A special exhibition featuring the 142-year history of the Goodna Mental Asylum has opened in Brisbane.The Asylum, now known as The Park - Centre for Mental Health, has been home to over 50,000 people since it began in 1865.
When it first opened, it was known as the Woogaroo Mental Asylum and in the 1970s was renamed Wolston Park.
The exhibition is located at the the Museum of Brisbane at the Brisbane City Hall and features photographs and memorabilia of the facility built on the banks of the Brisbane River adjacent to Woogaroo Creek.
A collection of straightjackets and an historic
tombstone on display at the Remembering Goodna
exhibition at Brisbane City Hall.
Two hundred staff and former patients attended the official opening of the exhibition on Friday by the former Governor of Queensland Leneen Forde.
The exhibition features rare photographs and documents, many of which have never been previously publicly exhibited.
In the 1950s, the hospital was the largest mental health facility in Australia.
Many historic buildings remain on the site where the changes in architectural structure demonstrate the differing modes for containment and management of patients.
Ipswich Councillor Paul Tully, Chair of the Heritage Consultative Committee, was an official guest at the launch and described it as "the greatest historical collection put together on one health institution in Queensland".
"This is an important exhibition which depicts both the sad and joyous history of this hospital which has served the state for almost 150 years."
Cr Tully said many existing residents of Goodna and surrounding suburbs had worked at the hospital in the past 70 years and the exhibition would bring back a flood of memories.
He said one interesting photograph was of the "Goodna Bus Service", a long gone bus company which ferried passengers between the nearby railway station and the hospital.
Cr Tully urged local residents to visit the exhibition which is open daily free of charge on the ground floor of the Brisbane City Hall.
The exhibition continues until 23 March 2008.
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