Henry Mills Hurd

Artist: Thomas C. Corner; Oil on canvas

Henry Mills Hurd was born in Union City, Michigan. He received his A.B. in 1863 and his M.D. in 1866, both from the University of Michigan.

After a brief time in general practice and work in dispensaries in Chicago and New York City, he embarked upon a career in psychiatry and hospital administration.

From 1870 to 1878, he served as assistant physician for the Michigan Asylum for the Insane, and from 1878 to 1889, as medical superintendent of Eastern Michigan Asylum.

Having earned an impressive reputation as a hospital administrator, he was appointed the first superintendent of the Johns Hopkins Hospital shortly after it opened in 1889 and remained there until his retirement in 1911. Dr. Hurd also served on the faculty of psychiatry at the School of Medicine. He played a significant role in guiding the early development of the Johns Hopkins Hospital.

One of his greatest contributions was fostering biomedical communication. Hurd will be especially remembered for his Editorship of the monumental four-volume work titled Institutional Care of the Insane in the United States and Canada (1916).

Dr. Hurd wrote the entire first volume (497 pages) which deals with the history of American psychiatry. The other three volumes describe every public and private asylum and include bibliographies of prominent psychiatrists. The work was undertaken at the request of the American Medico-Psychological Association by a committee of six asylum superintendents, with Hurd as Editor in Chief.