Women at the Ladd School

One of the earliest, major buildings was Gleason House. Gleason House was originally made as a school; the only school, in fact, for which the institution could be called a school. In the early 1900s, I mean the early 1930s and before, Gleason House wasn't being used as a school at all, but as a dormitory for sheltering more than 200 women and young children. This was in addition to a female dormitory building called Mann, and later, another called Higgins, as well as an "annex" at the Oaklawn School For Girls (women's reformatory) in Cranston. By the time a third female dormitory, Ranger, was built in the 1940s, Gleason was restored as a training school. In the early 1950s, a fourth female dormitory, called Evergeen, was added.

Conversely, on the male side of the institution (the male and female buildings were partitioned on opposite sides of Main Street), there were far fewer dorms. Howe House was the only male dormitory until the 1950s when Riverfield was built for sheltering the severely disabled. The rest of the male population lived in the old colony houses, built at the turn of the century, on the farm.

The population rosters do not show a significant difference in the number of female versus male inmates. However, I do think that this distribution of male and female dormitories bespeaks of a special emphasis on the female population.