History
Thirty years ago, Dunn Center came to life as a comprehensive community mental health center servicing Fayette, Randolph, Union, and Wayne Counties. However, Dunn Center's history of service certainly did not begin in 1975. In 1958 Richmond resident Camilla B. Dunn returned from Denver, Colorado with a vision of replicating service provision to children she had observed there by establishing a child guidance clinic for the children of Wayne County.
Working in conjunction with the Wayne County Mental Health Association and sharing its office space, Mrs. Dunn established the Child Guidance Clinic of Wayne County, becoming its first board president. The clnic staff consisted of one full-time person and a part-time psychiatrist. In 1960 the clinic was incorporated.
In the early 1960s Mrs. Dunn offered space in her home to accomodate a new location for the clinic. That location, 54 South 15th St, is now a focal point of Dunn Center CSS Services. The clinic continued to serve only the children of Wayne County until 1967 when services were expanded to include children in Randolph and Union Counties and the age range was extended from 18 years of age to include young adults up to the age of 21.
Around that time legislation was passed to allow for the development of comprehensive mental health centers. As part of the move toward such a center in this region, people in Wayne, Union, Fayette, and Randolph Counties came togethor to form Eastern Indiana Mental Health Services Incorporated.
By 1969 the clinic was growing by leaps and bounds and the staff had grown to include a psychiatrist, a consulting psychologist, three social workers, an educational specialist, and two secretaries. Because of the needs expressed by the members of Eastern Indiana Mental Health Services, Inc., services at the clinic were offered to persons up to age 26 and the name was changed from The Child Guidance Clinic of Wayne County to the The Camilla B. Dunn Mental Health Clinic, to better represent the revised mission and service provision.
Within a year EIMHS and The Camilla B. Dunn Mental Health Clinic collaborated to obtain increased funding so that services could be made available to any resident, regardless of age, in Wayne, Randolph, Union, and Fayette Counties. Subsequently, the staff worked more diligently toward developing as a comprehensive mental health center. In 1974 the clinic and EIMHS merged.
The Camilla B. Dunn Mental Health Clinic was reorganized as a comprehensive mental health center in 1974 and soon after official name of the organization became The Dunn Mental Health Center, Inc.
Today Dunn Center is east central Indiana's established provider of behavioral health care. We have grown from Camilla B. Dunn's vision of service provision to local children with a handful of employees, to a comprehensive mental health center with a staff of hundreds.
We are thankful that Mrs. Dunn was a woman of vision. We believe her dreams are realized every day through the work of the compassionate and professional staff of Dunn Mental Health Center. We look forward to continued community service and partnership, always growing to meet the needs of those we serve.