The
Stockton Sanitarium opened in Merchantville on October 29, 1884 for treatment of nervous affections and mild cases of mental disease. The 26 room home, originally owned by Senator Alexander G. Cattell, was
located on eleven acres of land with the appearance of an asylum avoided and a degree of freedom allowed. Established by Dr. S. Preston Jones , it was a private institution without a board of directors or trustees. On September 18, 1889, a "lunatic on the loose" was quite the topic of the village and seems a timely story for Monsterville. A hypochondriacal patient escaped from the Stockton Sanitarium of Dr. S. Preston Jones, a renowned physician and expert witness in his field at the time. In 1889 residents of Merchantville brought charges against the doctor and his clinic. Among the ten bills of indictment found by the Camden Grand Jury on October 21st, was one against Dr. S. Preston Jones for maintaining a nuisance in the shape of a private insane asylum at Merchantville because his fellow townsmen found themselves annoyed by the patients in his private asylum. Born in 1832, he was listed as the Assistant Physician for Males at the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane in 1877. 