Francis Farmer: A Ravaged Life

A Ravaged Life

Back in December last year 2000, I wrote President Clinton a thank- you note, for his kind "recognition" of my efforts in Civil Rights. In it, I enticed him to turn on his P.C. and briefly examine the tragedy of a life, named Frances Farmer. I guess feeling one letter to me, might just be enough, he chose politely, not to respond; but had our former President taken my suggestion, he would have witnessed the following story:

Born in 1914, in Seattle, of rather "difficult", parents, the beautiful Frances led a life, typical of a young girl, of the age. Enjoying the arts, and literature, she came to some literary acclaim, (and her lifelong demise), when her piece entitled, "God Dies", appeared around Seattle, while just 16 years old. Being controlling, and very spiteful, Frances' mother seized this opportunity of her daughter's professed atheism, (as seen in this above poem), to "label" her gifted daughter, as "crazy" perhaps, and thereby start the endless cycle of institutionalizing her daughter pretty much at her own discretion; for with this package came something we still have today: legal guardianship.

That Ms. Farmer was a brilliant actress of the 1930's and 1940's is unquestionable. That a harmless poem written in 1931, destroyed her life forever, is also not in dispute, and that her alcoholism, and pill addiction, combined with several failed marriages certainly did little to ease her emotional status. But what will one day be contested, as a clear result of her traumas, is the emotional devastation on a person when "turned over' to the control of another. Be that "guardian", a parent, a public defender, or a court ordered official; you simply have no right to do such a thing, to a human life.

In Frances Farmer's case she was sent to hospitals on as little as a whim. Suffering lobotomies, insulin shock treatments, rape and other abuses, she finally "gave up" with the following statement: "Psychiatry has systematically destroyed the only thing I have ever been able to hold onto in life....my faith in my artistic creativity"

She died, as we all do in mental health, broke, friendless and despised at age 56. But she did not lose her "creativity", for some of us still remember and love her. No she kept her talent.....it was the hospital attendant, who brutalized her....that lost his.

Regards, Tom Barresi.

Note: Tom received the above response back from President Clinton.

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