Opening in 1962, the center was a wilderness treatment center for troubled boys. Anneewakee expanded from the single Douglasville, Georgia, center to include a boys campus near Carrabelle, Florida and a girls campus near Rockmart, Georgia.
Scandals emerged in the 1980s with decades long history of forced child labor, sexual abuse, physical abuse and deprivation of education. Survivors of this center today range from people who say it saved their lives, to people who refer to it as the Chernobyl of treatment centers.
Anneewakee was acquired and is now operated as Inner Harbour Ltd or DBA Inner Harbour for Children & Families. After the scandals, the court awarded the management of the organization to Hospital Corporation of America (HCA) out of Nashville, TN. A medical model was instituted where care is supervised by medical doctors/psychiatrists.
In 2015 one of the former patients at the facility wrote a book about his time there. It is the only book written by a former patient. "Anneewakee: One Boy's Journey," by Steve Salem Evans.
Video Anneewakee Treatment Center for Emotionally Disturbed Youth
References
Maps Anneewakee Treatment Center for Emotionally Disturbed Youth
External links
- Anneewakee survivors website
https://www.amazon.com/Steve-Salem-Evans/e/B00UW3ID54
Source of the article : Wikipedia