The Provincial Lunatic Asylum opened on January 26, 1850.
It was subsequently renamed Asylum for the Insane, then Hospital for the Insane, then Ontario Hospital (1919), and then the Queen Street Mental Health Centre (1966).
It had also been called the Toronto Lunatic Asylum and 999 Queen Street West.

The original buildings were constructed in a series of rigid lines and sharp angles, consistent with the belief at the time that orderly physical structure would facilitate orderly mental states for the patients.
High walls segregated the patients from the community, establishing a long-standing stigma about the facility.

The Queen Street Site of CAMH contained the Samuel A. Malcolmson Lecture Theatre, named for the site's Chief Psychiatrist and Clinical Director of Forensics.
 In 2009, however, Malcolmson was subject to a disciplinary hearing of Ontario's College of Physicians and Surgeons, following that he sexually abused a patient and fathered a child with her.
Malcomson pleaded "no contest" and resigned his license to practice.
The lecture hall was renamed the Queen Street Auditorium.

Reforms were made after a series of deaths at the Queen Street Mental Health Centre and newspaper accounts of involuntary drug treatment, electroshock therapy, and prison-like conditions.
The Provincial Lunatic Asylum opened on January 26, 1850. It was subsequently renamed Asylum for the Insane, then Hospital for the Insane, then Ontario Hospital (1919), and then the Queen Street Mental Health Centre (1966). It had also been called the Toronto Lunatic Asylum and 999 Queen Street West.
The original buildings were constructed in a series of rigid lines and sharp angles, consistent with the belief at the time that orderly physical structure would facilitate orderly mental states for the patients. High walls segregated the patients from the community, establishing a long-standing stigma about the facility.
The Queen Street Site of CAMH contained the Samuel A. Malcolmson Lecture Theatre, named for the site's Chief Psychiatrist and Clinical Director of Forensics.  In 2009, however, Malcolmson was subject to a disciplinary hearing of Ontario's College of Physicians and Surgeons, following that he sexually abused a patient and fathered a child with her. Malcomson pleaded "no contest" and resigned his license to practice. The lecture hall was renamed the Queen Street Auditorium.
Reforms were made after a series of deaths at the Queen Street Mental Health Centre and newspaper accounts of involuntary drug treatment, electroshock therapy, and prison-like conditions.
Centre for Addiction and Mental Health