Abstract:
Previously an insurance salesmen from Chapel Hill, John Wesley Umstead, Jr. shifted trades after the loss of a son in 1944, becoming one of the most influential people of North Carolina in the field of mental health. Appointed to the State Hospitals Board of Control, as overseer of mental hospitals in 1945, Umstead is noted as being responsible for the emergence of North Carolina as one of the premier locations for the treatment of mental health problems nationwide.