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History of the Clubhouse This is a short history of how the concept of the clubhouse philosophy of rehabilitation began. Fountain House, the first "clubhouse" opened in New York City in 1948. Fountain House was unique from other programs for men and women with mental illness, it was founded upon the premise that regardless of mental illness, clubhouse "members" could work productively and have socially satisfying lives. For nearly thirty years, Fountain House was alone in this way of thinking. The mental health establishment continued to base mental health programs in terms of "professional" and "patient". Fountain House again distinguished itself by believing that people with mental illness would not only benefit from a program based on rehabilitation, community, and mutually reciprocal relationships with staff; but that staff also needed to constantly be seeking out members strengths and talents to run the Clubhouse successfully . In 1977 Fountain House was awarded a multi-year grant from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), to establish a national training program on the Clubhouse Model. By 1987, there were 220 clubhouses in the United States. Clubhouse was universally attractive because it was base on human values, thus clubhouses began to develop around the world. In 1987 the NIMH grant came to an end. Fountain House applied for, and was awarded, a major grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. That grant combined with other sources of funding enabled Fountain House to meet the needs and lend support to the future growth of not only the clubhouse movement, but specifically the National Clubhouse Expansion Project . Rudyard Propst became the Director of Training at Fountain House in 1981. By 1987, Rudyard was concerned and wanted to preserve the values and consistency of the quickly expanding clubhouse movement. To ensure the integrity of the services available to clubhouse members, thirty five standards were developed and agreed upon by all the clubhouses. International Standards for Clubhouse Programs went into effect in 1989. Three-week Clubhouse Training was enormously successful, except it wasn't enough. Groups would return from training, and have no way to assess their success at building a clubhouse or on-site assistance and consultation. As part of the National Clubhouse Expansion Project, the Faculty for Clubhouse Development was established to address this need. The Faculty was created by drawing staff and members from strong clubhouses, consisting of a member/staff team whose responsibility was to visit and consult with the clubhouse. The consultation process was greatly strengthened by the completion of a Self-Study which the clubhouse prepared prior to the arrival of the consulting team. The funding for the National Clubhouse Expansion Project ended in the fall of 1992. However the work of the project must be continued and out of this an international organization of clubhouses was needed to pursue this work. In August of 1993, at it's annual meeting the Faculty for Clubhouse Development appointed a Steering Committee (comprised of members, staff, and Board members from the clubhouse community to formulate how this new organization would be structured and what its responsibilities would be. In the spring of 1994 , clubhouses around the world received a mailing, detailing the proposed structures and functions of the new International Center for Clubhouse Development. The Steering Committee acted as the Nominating Committee for the first Board of Directors of the ICCD. On June 2, 1994 the newly elected ICCD Board met for the first time and appointed Rudyard Propst as it's first Executive Director. In 1997, with the retirement of Rudyard Propst, Joel Corcoran became the second Executive Director of the ICCD. Today, clubhouse consultation/certification is fully international, and the Faculty for Clubhouse Development has been expanded to include members and staff from clubhouses around the globe. The ICCD today is a rapidly growing organization, helping clubhouses to help one another throughout the world.
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