Amadeus Arkham
| Amadeus Arkham | |
|---|---|
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance | Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #1 |
| Created by | Len Wein, Grant Morrison, Dave McKean |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Amadeus Arkham |
| Team affiliations | Arkham Asylum |
Amadeus Arkham is a fictional character in DC Comics. He was the founder of Arkham Asylum and is the uncle of Jeremiah Arkham.
He was created in 1984 for the entry for Arkham Asylum in Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #1. The story was retold and expanded in 1989 in Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth. The graphic novel is interspersed with flashbacks to Arkham founder Amadeus Arkham's life and childhood. The character currently appears in DC's The New 52 as a protagonist of All Star Western alongside Jonah Hex.
The Who's Who entry establishes that the Asylum was named after Elizabeth Arkham, the mother of founder Amadeus Arkham. The original name of the asylum was Arkham Hospital. Its dark history began in the early 1900s when Arkham's mother, having suffered from mental illness most of her life, committed suicide (It was later revealed that her son actually euthanized her, and repressed the memory). Amadeus Arkham decided, then, as the sole heir to the Arkham estate, to remodel his family home in order to properly treat the mentally ill, so others might not suffer as his mother had. Prior to the period of the hospital's remodeling, Arkham treated patients at the State Psychiatric Hospital in Metropolis, where he and his wife, Constance, and daughter, Harriet, had been living for quite some time.
Upon telling his family of his plans, they moved back to his family home to oversee the remodeling. While there, Arkham received a call from the police notifying him that serial killer Martin "Mad Dog" Hawkins — referred to Arkham by Metropolis Penitentiary while at State Psychiatric Hospital — had escaped from prison, and sought his considered opinion on the murderer's state of mind. Shortly afterward, Arkham returned to his home to find his front door wide open. Inside, he discovered the raped and mutilated bodies of his daughter and wife in an upstairs room, with Hawkins' nickname carved on Harriet's body.
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Wikipedia