Keeley Institute

The Keeley Institute, known for its Keeley Cure or Gold Cure, was a commercial medical operation that offered treatment to alcoholics from 1879 to 1965. Though at one time there were more than 200 branches in the United States and Europe, the original institute was founded by Leslie Keeley in Dwight, Illinois, United States. The Keeley Institute's location in Dwight, Illinois had a major influence on the development of Dwight as a village, though only a few indications of its significance remain in the village.

After Keeley's death the institute began a slow decline but remained in operation under John R. Oughton, and, later, his son. The Institute offered the internationally known Keeley Cure, a cure which drew sharp criticism from those in the mainstream medical profession. It was wildly popular in the late 1890s. Thousands of people came to Dwight to be cured of alcoholism; thousands more sent for the mail-order oral liquid form which they took in the privacy of their homes.

It began to decline after Keeley’s death.(Lender, and Martin)

In 1879 Dr. Leslie Keeley announced the result of a collaboration with John R. Oughton, an Irish chemist, which was heralded as a "major discovery" by Keeley. The discovery, a new treatment for alcoholism, resulted in the founding of the Keeley Institute. The treatment was developed from a partnership with John Oughton, an Irish chemist, and a merchant named Curtis Judd.("Fargo, N.D., History Exhibition") The institute attempted to treat alcoholism as a disease. Patients who were cured using this treatment were honored as "graduates" and asked to promote the cure. (Tracy) Keeley became wealthy through the popularity of the institute and its well-known slogan, “Drunkenness is a disease and I can cure it.” His work foreshadowed later work that would attribute a physiological nature to alcoholism.

The Dwight, Illinois location was the original institute founded by Leslie Keeley that treated alcoholics with the infamous Keeley Cure, which was criticized by the medical profession.(Lender, and Martin) This cure, which later became known as the “gold cure”, expanded to over 200 locations in the United States and Europe.(Keeley Cure)

The Keeley Institute eventually had over 200 branches throughout the United States and Europe, and by 1900 the so-called Keeley Cure, injections of bichloride of gold, had been administered to more than 300,000 people. The reputation of the Keeley Cure was largely enhanced by positive coverage from the Chicago Tribune.The New York Times also featured coverage on the Keeley Institute as early as 1891, and in 1893 a Brooklyn man's drunken rabble-rousing received coverage which noted he was a Keeley Institute graduate. The Times said "it is not everyday that a man from the Keeley Institute for the cure of drunkenness comes to New-York and gets into such a predicament."