 1871, it was first called an “insane asylum” and was located on the site of Fort Steilacoom. Most mental patients were deemed a danger to society and were locked up, having little chance of ever leaving the facility. Many served life sentences there. Radical treatments such as ice water immersion, frontal lobotomies, and electric shock therapy had been practiced on patients at the insane asylum for years. However, the 1960’s brought in a new wave of treatment for the mentally ill—anti-psychotic drugs, which tipped the treatment scale heavily toward drug therapy. The 1975 movie “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” starring Jack Nicholson, later dramatized the life of patients in mental institutions such as this. For the first time, the public got a peek into the mysterious, daily, at times horrifying, happenings within the walls of a mental hospital. Today, with new treatments available, Western State Hospital continues to treat the mentally ill and evaluates the alleged criminally insane.
How is it that young Judith became a patient in such a facility? She was “voluntarily committed” at seventeen years of age, and was coaxed into signing a voluntary commitment form.
Judith does not remember much about May 19, 1961, just three days before her sister Lori was born, when she was left at Western State Hospital. She cannot remember the majority of her stay at the hospital. One day, mother simply told her, “Okay, Judith, it’s time to go to the hospital now.” Very pregnant mother and George swiftly loaded up Judith and the young ones into the car. The next thing Judith knew, having no idea how many miles they had driven—they could have traveled into another state, according to Judith’s perception—she was looking out the car window at an intimidating, large, brick building. It was the biggest building she had ever seen. She was told that she would be living in this hospital, just for a while, so that doctors could experiment with strong medications to help get rid of her seizures. To Judith, it sort of felt familiar, like just another visit to a doctor, an exercise she and her mother had been performing most of her life. They never stopped hunting for a “cure” to her ailment. If mother told her that this place would help, then it was just the next stop in a never-ending series of medical appointments.
