In 1841, while teaching a Sunday school class at the East Cambridge House of Correction in Massachusetts, Dorothea Lynde Dix observed that not only were mentally ill incarcerated with the criminals, but that they were mistreated.
She then traveled for two years throughout Massachusetts, documenting the horrendous treatment of the indigent mentally ill in institutions and private homes where people were paid by the state to take care of them.
In January 1843, she submitted her report to the Massachusetts Legislature.
“Not Above a Whisper” -- a drama built around the day Dix’s argument was presented before the state legislature -- will be presented by the East Lynne Theater Company in a staged reading to be posted on YouTube online from 8 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 18, to 8 p.m. Friday, Aug. 21.
ELTC artistic director Gayle Stahlhuth received a commission from the Smithsonian Institution to write the two-person play about Dix, which had its premiere at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. in April,1983, performed by Stahlhuth and her husband, Lee O’Connor. During the next four years, they toured “Not Above a Whisper” to mental health organizations throughout the country to help raise money and awareness.
Stahlhuth and O’Connor will reprise the roles they first performed 37 years ago for the Cape May-based theater’s staged reading. Viewing is free but donations are requested.
While this month marks the 100th anniversary of the Aug. 26, 1920 ratification of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote, “Not Above a Whisper” takes place 77 years prior to that momentous act, and clearly demonstrates how hard it was for women to make their voices heard in government.
The setting for the play, in fact, has DIx waiting outside the Massachusetts Legislature chambers, since women were not allowed to appear before the governing body in person. Her argument was delivered by physician, abolitionist and advocate for the blind Samuel Gridley Howe.
The play’s title comes from a comment Dix reportedly overheard from someone disparaging her findings, saying, “And a woman made these terrible discoveries? It really should not be discussed above a whisper.”
Dix did not get everything she’d asked for in her appeal, but a bill was passed to enlarge the Worcester Insane Asylum, due to her efforts. She eventually traveled to every state to compile evidence about the horrific conditions for the mentally ill, and in every state, she had to find a man to speak for her in state legislatures.
Dix’s campaign resulted in 15 states and Canada passing bills for better treatment and the creation of hospitals just for the mentally ill. In all, she was responsible for the building of 32 such institutions in the United States alone. She died in 1887.
Stahlhuth’s plays and musicals have been produced in NYC and throughout the country. She specializes in biographical dramas. It was her production of “Lou: The Remarkable Miss Alcott” in 1982 that led to the Smithsonian commission for “Not Above a Whisper.” She also received commissions to write a musical about Walt Whitman for Pennsylvania Stage Company, a one-person play about Paul Robeson for TheaterWorks USA and a one-woman play, which she toured, about Edna Ferber, for the Illinois and Missouri Humanities Councils.