SHRINK WRAPPED DRUGS AND ROCK ‘N’ ROLL WERE REGULAR FEATURES OF LIFE AT MCLEAN PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL IN BELMONT. FOR JAMES TAYLOR AND MANY OTHER AFFLUENT YOUNG PEOPLE, IT WAS A COMBINATION OF PROGRESSIVE MUSIC SCHOOL AND COUNTRY CLUB, WITH BARRED WINDOWS.

The Boston Globe
Author: ALEX BEAM

To the mellow, preppy cohort of the ’60s generation, the soft- singing Taylor siblings – James, his talented brother, Livingston, and the singer always known as Sister [Kate Taylor] – put McLean on the map. “For the Taylors,” Time magazine noted sardonically in a 1971 cover story on James, “the McLean experience would soon become what Harvard is for the Saltonstalls – something of a family tradition.”

Read the full article at the Boston Globe.

JT also features prominently in Beam’s 2003 book, Gracefully Insane: Life and Death Inside America’s Premier Mental Hospital.