Several months ago someone was asking about Watertown State Hospital and I just happened to find this tonight while I was checking out the online website Illinois has for their databases. They also have information other mental health centers and state hospitals listed there. go to: www.cyberdriveillinois.com/departments/archives/isaholdings.html then click on the first item in blue, and scroll down to State Institutions. You can find them listed there. This is some of the information for Watertown State Hospital held at the Illinois State Archives in Springfield, IL: RECORD GROUP 262.000 - EAST MOLINE MENTAL HEALTH CENTER In 1895 the General Assembly established the Illinois Western Hospital for the Insane. A board of three trustees, appointed by the Governor, was instructed to select a suitable site within the northwestern part of the state on which to locate the institution. The board also was empowered to initiate construction plans and after completion oversee the administration of the institution subject to the inspection of the Board of State Commissioners of Public Charities (L. 1895, p. 18). The trustees purchased land five miles east of Moline in an area known as the Watertown site. The hospital was opened in May 1898 and received its first patients from the Illinois Central Hospital for the Insane at Jacksonville. The board of trustees and the Board of State Commissioners of Public Charities were abolished in 1909 as control of all state charitable institutions passed to the newly created Board of Administration. The institution's name then became Watertown State Hospital (L. 1909, p. 102). The Civil Administrative Code of 1917 transferred jurisdiction of the institution to the Department of Public Welfare. When the Department of Public Welfare was abolished in 1961 the Department of Mental Health assumed responsibility for the hospital (L. 1961, p. 2666). In 1975 the institution's name, which had been changed to East Moline State Hospital in 1927, was again altered to East Moline Mental Health Center (P.A. 79-581, p. 1895). Access to some of these records is restricted according to the provisions of the Mental Health Code and the State Records Act of 1957 as amended.