Harlem Lodge scrapbook

Born in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania to Jacob and Annie Gordon Gemmill Dunton, Dr. William Rush Dunton, Jr. (1868-1966) received his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1893. He trained with Howard Atwood Kelly (1858-1943) at Johns Hopkins Hospital and in 1901 he was appointed clinical assistant in the department of Clinical Neurology. Beginning in 1903, Dunton became an assistant professor in psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine as well as the assistant physician at Sheppard Asylum (now Sheppard and Enoch Pratt Hospital) in Towson, Maryland. He left his position at Sheppard in 1924 to manage Harlem Lodge, a 28-acre private sanitarium in Catonsville, Maryland previously run by Dr. Richard F. Gundry (1866-1924). While Gundry admitted patients with drug addiction, alcoholism, and nervous and mental diseases, Dunton only accepted those with nervous complaints and "mild mental issues."

During his time working at the Sheppard Asylum, Dunton was one of several individuals who promoted the healing properties of engaging activities. He implemented a large variety of occupations, such as gardening, woodworking, weaving, and quilting. He observed that these occupations were particularly therapeutic because they required some level of concentration that distracted a patient’s attention from his or her mental distress. In 1917, Dunton was one of the founders of the National Society for the Promotion of Occupational Therapy (now the American Occupational Therapy Association).

Dunton continued to develop and formalize his occupational therapy treatments at Harlem Lodge. In particular, he observed that the repetitive nature of quilting, the establishment of community as women came together to complete one quilt, and the encouragement of self-expression and creativity all provided unparalleled benefits. This method of treatment also sparked a personal interest for Dunton in quilt collecting and learning the history of the Baltimore album quilt tradition. Dunton self-published the book Old Quilts in 1946–1947, and in it he details many Baltimore album quilts and their associated social histories. This rare book remains the oldest history of this niche quilt style popular from 1840 to 1855. In 1979, Dunton was one of the first inductees into the Quilters Hall of Fame.