Research


Scope and Content Note

This series consists of record cards relating to approximately 1,000 women received from about 1929 to 1940 at the Westfield State Farm and its predecessor, the New York State Reformatory for Women. The 8" x 9" cards include the following categories of information: inmate background (color, education, previous occupation, previous arrests, family, and marital status); crime (nature of crime, term of sentence, county of sentencing, and name of judge); psychological testing (inmate's mental age and IQ based on several psychological tests including the Binet, Healey, Pinter Patterson, and Porteus Maze tests); psychological or psychiatric classification (e.g., normal, feebleminded, moron, defective delinquent, neuropathic); medical (family medical history, physical data, and the results of a physical examination and testing for syphilis and gonorrhoea); names of cottage assignments at the reformatory; and date of release or transfer.