A Masters student from Toronto’s York University has started a petition to save the old Weyburn Asylum in Saskatchewan. Her plea included on this blog post reminds us of some of the history of international significance which took place within its walls. For a long time a veritable hell-hole warehouse for patients, Weyburn eventually became home to the pioneering work of psychiatrist Dr. Abram Hoffer, whom CMM has written about before. Hoffer and Dr. Humphrey Osmond were amongst the first psychiatrists anywhere to work with the psychedelic drug LSD in the 1950s; unlike the now notorious CIA-backed McGill University MKULTRA experiments run by Ewan Cameron, Hoffer and Osmond administered LSD to volunteer patients exploring its healing and human growth potential rather than forcing it onto patients to test its usefulness for brainwashing. Hoffer also worked with Linus Pauling in developing megavitamin, nutrition and exercise programs to try to help people suffering through psychological disturbances. In any case, Weyburn Asylum was home to some of the worst and some of the best of what psychiatry has ever offered to psychiatric inmates in Canada, and perhaps it is a landmark worth saving as a testament to the many who suffered, died, persevered, and sometimes grew or healed within its walls.