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142-616: Ravencroft Institute for the Criminally Insane was a maximum-security asylum for the mentally ill. Many insane murderers and supervillains, such as Carnage , and Venom , have been kept at Ravencroft. The institute was first mentioned in Web of Spider-Man #112, written by Terry Kavanagh . The institute officially opens in Web of Spider-Man Annual #10 ( 1994 ), written by Terry Kavanagh, with art by Jerry Bingham . Ravencroft Institute

284-699: A remission in 1789, mental illness came to be seen as something which could be treated and cured. The introduction of moral treatment was initiated independently by the French doctor Philippe Pinel and the English Quaker William Tuke . In 1792, Pinel became the chief physician at the Bicêtre Hospital in Le Kremlin-Bicêtre , near Paris. Before his arrival, inmates were chained in cramped cell-like rooms where there

426-468: A "tranquilizing chair" and gyroscope. A similar reform was carried out in Italy by Vincenzo Chiarugi , who discontinued the use of chains on the inmates in the early 19th century. In the town of Interlaken , Johann Jakob Guggenbühl started a retreat for mentally disabled children in 1841. The modern era of institutionalized provision for the care of the mentally ill, began in the early 19th century with

568-561: A Triune facility. Posing as Captain America, he contacted Warbird , Ant-Man, Silverclaw and Captain Marvel , claiming that he needed their help to destroy a Triune building containing a mind-control machine. Although they saw through his deception and subsequently defeated him — thanks to Captain Marvel transforming into Rick Jones mere milliseconds away from Taskmaster, thus causing a complete change of attack before Taskmaster could react —

710-654: A brainwashed minion of Krona . A primate version of the Taskmaster appears in the Marvel Apes titles Marvel Apes: Evolution Starts Here #1 (2009), Marvel: Apes: Speedball Special #1 (2009) and Marvel Apes: Grunt Line Special #1 (2009). In the Marvel Universe Millennial Visions 2001 (2002) storyline Thunderbolts: Give a Guy a Break , Hawkeye takes it upon himself to force supervillains to seek redemption. The Taskmaster

852-480: A corrupted version of the super-soldier serum. Gorscht had developed a new serum that could unlock the mind's potential to absorb knowledge instantaneously. With Gorscht's serum and test notes destroyed, Masters injected the last of the serum into himself. Having regained these memories, Taskmaster recognizes Mercedes' voice as being the same as 'The Hub', a mysterious voice who works for the Org. Taskmaster shoots Mercedes in

994-578: A cup of coffee until you figure out how to be a professional..." Taskmaster was given a full presidential pardon for his efforts in testing the security of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier , in which he was able to break in and place Deputy Director Maria Hill in his sights. Though he was allowed to leave, a threatening message left in Hill's private bathroom revealed that if he ever desired, infiltrating S.H.I.E.L.D. would be no difficult feat. Taskmaster replaces Gauntlet as Camp Hammond 's drill instructor and

1136-420: A drop in the ocean for the vast population that they had to serve, and their true function lay in highlighting ideals of compassion and bringing together the activities of the medical profession." In Europe during the medieval era, a small subsection of the population of those considered mad were housed in a variety of institutional settings. Mentally ill people were often held captive in cages or kept up within

1278-478: A family-style ethos, and patients performed chores to give them a sense of contribution. There was a daily routine of both work and leisure time. If patients behaved well, they were rewarded; if they behaved poorly, there was some minimal use of restraints or instilling of fear. The patients were told that treatment depended on their conduct. In this sense, the patient's moral autonomy was recognised. William Tuke's grandson, Samuel Tuke , published an influential work in

1420-585: A fight between Taskmaster and Agent Venom . However, Taskmaster escaped and returned the crown to Fury, only for Max to apparently kill Taskmaster when he asks for payment. When the crown's effects don't function for Max, Taskmaster takes the crown for himself, which saves his life by making him the Avatar for the Abyss. As the Abyss spreads, the Secret Avengers members Venom and Ant-Man are able to remove

1562-466: A fight ensues between him and the manacled merc. He mentions his professional ethics, but this simply comes down to deciding to simply maim his opponent rather than kill him. In the end, he is defeated by Deadpool who, in spite of the victory, fails to impress his captive audience. After being thanked for letting him win, Taskmaster tells Deadpool that he had not let him win, "The truth is... You're that good. You've always been that good. Which won't get you

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1704-464: A form of photographic memory dubbed "photographic reflexes". Upon graduation, he briefly considered a career as a crime fighter, but opted for the purportedly more lucrative occupation of professional criminal. He then began a program of observing the fighting techniques of numerous costumed heroes and villains (using archival television news broadcasts). He initially used his skills to execute several grand larcenies, but he had not properly anticipated

1846-633: A large state-led effort. Public mental asylums were established in Britain after the passing of the 1808 County Asylums Act . This empowered magistrates to build rate-supported asylums in every county to house the many 'pauper lunatics'. Nine counties first applied, and the first public asylum opened in 1811 in Nottinghamshire . Parliamentary Committees were established to investigate abuses at private madhouses like Bethlem Hospital – its officers were eventually dismissed and national attention

1988-583: A madhouse at Fishponds in Bristol from 1766. It is likely that many of these provincial madhouses, as was the case with the exclusive Ticehurst House , may have evolved from householders who were boarding lunatics on behalf of parochial authorities and later formalised this practice into a business venture. The vast majority were small in scale with only seven asylums outside London with in excess of thirty patients by 1800 and somewhere between ten and twenty institutions had fewer patients than this. During

2130-744: A madhouse, the Tollhaus , attached to the Teutonic Knights' hospital. Dave Sheppard's Development of Mental Health Law and Practice begins in 1285 with a case that linked "the instigation of the devil" with being "frantic and mad". In Spain, other such institutions for the insane were established after the Christian Reconquista ; facilities included hospitals in Valencia (1407), Zaragoza (1425), Seville (1436), Barcelona (1481) and Toledo (1483). In London , England,

2272-582: A new incarnation of the Secret Avengers . Taskmaster is a mysterious figure believed to have been born in the Bronx, New York City . He is able to mimic the physical movements of anyone he witnesses; writers differ on whether this counts as a "super power". He claims to have had this ability since childhood. He is a combat instructor and part-time mercenary. Initially portrayed as a villain, he has also trained U.S. Agent and other neophyte superheroes at

2414-402: A part in the administration of the asylums. In Germany, many practising psychiatrists were educated in universities associated with particular asylums. However, because Germany remained a loosely bound conglomerate of individual states, it lacked a national regulatory framework for asylums. Although Tuke, Pinel and others had tried to do away with physical restraint, it remained widespread in

2556-492: A primarily male-dominated culture. There were financial incentives too; before the passage of the Married Women's Property Act 1882 , all of a wife's assets passed automatically to her husband. The men who were in charge of these women, either a husband, father or brother, could send these women to mental institutions, stating that they believed that these women were mentally ill because of their strong opinions. "Between

2698-708: A private practice. The institute reappeared in Vengeance of the Moon Knight . In this incarnation, it housed mostly non-superpowered psychopaths and had an imposing metal front gate with a Gothic façade similar to DC's Arkham Asylum . Ravencroft's known patients include Carnage , Chameleon , D.K., Doctor Octopus , Electro , Green Goblin , Gale, Jackal , Massacre , Mayhem , Mysterio , Prism, Pyromania, Ramon Grant, Shriek , Venom , Vulture , and Webber. The storyline after Absolute Carnage , Ruins of Ravencroft eventually explains its true origin. It turns out that

2840-405: A psychiatric disorder. Again, both of these therapies were initially targeted at curing dementia praecox. Cardiazol shock therapy, founded on the theoretical notion that there existed a biological antagonism between schizophrenia and epilepsy and that therefore inducing epileptiform fits in schizophrenic patients might effect a cure, was superseded by electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), invented by

2982-636: A resident qualified physician . A national body for asylum superintendents – the Medico-Psychological Association – was established in 1866 under the Presidency of William A. F. Browne , although the body appeared in an earlier form in 1841. In 1838, France enacted a law to regulate both the admissions into asylums and asylum services across the country. Édouard Séguin developed a systematic approach for training individuals with mental deficiencies, and, in 1839, he opened

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3124-731: A resistance against the Unity Party that was formed by Master of the World . In order for the Masters of Evil to obtain the Crown of Wolves for the Shadow Council , Max Fury hired Taskmaster to retrieve it only for Taskmaster to demand more money for the job and he hid in the Hole. The Secret Avengers went to the Hole to get the Crown of Wolves before Fury got his hands on it. This led to

3266-532: A scale unseen elsewhere. References to such institutions are limited for the 17th century but it is evident that by the start of the 18th century, the so-called 'trade in lunacy' was well established. Daniel Defoe , an ardent critic of private madhouses, estimated in 1724 that there were fifteen then operating in the London area. Defoe may have exaggerated but exact figures for private metropolitan madhouses are available only from 1774, when licensing legislation

3408-633: A shield, Hawkeye with a bow and arrow, the Punisher with firearms, and Bullseye with various projectiles); he also displays a strenuously honed athletic ability ( Black Panther , Daredevil , Spider-Man ). Taskmaster can use every fighting style he has watched in any given fight. Once the Taskmaster has mastered an opponent's physical movements, he can predict the next attack. A few people can negate Taskmaster's abilities; among them are Deadpool , whose manic personality makes him nearly impossible to predict; Mister X , who uses his psychic abilities to get

3550-554: A shield, the Red Skull arranged for him to escape from the Commission's detention center so he could continue training lackeys and Red Skull himself. Taskmaster's more skilled, successful, and notable students include such characters as Crossbones and Cutthroat (both the Red Skull's henchmen), U.S. Agent, Hauptmann Deutschland , Diamondback (Steve Rogers's one-time girlfriend), Spymaster , Spider-Woman , and Agent X . On

3692-607: A specialty. Asylums were once again turning into custodial institutions and the reputation of psychiatry in the medical world had hit an extreme low. In the 1800s, middle class facilities became more common, replacing private care for wealthier persons. However, facilities in this period were largely oversubscribed. Individuals were referred to facilities either by the community or by the criminal justice system. Dangerous or violent cases were usually given precedence for admission. A survey taken in 1891 in Cape Town , South Africa shows

3834-559: A supporting character in #8–19 (2008–2009) and Avengers: The Initiative Annual #1 (2008) then later as a central character in #20–35 (2009–2010) during the Dark Reign and Siege storylines. Age of Heroes #3 (2010) provided the prologue for the Taskmaster's second limited series Taskmaster vol. 2 #1–4 (2010–2011). In 2011 Taskmaster got his first solo graphic novel collecting a four-issue story— Taskmaster: Unthinkable . In Marvel's 2012–2015 rebranding, Marvel NOW! , Taskmaster joins

3976-483: A traveling carnival as a mobile base, where he battled Hawkeye and Ant-Man, and then escaped again. He next trained henchmen for the Black Abbott. Alongside Black Abbott, he battled Spider-Man and Nomad , and escaped yet again. Deciding to further explore the use of a circus as a front for his academy, Taskmaster took over yet another small outfit, and used it for many months to great success. However, while it

4118-593: A video in fast-forward, Taskmaster can learn to replicate human movement at near-superhuman speed. However, this puts his body under intense strain and can only be used for short periods of time. He can manipulate his vocal cords to mimic others' voices. The Taskmaster is skilled in meditation techniques that allow him to slow his breathing and heart rate, allowing him to play dead or and survive for extended periods of time without air. He claims to have learned forensic methods from CIA agents and Mossad operatives. Taskmaster can use chi under exceptional circumstances. Taskmaster

4260-484: A way to communicate ideas and promote reform. This periodical later became The Psychiatric Aide , a professional journal for mental health workers. On 6 May 1946, Life magazine printed an exposé of the psychiatric system by Albert Q. Maisel based on the reports of COs. Another effort of CPS, namely the Mental Hygiene Project , became the national Mental Health Foundation . Initially skeptical about

4402-592: Is Mary Wollstonecraft 's posthumously published novel Maria: or, The Wrongs of Woman (1798), in which the title character is confined to an insane asylum when she becomes inconvenient to her husband. Real women's stories reached the public through court cases: Louisa Nottidge was abducted by male relatives to prevent her committing her inheritance and her life to live in a revivalist clergyman's intentional community . Wilkie Collins based his 1859 novel The Woman in White on this case, dedicating it to Bryan Procter ,

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4544-452: Is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This fictional location article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . History of psychiatric institutions The lunatic asylum , insane asylum or mental asylum was an institution where people with mental illness were confined. It was an early precursor of the modern psychiatric hospital . Modern psychiatric hospitals evolved from and eventually replaced

4686-583: Is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics . Created by writer David Michelinie and artist George Pérez , the character made his debut in The Avengers #195 (May 1980). Possessing photographic reflexes that allow him to mimic any fighting style at the cost of his long and short-term memory, he has served as an adversary of Marvel Universe superheroes such as Captain America , Ant-Man , and Spider-Man . He

4828-642: Is about to be beheaded when the real Deadpool saves him. Deadpool finally pays him, but he expresses annoyance at being paid from an ATM due to his major villain status. During the " Dark Reign " storyline, Taskmaster is chosen to lead the Shadow Initiative after the Skrull invasion , with their first mission to take down Hardball 's HYDRA cell in Madripoor . Along with Constrictor , Bengal , Typhoid Mary and Komodo , Taskmaster stealthily leads

4970-754: Is among the supervillains hypnotized by the Ringmaster and forced to become a member of the Thunderbolts . In Marvel Universe vs. the Punisher #4 (September 2010), where the Marvel Universe is infected by a cannibal plague, the Taskmaster is killed when the Red Hulk tears his head off. The Taskmaster appears in Marvel Vs. Capcom : Fate of Two Worlds #1 (2011) based on his appearance in

5112-863: Is attacked from behind by Redshirt who has genetically altered his body and mastered superior fighting skills to those of Taskmaster. Redshirt gains the upper hand as the pair push each other to the limits. Mercedes tries to intervene to protect her husband, but is quickly and effortlessly cast to one side. Enraged, Taskmaster attacks Redshirt and delivers a killing blow using Redshirt's own fighting style (which causes Taskmaster to lose his memories once more). Taskmaster, not recognizing Mercedes or his reasons for being there, flees and leaves Mercedes alone once more. Avengers Academy student Finesse later seeks out Taskmaster, thinking that he may be her long-lost father. When she finds Taskmaster, Finesse ends up sparring with him. After much sparring, Taskmaster finally relents to tell Finesse that he very well might be and most likely

5254-648: Is exposed to the Isotope Genome Accelerator that splits him from his Peter Parker side. In a prelude to " Hunted ", Taskmaster and Black Ant work with Kraven the Hunter and Arcade in capturing some animal-themed characters for his upcoming hunt. After Spider-Man thwarted the hunt, Taskmaster and Black Ant got away. During the " King in Black " storyline, Taskmaster is among the villains recruited by Mayor Wilson Fisk to lead his Thunderbolts at

5396-409: Is her father, but that the powers to learn so much about others’ movements and techniques have caused him to forget important things in life. Knowing he likely will not remember the conversation in a couple days, Taskmaster tells Finesse that he wanted to fight her so he might remember her. During the 2011 " Fear Itself " storyline, Taskmaster comes to the aid of Alpha Flight when it comes to forming

5538-505: Is shot and seemingly killed by Mockingbird apparently under the control of Scientist Supreme (Andrew Forson). However, Mentallo discovered that Mockingbird purposely missed any vitals and Taskmaster survived. At the time when Captain America was brainwashed into being a Hydra sleeper agent by Red Skull's clone using the powers of Kobik , Taskmaster later move to Bagalia where he became its sheriff. When Taskmaster and Black Ant (Eric O'Grady's Life Model Decoy counterpart) found out what

5680-940: Is spread that Taskmaster is leaking information about the criminal underworld to Rogers's new 'heroic' regime. A bounty of $ 1,000,000,000 is placed on the Taskmaster's head by the mysterious Org. The hordes of AIM, HYDRA, the Secret Empire , ULTIMATUM , the Cyber Ninjas, the Black Choppers, the Trenchcoat Mafia, the Legions of the Living Lightning, the Militiamen, the Sons of the Serpent , and

5822-513: Is still used in the West in the 21st century, but it is seen as a last resort for treatment of mood disorders and is administered much more safely than in the past. Elsewhere, particularly in India, use of ECT is reportedly increasing, as a cost-effective alternative to drug treatment. The effect of a shock on an overly excitable patient often allowed these patients to be discharged to their homes, which

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5964-658: Is tasked with training registered superheroes for the Fifty State Initiative . Taskmaster would also be involved in MVP 's cloning process inputting (via technology) the original's move set for the Scarlet Spiders as well as the move set of Spider-Man. Taskmaster is hired by Deadpool to help his old enemy and occasional friend defeat the Thunderbolts. Being disguised as Deadpool, he gets captured and

6106-572: Is to re-discover Taskmaster's origins. Taskmaster and Mercedes' quest takes them to Mexico to battle the Don of the Dead , and then to Bolivia to the village where everyone is Hitler. Inside an exact replica of Himmler's Wewelsburg Castle, Taskmaster regains his memories. He remembers being S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Tony Masters that had been sent to Bolivia to terminate Horst Gorscht, the Nazi scientist responsible for

6248-545: Is usually depicted as a mercenary hired by criminal organizations to act as a training instructor. He is the biological father of Finesse . The character has been adapted from the comics into various forms of media, including several animated television series and video games. A female version of Taskmaster named Antonia Dreykov appears in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Black Widow (2021), portrayed by Olga Kurylenko . Kurylenko will reprise

6390-721: The Age of Ultron story, the Taskmaster is depicted as working with the Black Panther and Red Hulk in Chicago attempting to capture Ultron Sentinel technology. Successful in doing so, Red Hulk holds off the Ultron minions to allow Taskmaster and Black Panther to escape. When Taskmaster tries to run away with one of the Ultron Sentinels, Red Hulk tells him he doesn't trust him, and then kills him. An alternate version of

6532-649: The Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds video game. He briefly appears in Latveria, having been hired by Doctor Doom to aid in the invasion of the second Earth and grows increasingly impatient due to Albert Wesker's inability to fully link the two worlds. The Taskmaster appears in the Malibu Comics (also known as the Ultraverse ) series Siren (1995), Siren #1–3 (1995) and Siren Special #1 (1996) as

6674-683: The 1774 legislation . Fragmentary evidence indicates that some provincial madhouses existed in Britain from at least the 17th century and possibly earlier. A madhouse at Kingsdown , Box, Wiltshire was opened during the 17th century. Further locales of early businesses include one at Guildford in Surrey which was accepting patients by 1700, one at Fonthill Gifford in Wiltshire from 1718, another at Hook Norton in Oxfordshire from about 1725, one at St Albans dating from around 1740, and

6816-592: The Age of Enlightenment , attitudes began to change, in particular among the educated classes in Western Europe. “Mental illness” came to be viewed as a disorder that required some form of compassionate but clinical, “rational” treatment that would aid in the rehabilitation of the patient into a rational being. When the ruling monarch of the United Kingdom , George III , who had a mental disorder, experienced

6958-703: The Liverpool Lunatic Asylum (1797). A similar expansion took place in the British American colonies. The Pennsylvania Hospital was founded in Philadelphia in 1751 as a result of work begun in 1709 by the Religious Society of Friends . A portion of this hospital was set apart for the mentally ill, and the first patients were admitted in 1752. Virginia is recognized as the first state to establish an institution for

7100-578: The Lunacy Commission , headed by Lord Shaftesbury , to focus on lunacy legislation reform. The commission was made up of eleven Metropolitan Commissioners who were required to carry out the provisions of the Act: the compulsory construction of asylums in every county, with regular inspections on behalf of the Home Secretary . All asylums were required to have written regulations and to have

7242-399: The Priory of Saint Mary of Bethlehem , which later became known more notoriously as Bedlam , was founded in 1247. At the start of the 15th century, it housed six insane men. The former lunatic asylum, Het Dolhuys , established in the 16th century in Haarlem , the Netherlands , has been adapted as a museum of psychiatry, with an overview of treatments from the origins of the building up to

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7384-415: The Vienna -based psychiatrist Manfred Sakel introduced insulin shock therapy , and in August 1934 Ladislas J. Meduna , a Hungarian neuropathologist and psychiatrist working in Budapest , introduced cardiazol shock therapy (cardiazol is the tradename of the chemical compound pentylenetetrazol , known by the tradename metrazol in the United States), which was the first convulsive or seizure therapy for

7526-404: The " Civil War " broke out, Taskmaster was hired by the government and enrolled into a team of Thunderbolts and given temporary amnesty to take down the Secret Avengers . He later battles the Secret Avengers in New York. He attempts to kill Susan "Sue" Storm , only for Reed Richards to take the bullet. Enraged, Sue crushes him with an invisible telekinetic field, rendering him unconscious. He

7668-403: The " Devil's Reign " storyline, Taskmaster appears as a member of Mayor Wilson Fisk's latest incarnation of the Thunderbolts at the time when Mayor Fisk passed a law that forbids superhero activity. During the "Carnage Reigns" storyline, Taskmaster joins Agent Gao's Cape-Killers . Taskmaster was at the Bar with No Name when Spider-Woman arrived. They went outside to fight as Spider-Woman gets

7810-444: The 1890s, little distinction existed between the lunatic and criminal lunatic. The term was often used to police vagrancy as well as paupers and the insane. In the 1850s, lurid rumours that medical doctors were declaring normal people "insane" in Britain, were spread by the press causing widespread public anxiety. The fear was that people who were a source of embarrassment to their families were conveniently disposed of into asylums with

7952-423: The 1910s, although the two terms were used more or less interchangeably until at least the end of the 1930s), which were typically regarded as hereditary degenerative disorders and therefore unamenable to any therapeutic intervention. Malarial therapy was followed in 1920 by barbiturate -induced deep sleep therapy to treat dementia praecox, which was popularised by the Swiss psychiatrist Jakob Klaesi . In 1933

8094-500: The 1940s, the 'duty to care' was violated on an enormous scale: A reported 300,000 individuals were sterilised and 100,000 killed in Germany alone, as were many thousands further afield, mainly in Eastern Europe. From the 1960s up to 1986, political abuse of psychiatry was reported to be systematic in the Soviet Union , and to surface on occasion in other Eastern European countries such as Romania , Hungary , Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia . A "mental health genocide" reminiscent of

8236-440: The 1990s. The level of specialist institutional provision for the care and control of the insane remained extremely limited at the turn of the 18th century. Madness was seen principally as a domestic problem, with families and parish authorities in Europe and England central to regimens of care. Various forms of outdoor relief were extended by the parish authorities to families in these circumstances, including financial support,

8378-404: The 19th century. At the Lincoln Asylum in England, Robert Gardiner Hill , with the support of Edward Parker Charlesworth , pioneered a mode of treatment that suited "all types" of patients, so that mechanical restraints and coercion could be dispensed with—a situation he finally achieved in 1838. In 1839 Sergeant John Adams and Dr. John Conolly were impressed by the work of Hill, and introduced

8520-502: The Avengers and be remote-controlled by Killionaire. When Taskmaster asks for his cut, Killionaire takes Toy Soldier out for a test drive by having it attack Taskmaster. During the " Gang War " storyline, Taskmaster was with Agent Gao's Cape-Killers at the time when Spider-Man (Miles Morales) , Misty Knight , and Colleen Wing defeated Bumbler 's group and Frost Pharaoh 's group. Taskmaster injected himself with SS-Hauptsturmführer Horst Gorscht's primer, an elaborate modification of

8662-413: The Commissioner for Lunacy. A generation later, Rosina Bulwer Lytton , daughter of the women's rights advocate Anna Wheeler , was locked up by her husband Edward Bulwer-Lytton and subsequently wrote of this in A Blighted Life (1880). In 1887, journalist Nellie Bly had herself committed to the Blackwell's Island Insane Asylum in New York City, in order to investigate conditions there. Her account

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8804-565: The Hartford Retreat (now the Institute of Living ). Benjamin Rush of Philadelphia also promoted humane treatment of the insane outside dungeons and without iron restraints, as well as sought their reintegration into society. In 1792, Rush successfully campaigned for a separate ward for the insane at the Pennsylvania Hospital. His talk-based approach could be considered as a rudimentary form of modern occupational therapy, although most of his physical approaches have long been discredited, such as bleeding and purging, hot and cold baths, mercury pills,

8946-433: The Homewood Retreat, Cheryl Krasnick Warsh concludes that "the realities of the household in late Victorian and Edwardian middle class society rendered certain elements—socially redundant women in particular—more susceptible to institutionalization than others." In the 18th to the early 20th century, women were sometimes institutionalised due to their opinions, their unruliness and their inability to be controlled properly by

9088-425: The Inquisition take up the chase to claim the money. Taskmaster, ambushed in a small diner, manages to best his opponents. But the diner's waitress, Mercedes Merced, gets entangled in the saga and is included in the bounty. Taskmaster reveals to Mercedes that his powers cause him to lose his explicit memory, meaning that he cannot remember anything about his personal life, and the only way for the whole ordeal to be over

9230-429: The Islamic world, the Bimaristans were described by European travellers, who wrote about their wonder at the care and kindness shown to lunatics. In 872, Ahmad ibn Tulun built a hospital in Cairo that provided care to the insane, which included music therapy. Nonetheless, British historian of medicine Roy Porter cautioned against idealising the role of hospitals generally in medieval Islam, stating that "They were

9372-457: The Italian neurologist Ugo Cerletti in 1938. The use of psychosurgery was narrowed to a very small number of people for specific indications. Egas Moniz performed the first leucotomy, or lobotomy in Portugal in 1935, which targets the brain's frontal lobes. This was shortly thereafter adapted by Walter Freeman and James W. Watts in what is known as Freeman–Watts procedure or the standard prefrontal lobotomy. From 1946, Freeman developed

9514-402: The Knull-worshiping cult, and had Jameson, whom he had infected with a branch of his symbiote, kill the guards and lure Spider-Man and Venom into a trap. Kasady infected the inmates with pieces of his symbiote, turning them into Carnage doppelgängers. Carnage claimed the asylum as a base for the cult, resurrecting Demogoblin using Shriek as a sacrifice. However, Deadpool unwittingly disrupted

9656-449: The Minister of Defense. Mockingbird later goes to A.I.M. Island to assist Taskmaster in helping make contact between the Iron Patriot A.I. drones and James Rhodes . After the mission goes south and Mockingbird is left stranded on AIM Island, Taskmaster works undercover to free her. But when he gets the chance to get her off the island, she doesn't respond to anything he says until both are captured. While being interrogated, Taskmaster

9798-424: The Nazi aberrations has been located in the history of South African oppression during the apartheid era. A continued misappropriation of the discipline was subsequently attributed to the People's Republic of China. The 20th century saw the development of the first effective psychiatric drugs . The first anti-psychotic drug , chlorpromazine (known under the trade name Largactil in Europe and Thorazine in

9940-409: The President's Commission on Superhuman Activities ), Mr. Smith arranged for Taskmaster to train John Walker to make him appear to be the real Captain America. To conceal the Red Skull's involvement, Rockwell had the Commission work out a deal to have years taken off Taskmaster's sentence in return for training Walker. After Taskmaster successfully trained Walker in Rogers' fighting style and the use of

10082-406: The Solomon Institute for the Criminally Insane (a front for one of these academies) uses the school's resources to clone himself when the administrator required an organ donation, as he possessed a rare blood type. Learning of his intended death, the clone contacts the Avengers for help. Taskmaster captures Yellowjacket , the Wasp , and Ant-Man when the Avengers invade the school trying to rescue

10224-643: The Taskmaster appears in Avataars: Covenant of the Shield #1 (2000) where the Marvel Universe is re-imagined in a fantasy setting. In this reality, the Taskmaster is an assassin known as the Deathmaster . A female version of Taskmaster appeared in the Marvel Max series Deadpool Max . This version became a mother figure to a young version of Deadpool when she kidnapped his Muskrat troop. She

10366-787: The United States), was first synthesized in France in 1950. Pierre Deniker , a psychiatrist of the Saint-Anne Psychiatric Center in Paris, is credited with first recognising the specificity of action of the drug in psychosis in 1952. Denier traveled with a colleague to the United States and Canada promoting the drug at medical conferences in 1954. The first publication regarding its use in North America

10508-549: The academy and used one such session as an opportunity to kidnap Red Skull). He has also employed other supervillains, such as when he hired Anaconda as his academy's calisthenics instructor. On another occasion, Taskmaster was hired by the Triune Understanding — a religious group secretly masterminding a smear campaign to paint the Avengers as being religiously and racially intolerant — to stage an attack on

10650-643: The adrenal steroid cortisol designed to unlock the mind's procedural memory potential. This increased Taskmaster's natural ability to absorb knowledge. This ability is linked to his muscle memory , allowing Taskmaster to instantly replicate the physical movement of peak-level humans. Taskmaster cannot duplicate a physical feat that requires superhuman effort, like lifting a car. These "photographic reflexes" have made Taskmaster highly skilled in various forms of combat: martial arts (mimicking Elektra , Iron Fist , Shang-Chi ), swordfighting ( Black Knight , Silver Samurai , Swordsman ), marksmanship ( Captain America with

10792-546: The behest of his love interest Sandi Brandenberg , in missions from time to time, while continuing to teach at his academies around the world. More recently, Taskmaster is once again seen as a hired mercenary, contracted by the Committee to kill Moon Knight . Taskmaster was misled with information that Moon Knight was broken, friendless and desiring death. During the conflict these factors all proved to be false as Marc's ex-girlfriend and butler came to Spector's defense and found

10934-469: The behest of the U.S. government. As a mercenary, he has no ideology except that of his employer. Taskmaster has occasionally been used to impersonate other characters. Tony Masters first demonstrated unusual abilities during childhood. After watching a cowboy show on television, he found himself able to duplicate sophisticated rope tricks, and later became a star high school quarterback after watching one NFL game. Psychiatrists explained Tony's abilities to be

11076-483: The better of Taskmaster in a fight; and Slapstick , whose flexible cartoony body causes Taskmaster to break his own spine upon copying the hero's ability. A side effect of the primer is severe declarative memory loss. As he gains implicit memories (i.e., knowledge and abilities), he loses explicit memories (i.e., personal experiences). The Org (Mercedes Merced) has acted as Taskmaster's surrogate memory, his banker, and his handler during his criminal career. By viewing

11218-534: The building was destroyed in the ensuing battle and Taskmaster escaped, leaving the heroes lacking any evidence of their story. Taskmaster continued to train numerous villains and thugs until the Avengers began to search out and shut down some of his academies across the United States. Taskmaster began to spend more time working as a mercenary to make up for the loss of profit. This led him to join Agency X at

11360-412: The captive Champions . When Taskmaster and Black Ant asks for them to put in a good word for them, Spider-Man webs them up anyway. Taskmaster and Black Ant later attack Empire State University where Curt Connors was teaching a class. As the inhibitor chip prevents Connors into turning into Lizard, Peter Parker sneaks off to become Spider-Man. During his fight with Black Ant and Taskmaster, Spider-Man

11502-473: The city walls, or they were compelled to amuse members of courtly society. Porter gives examples of such locales where some of the insane were cared for, such as in monasteries. A few towns had towers where madmen were kept (called Narrentürme in German, or "fools' towers"). The ancient Parisian hospital Hôtel-Dieu also had a small number of cells set aside for lunatics, whilst the town of Elbing boasted

11644-505: The clone, but the other Avengers follow, exposing his front operation. Taskmaster held his own against Captain America and Iron Man , but was forced to flee after a confrontation with Jocasta since his lack of experience with Jocasta's abilities made it impossible to predict the robot's next move. Taskmaster later established a new training academy in Manhattan, where he battled Spider-Man and Ant-Man, and then escaped. He later used

11786-416: The context of commitments to asylums in North America and Great Britain, Cheryl Krasnick Warsh states that "the kin of asylum patients were, in fact, the major impetus behind commitment, but their motivations were based not so much upon greed as upon the internal dynamics of the family, and upon the economic structure of western society in the 19th and early 20th centuries." Based on her study of cases from

11928-506: The criminal underground by using Taskmaster to lead them straight to the Org. Redshirt leads the Minions' International Liberation Front (or the acronym MILF for short) into battle against the Taskmaster and Mercedes. Mercedes convinces the Taskmaster to trust her and work together to fend off the forces of MILF. During the battle, Taskmaster regains his memories of Mercedes and how he fell in love with her. Before they can reconcile, Taskmaster

12070-459: The crown and stop the spread, while Taskmaster and the Masters of Evil are left behind when the Avengers leave with Max in their custody. The criminals of Bagalia imprison Taskmaster and are preparing to offer him up to the highest bidder. S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Secret Avengers come to rescue him and offer him a position. As their inside man, Taskmaster is part of the new High Council of A.I.M. as

12212-426: The cult's rituals and burned the asylum to the ground to escape. Crimelord Wilson Fisk - using his influence as mayor of New York - financed the cleanup of the destroyed asylum, intending to have it rebuilt to further his own nefarious purposes. During the cleanup, Jonas Ravencroft's journal was discovered, as was as an underground facility hidden beneath the south wing. Despite Reed Richards ' efforts to ensure that

12354-442: The dangers involved. He decided to use his stolen capital to establish centers to turn aspiring criminals into polished professionals. His goal was to become a supplier for criminal organizations around the world. Designing a costume with a white cowl and skull mask, Masters takes the name "Taskmaster" and begins training thugs at criminal academies across the United States. His existence was eventually revealed when Pernell Solomon of

12496-665: The death of a fellow Quaker in a local asylum in 1790. In 1796, with the help of fellow Quakers and others, he founded the York Retreat , where eventually about 30 patients lived as part of a small community in a quiet country house and engaged in a combination of rest, talk, and manual work. Rejecting medical theories and techniques, the efforts of the York Retreat centred around minimising restraints and cultivating rationality and moral strength. The entire Tuke family became known as founders of moral treatment. They created

12638-451: The designation of social dissidents, allowing the state to hold persons against their will and to insist upon therapies that work in favour of ideological conformity and in the broader interests of society. In a monolithic state, psychiatry can be used to bypass standard legal procedures for establishing guilt or innocence and allow political incarceration without the ordinary odium attaching to such political trials. In Nazi Germany in

12780-433: The distribution between different facilities. Out of 2046 persons surveyed, 1,281 were in private dwellings, 120 in jails and 645 in asylums, with men representing nearly two-thirds of the number surveyed. Defining someone as insane was a necessary prerequisite for being admitted to a facility. A doctor was only called after someone was labelled insane on social terms and had become socially or economically problematic. Until

12922-579: The earliest collections of artistic work by patients, at Montrose Asylum . By the end of the 19th century, national systems of regulated asylums for the mentally ill had been established in most industrialized countries . At the turn of the century, Britain and France combined had only a few hundred people in asylums, but by the end of the century this number had risen to the hundreds of thousands. The United States housed 150,000 patients in mental hospitals by 1904. Germany housed more than 400 public and private sector asylums. These asylums were critical to

13064-472: The early 19th century on the methods of the retreat; Pinel's Treatise on Insanity had by then been published, and Samuel Tuke translated his term as "moral treatment". Tuke's Retreat became a model throughout the world for humane and moral treatment of patients with mental disorders. The York Retreat inspired similar institutions in the United States, most notably the Brattleboro Retreat and

13206-431: The effective and concordant action of the new drugs in the treatment of psychosis. The new antipsychotics had an immense impact on the lives of psychiatrists and patients. For instance, Henri Ey , a French psychiatrist at Bonneval, related that between 1921 and 1937 only 6% of patients with schizophrenia and chronic delirium were discharged from his institution. The comparable figure for the period from 1955 to 1967, after

13348-429: The evolution of psychiatry as they provided places of practice throughout the world. However, the hope that mental illness could be ameliorated through treatment during the mid-19th century was disappointed. Instead, psychiatrists were pressured by an ever-increasing patient population. The average number of patients in asylums in the United States jumped 927%. Numbers were similar in Britain and Germany. Overcrowding

13490-456: The first school for the "severely retarded". His method of treatment was based on the assumption that the "mentally deficient" did not suffer from disease. In the United States, the erection of state asylums began with the first law for the creation of one in New York, passed in 1842. The Utica State Hospital was opened approximately in 1850. The creation of this hospital, as of many others,

13632-697: The forced sterilization of numerous psychiatric inmates. As late as the 1950s, laws in Japan allowed the forcible sterilization of patients with psychiatric illnesses. Under Nazi Germany , the Aktion T4 euthanasia program resulted in the killings of thousands of the mentally ill housed in state institutions. In 1939, the Nazis secretly began to exterminate the mentally ill in a euthanasia campaign. Around 6,000 disabled babies, children and teenagers were murdered by starvation or lethal injection. Psychiatrists around

13774-518: The group into the country, but they are soon discovered by HYDRA. Norman Osborn appoints Taskmaster to train criminals for the new Initiative, to behave like heroes. His first task is to retrain Penance . Also, when Blastaar takes control of the Negative Zone prison 42, Taskmaster is ordered to lead a squad to take the prison back. Later, he gives Night Thrasher a severe bullet wound to

13916-500: The head, allowing Osborn to take Night Thrasher prisoner. When Emma Frost and Namor resign from the Cabal, Taskmaster is offered membership. Taskmaster was present at a meeting when Osborn discusses about Asgard. He is severely wounded at the meeting as a result of an attack by Doctor Doom . While recovering in a hospital, Taskmaster declined to join the Cabal. Osborn cut the oxygen tank next to Taskmaster's bed, reminding him that it

14058-559: The information on some of the thugs he recently trained. As Captain America is transporting a specific cargo, his futuristic helicopter gets Spider-Boy as a passenger due to his spider-senses stating that Captain America needs help from Taskmaster. Captain America figures out that one of the soldiers is actually Taskmaster using an Image Inducer as the cargo in question is Super-Adaptoid . Even though Captain America and Spider-Boy fend off Taskmaster, he makes off with Super-Adaptoid's left hand as he plans to give it to Killionaire. Taskmaster

14200-405: The insane (or neurosyphilis ) first used in 1917, and for which he won a Nobel Prize in 1927. This treatment heralded the beginning of a radical and experimental era in psychiatric medicine that increasingly broke with an asylum-based culture of therapeutic nihilism in the treatment of chronic psychiatric disorders , most particularly dementia praecox (increasingly known as schizophrenia from

14342-480: The institute is more than just for the criminally insane. It used to act as a staging area for superhuman experiments, particularly supernatural individuals such as Dracula during the 20th century, where Jonas Ravencroft unleashed the vampiric monsters on the Weapon Plus personnel before committing suicide. Massacre soon escaped and shot Dr. Kafka in the process. Cletus Kasady was reanimated and took control of

14484-499: The introduction of chlorpromazine, was 67%. Between 1955 and 1968 the residential psychiatric population in the United States dropped by 30%. Newly developed antidepressants were used to treat cases of depression , and the introduction of muscle relaxants allowed ECT to be used in a modified form for the treatment of severe depression and a few other disorders. The discovery of the mood stabilizing effect of lithium carbonate by John Cade in 1948 would eventually revolutionise

14626-493: The late 17th century, this model began to change, and privately run asylums for the insane began to proliferate and expand in size. Already in 1632 it was recorded that Bethlem Royal Hospital , London had "below stairs a parlor, a kitchen, two larders, a long entry throughout the house, and 21 rooms wherein the poor distracted people lie, and above the stairs eight rooms more for servants and the poor to lie in". Inmates who were deemed dangerous or disturbing were chained, but Bethlem

14768-441: The market. Thus, rather than there being a proliferation of private madhouses in London, existing institutions tended to expand considerably in size. The establishments which increased most during the 18th century, such as Hoxton House, did so by accepting pauper patients rather than private, middle class, fee-paying patients. Significantly, pauper patients, unlike their private counterparts, were not subject to inspection under

14910-464: The mentally ill. Eastern State Hospital , located in Williamsburg, Virginia , was incorporated in 1768 under the name of the "Public Hospital for Persons of Insane and Disordered Minds" and its first patients were admitted in 1773. There was no centralised state response to “madness” in society in century Britain until the 19th century, however private madhouses proliferated there in 18th on

15052-476: The method into their Hanwell Asylum , by then the largest in the country. Hill's system was adapted, since Conolly was unable to supervise each attendant as closely as Hill had done. By September 1839, mechanical restraint was no longer required for any patient. William A. F. Browne (1805–1885) introduced activities for patients including writing, art, group activity and drama, pioneered early forms of occupational therapy and art therapy , and initiated one of

15194-761: The mid-eighteenth century the number of public charitably funded asylums expanded moderately with the opening of St Luke's Hospital in 1751 in Upper Moorfields, London; the establishment in 1765 of the Hospital for Lunatics at Newcastle upon Tyne ; the Manchester Lunatic Hospital, which opened in 1766; the York Asylum in 1777 (not to be confused with the York Retreat ); the Leicester Lunatic Asylum (1794), and

15336-478: The most famous people to have a lobotomy was the sister of John F. Kennedy , Rosemary Kennedy , who was rendered profoundly intellectually disabled as a result of the surgery. In modern times, insulin shock therapy and lobotomies are viewed as being almost as barbaric as the Bedlam "treatments", although the insulin shock therapy was still seen as the only option which produced any noticeable effect on patients. ECT

15478-488: The older lunatic asylum. The treatment of inmates in early lunatic asylums was sometimes brutal and focused on containment and restraint. The discovery of anti-psychotic drugs and mood-stabilizing drugs resulted in a shift in focus from containment in lunatic asylums to treatment in psychiatric hospitals. Later, there was further and more thorough critique in the form of the deinstitutionalization movement which focuses on treatment at home or in less isolated institutions. In

15620-433: The other hand, Taskmaster also trains many of his students to serve as low-rent henchmen and cannon fodder. In his early appearances, Taskmaster mentions putting intellect-reducing drugs in the diet of his students. He also routinely sent groups of his more disappointing students to serve as "sparring partners" for the Red Skull, routinely engaging several of them at a time and killing them all (Hauptmann Deutschland infiltrated

15762-823: The people of New York. Despite numerous setbacks, by the early 1900s he had established the Ravencroft Institute for the Criminally Insane. At some point, Doctor Ravencroft took to recording a journal detailing the history of Westchester County, his family, and the Ravencroft Institute. In the modern era, Dr. Ashley Kafka was the founder and first director of Ravencroft. John Jameson was head of security. Both get fired in Spectacular Spider-Man #246, and Dr. Leonard Samson becomes Ravencroft's new director. The institute hasn't appeared since and in Leonard Samson's recent appearances, he owns

15904-494: The provision of parish nurses and, where family care was not possible, lunatics might be 'boarded out' to other members of the local community or committed to private madhouses. Exceptionally, if those deemed mad were judged to be particularly disturbing or violent, parish authorities might meet the not inconsiderable costs of their confinement in charitable asylums such as Bethlem , in Houses of Correction or in workhouses. In

16046-534: The rebuilt Ravencroft Institute was a proper psychiatric institution, it was rebuilt as a prison for dangerous supervillains, with John Jameson lamenting that history would only repeat itself. Proving this prediction true, Fisk hired supervillains Norman Osborn , Taskmaster , Mac Gargan , Karla Sofen , and Roderick Kingsley as staff members. Ravencroft also appears in the tie-in video game The Amazing Spider-Man 2 , in which Oscorp uses it to conduct secret experiments. This Marvel Comics –related article

16188-664: The role in the upcoming film Thunderbolts* (2025). The Taskmaster first appeared briefly in The Avengers #195 (May 1980), created by writer David Michelinie and artist George Pérez . making his full debut in Avengers #196 (June 1980). The Taskmaster appeared in his own limited series Taskmaster #1–4 (2002), which was followed by a supporting role in Agent X #1–15 (2002–2003). The character went on to feature prominently in Avengers: The Initiative as

16330-529: The same principles. There was an emphasis on the selection and supervision of attendants in order to establish a suitable setting to facilitate psychological work, and particularly on the employment of ex-patients as they were thought most likely to refrain from inhumane treatment while being able to stand up to patients' pleas, menaces, or complaints. William Tuke led the development of a radical new type of institution in Northern England , following

16472-563: The shoulder and threatens to kill her if she doesn't start talking. Mercedes reveals that the Org is a S.H.I.E.L.D. front, and that she is not only an agent, but also Taskmaster's wife. Miles above the Wewelsburg castle in an airship, the Minions' International Liberation Front (a secret group composed of henchmen from all of the major terrorist organizations), led by Redshirt the Uber-Henchman, reveal their deception and plot to rule

16614-407: The time of Knull 's invasion. At the conclusion of "The Chameleon Conspiracy" arc, Foreigner hired Taskmaster and Black Ant to help get revenge on Spider-Man. During the " Sinister War " storyline, Taskmaster was with Foreigner, Black Ant, Chance , Jack O'Lantern , and Slyde when they are sent by Kindred to attack Spider-Man after Kindred had disrupted their armored car robbery. During

16756-442: The transorbital lobotomy, using a device akin to an ice-pick. This was an "office" procedure which did not have to be performed in a surgical theatre and took as little as fifteen minutes to complete. Freeman is credited with the popularisation of the technique in the United States. In 1949, 5,074 lobotomies were carried out in the United States and by 1951, 18,608 people had undergone the controversial procedure in that country. One of

16898-602: The treatment of bipolar disorder , although its use was banned in the United States until the 1970s. From 1942 to 1947, conscientious objectors in the US assigned to psychiatric hospitals under Civilian Public Service exposed abuses throughout the psychiatric care system and were instrumental in reforms of the 1940s and 1950s. The CPS reformers were especially active at the Philadelphia State Hospital where four Quakers initiated The Attendant magazine as

17040-574: The value of Civilian Public Service, Eleanor Roosevelt , impressed by the changes introduced by COs in the mental health system, became a sponsor of the National Mental Health Foundation and actively inspired other prominent citizens including Owen J. Roberts , Pearl Buck and Harry Emerson Fosdick to join her in advancing the organization's objectives of reform and humane treatment of patients. Taskmaster (character) Taskmaster ( Anthony " Tony " Masters )

17182-603: The will to fight back. Despite his superior fighting abilities, Taskmaster was defeated. Moon Knight then carved off part of Taskmaster's facemask, though left him alive. Taskmaster also worked at training henchmen to copy fighting styles of specific heroes. Taskmaster unleashed Deathshield (trained to fight like Captain America), Jagged Bow (trained to fight like Hawkeye), and Blood Spider (trained to fight like Spider-Man) to face off against Spider-Man and Solo. The three were defeated, while Taskmaster escaped yet again. When

17324-487: The willing connivance of the psychiatric profession. This sensationalism appeared in widely read novels of the time, including The Woman in White . A series of radical physical therapies were developed in central and continental Europe in the late 1910s, the 1920s and most particularly, the 1930s. Among these, we may note the Austrian psychiatrist Julius Wagner-Jauregg 's malarial therapy for general paresis of

17466-450: The world have been involved in the suppression of individual rights by states wherein the definitions of mental disease had been expanded to include political disobedience. Nowadays, in many countries, political prisoners are sometimes confined to mental institutions and abused therein. Psychiatry possesses a built-in capacity for abuse which is greater than in other areas of medicine. The diagnosis of mental disease can serve as proxy for

17608-478: The years of 1850–1900, women were placed in mental institutions for behaving in ways the male society did not agree with." These men had the last say when it came to the mental health of these women, so if they believed that these women were mentally ill, or if they simply wanted to silence the voices and opinions of these women, they could easily send them to mental institutions. This was an easy way to render them vulnerable and submissive. An early fictional example

17750-459: Was Osborn who plucked him from obscurity. Taskmaster then agrees to join in the siege of Asgard . During the battle, he fights with both Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes as Captain America. As Asgard falls, Taskmaster finds Constrictor and the two beat a hasty retreat, but not before Taskmaster taunts Osborn about how Taskmaster helped Deadpool. After Osborn's ultimate defeat, Taskmaster and Constrictor went back to mercenary work. A false rumor

17892-635: Was an otherwise open building. Its inhabitants could roam around its confines and possibly throughout the general neighborhood in which the hospital was situated. In 1676, Bethlem expanded into newly built premises at Moorfields with a capacity for 100 inmates. A second public charitable institution was opened in 1713, the Bethel in Norwich . It was a small facility which generally housed between twenty and thirty inmates. In 1728 at Guy's Hospital , London, wards were established for chronic lunatics. From

18034-545: Was built on land that was considered cursed by local indigenous tribes since before the 15th century, having been claimed as territory by a cannibalistic cult worshipping the dark god Knull . Doctor Jonas Ravencroft, a descendant of British settler Molly Ravencroft, who was murdered by her husband, Cortland Kasady (an ancestor of Cletus Kasady ) in the 17th century, purchased the land in Westchester County in 1899, determined to provide proper psychiatric care for

18176-648: Was done to Captain America to be made into a Hydra sleeper agent, they planned to have a parley with Maria Hill to discuss this with only for the new Madame Hydra (Elisa Sinclair) to get to them first. Impressed with the fighting skills of the two of them, Madame Hydra made them bodyguards. During the " Secret Empire " storyline, Taskmaster appears as a member of Hydra's Avengers. During the battle in Washington DC, Taskmaster and Black Ant witness their teammate Odinson having enough of working for Hydra and striking them down. The two of them defect from Hydra and free

18318-505: Was focused on the routine use of bars, chains and handcuffs and the filthy conditions the inmates lived in. However, it was not until 1828 that the newly appointed Commissioners in Lunacy were empowered to license and supervise private asylums. The Lunacy Act 1845 was an important landmark in the treatment of the mentally ill, as it explicitly changed the status of mentally ill people to patients who required treatment. The Act created

18460-493: Was introduced: sixteen institutions were recorded. At least two of these, Hoxton House and Wood's Close, Clerkenwell , had been in operation since the 17th century. By 1807, the number had increased to seventeen. This limited growth in the number of London madhouses is believed likely to reflect the fact that vested interests, especially the College of Physicians , exercised considerable control in preventing new entrants to

18602-589: Was largely the work of Dorothea Lynde Dix , whose philanthropic efforts extended over many states, and in Europe as far as Constantinople . Many state hospitals in the United States were built in the 1850s and 1860s on the Kirkbride Plan , an architectural style meant to have curative effect. Looking into the late 19th and early 20th century history of the Homewood Retreat of Guelph, Ontario, and

18744-634: Was later revealed to be an operative for United States interest, a potential cult leader and child molester. In the House of M reality, the Taskmaster appeared as a member of the strike force known as the Brotherhood. Although not a mutant , he used his abilities to pass as one, since humans (even super-powered humans) were treated as second-class citizens. However, he is exposed after murdering Tigra . Taskmaster appears in JLA/Avengers #4 as

18886-477: Was later seen at Empire Unlimited getting reprimanded by Killionaire for not bringing all of Super-Adaptoid to him so that Shannon Stillwell can rebuild it into a suit that would give him the powers of the Avengers. When Killionaire threatened to dox Taskmaster and Shannon Stillwell, Killionaire was impressed with the latter reverse-engineering it to make the Toy Soldier that still can copy the abilities of all

19028-765: Was made in the same year by the Canadian psychiatrist Heinz Lehmann , who was based in Montreal . Also in 1954 another antipsychotic, reserpine , was first used by an American psychiatrist based in New York , Nathan S. Kline. At a Paris-based colloquium on neuroleptics (antipsychotics) in 1955 a series of psychiatric studies were presented by, among others, Hans Hoff (Vienna), Dr. Ihsan Aksel (Istanbul), Felix Labarth (Basle), Linford Rees (London), Sarro (Barcelona), Manfred Bleuler (Zurich), Willi Mayer-Gross (Birmingham), Winford (Washington) and Denber (New York) attesting to

19170-470: Was once shown to have aquaphobia (the fear of water), but later overcame his fears. Taskmaster carries many weapons. He most commonly uses a sword and a replica of Captain America's shield, but also carries a bow and a quiver of arrows, a billy club, a lasso, nunchaku , throwing darts, and various firearms. Taskmaster once used a stolen S.H.I.E.L.D. device that was able to create various forms of weaponry (such as arrows and shields) using solid energy. In

19312-612: Was playing a small town in Ohio, the Thing and Vance Astrovik (who would later take the name Justice) assisted a government agent in foiling Taskmaster's activities. While escaping, Taskmaster was captured by a group of U.S. Secret Service agents and taken into custody. There is reason to believe that the Red Skull was behind the Taskmaster's capture, since a group of normal men were able to capture him. Through Douglas Rockwell (the head of

19454-504: Was poor ventilation, led by a man named Jackson 'Brutis' Taylor. Taylor was then killed by the inmates leading to Pinel's leadership. In 1797, Jean-Baptiste Pussin, the "governor" of mental patients at Bicêtre, first freed patients of their chains and banned physical punishment, although straitjackets could be used instead. Patients were allowed to move freely about the hospital grounds, and eventually dark dungeons were replaced with sunny, well-ventilated rooms. Pinel argued that mental illness

19596-471: Was published in the New York World newspaper, and in book form as Ten Days in a Mad-House . In 1902, Margarethe von Ende de , wife of the German arms manufacturer Friedrich Alfred Krupp , was consigned to an insane asylum by Kaiser Wilhelm II , a family friend, when she asked him to respond to reports of her husband's gay orgies on Capri. In continental Europe , universities often played

19738-401: Was rampant in France, where asylums would commonly take in double their maximum capacity. Increases in asylum populations may have been a result of the transfer of care from families and poorhouses , but the specific reasons as to why the increase occurred are still debated today. No matter the cause, the pressure on asylums from the increase was taking its toll on the asylums and psychiatry as

19880-403: Was seen by administrators (and often guardians) as a preferable solution to institutionalisation. Lobotomies were performed in the thousands from the 1930s to the 1950s, and were ultimately replaced with modern psychotropic drugs . The eugenics movement of the early 20th century led to a number of countries enacting laws for the compulsory sterilization of the "feeble minded", which resulted in

20022-511: Was sent to the Negative Zone Prison with the other "Major-League" members of the Thunderbolts army such as Lady Deathstrike , but was apparently freed by Deadpool . To regain his own reputation as a mercenary, Deadpool frees Taskmaster from his imprisonment to have a showdown with him while potential merc contractors watched from their captive position in a nearby prison. Taskmaster is again referred to as Tasky by Deadpool, and

20164-405: Was the result of excessive exposure to social and psychological stresses , to heredity and physiological damage. Pussin and Pinel's approach was seen as remarkably successful, and they later brought similar reforms to a mental hospital in Paris for female patients, La Salpetrière . Pinel's student and successor, Jean Esquirol , went on to help establish 10 new mental hospitals that operated on

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