Haunted Hospitals

Located in the foggy woods of Sedro-Woolley, Washington, Northern State Hospital was once the largest mental institution in the state, besides the Old Western State Hospital.  The hospital opened in 1909 and was designed by the renowned Olmsted Brothers, the same architects who brought us New York’s Central Park. It was built to be a self-contained colony, with 700 acres of farmland, a dairy plant, a lumber mill, and even a bakery.

As years went on, controversy over asylums in general began to swell throughout the country. People heard about the brutal history of the hospital and began fighting for better rights for the mentally ill. In 1976, the Washington State Legislature cut off all funding, and the Northern State Hospital closed permanently.

Can you visit the hospital today? According to the Northern State Hospital website, “Northern State Hospital is part of the SWIFT Center, owned and operated by the Port of Skagit County. The former NSH farm is owned by Skagit County Parks. Visitors are welcome at the farm and along Hub Drive during daylight hours. Follow signs and stay on the historic route. Access to the inside of buildings is prohibited.”

“Northern State Hospital is part of the SWIFT Center, owned and operated by the Port of Skagit County. The former NSH farm is owned by Skagit County Parks. Visitors are welcome at the farm and along Hub Drive during daylight hours. Follow signs and stay on the historic route. Access to the inside of buildings is prohibited.”

Is the Northern State Hospital Haunted?

Despite its beautiful setting, Northern State Hospital had a dark and sinister side. Known as being one of the more humane hospitals of its time, patients may have still been subjected to lobotomies, heavy sedation, and electroshock therapy. Many of the patients shouldn’t have ever been admitted to the hospital, some were struggling with common conditions like depression, post-menopausal syndrome, and alcoholism.

Dairy Barn Building at Northern State Hospital

Many of these patients died while in the hospital’s care, but too many were never claimed by their families, leaving the hospital to cremate the patients’ remains.  Hundreds of patients’ ashes were found stored in tin cans, each with their numbers. These remains were eventually buried at Mount Vernon Cemetery. Almost 1500 patients were buried in the 1.5-acre cemetery on the hospital grounds.

Visitors have reported experiencing some pretty strange paranormal phenomena. Feelings of being followed, cold spots, and voices are all common occurrences. Some people have even seen strange shadows creeping around the cemetery.

The most common spirits are a young girl with a red ball and an older man chasing after her. Some have seen them running through the hospital, and others have spotted them in the cemetery.

The 2018 South Korean horror film, Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum was directed by Jung Bum-shik. This movie was based on the real psychiatric hospital of the same name. The movie follows a horror website crew that wanted to investigate the asylum after it was abandoned. They had heard tales of the hauntings here and they wanted to gain fame and clout by doing some investigating themselves. What they didn’t realize was just how horrific their encounters here would be. Let’s find out more about the movie and the real Gonjiam haunted asylum.

The Gonjiam Movie (Spoilers)

During the Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum film, two boys decide to go explore the Gonjiam Psychiatric Hospital. They had heard rumors that hundreds of people were killed here and patients had gone missing. The director of the hospital was rumored to have been killed here as well. The two of them knew that the most paranormal activity was coming from Room 402, which was the intensive care unit. As they filmed their mission, they caught a look of a very ghostly face. Shortly after, they disappeared. This is what made Ha-Joon, a YouTuber, want to go into the building and try to find out what happened to them.

Ha-Joon decides to get a crew of people together who also want to know more about the asylum. Ha-Joon’s YouTube channel is called “Horror Times” and he just knows that going to the asylum will boost viewers and soon he will become famous. However, what he has in mind isn’t exactly what he gets.

Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum Film

After getting his crew together, Ha-Joon is ready to begin his live broadcast at the asylum. He decides that he will stay at base camp while the others go inside and broadcast everything that they see inside the psychiatric hospital. Shortly after they go inside, it comes out that there is a script for what they will do and say when they enter the asylum. They have put together some ghost-hunting antics that they feel their fans will really love.

Even though there is a script to their live broadcast, it seems as if the spirits in the asylum have something planned of their own. The group finds strange coffins in the building and when one of the women puts her hand in a hole, she pulls it out and finds that she has been wounded horribly. This disturbs a few others in the group and they decide that this is not what they had in mind. They feel that it is time to leave.

During the film, each member sees paranormal and unexplainable events. They are attacked by these strange forces and eventually, the infra-red cameras pick up a dark presence in Room 402. As Ha-Joon is watching his team go underwater in the room, with no escape, he sees that the YouTube channel has gotten almost a million views. He goes to check this out and he ends up getting strangled to death by the ghost of the director of the asylum.

One last member of the crew is left, Seung-Wook and he eventually admits that the entire investigation was supposed to be scripted. The live stream cuts off shortly after he admits to this and as the movie ends, the dish of holy water begins to boil.

Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum Trailer

The Real Haunted Gonjiam Psychiatric Hospital

When this film was released, there was a lot of talk that the asylum never existed and that it was just an urban legend. However, others shared their own stories of being in the asylum. The Gonjiam asylum was built near Seoul, Korea in 1961. It had three floors where it served hundreds of patients. In 1996, the owner and director of the asylum died and the asylum closed. The building was never passed on to anyone else and there was no interest in reopening it. The building began to fall apart and it was finally demolished in 2018.

The legends of Gonjiam asylum have spread all over Korea and the world. Much like other asylums, spooky tales have come out about just how horrible this place was after it closed. Asylums are known for the cruel ways that they treated patients and this is why most of them closed down. In this asylum, the legends are that hundreds of patients died with no explanation. The cruel ways that the doctors treated the patients here were just part of how they lost their lives.

Not only were there plenty of unexplained deaths in the asylum but there were also suicides added to the list. Many employees took their own lives due to the paranormal encounters that happened to them in the asylum. The paranormal activity in the asylum has been reported by paranormal investigators. Let’s find out more about the haunts.

The Ghosts In the Gonjiam Asylum

There have been a lot of rumors about the ghosts that haunt the asylum. There have been paranormal investigators who made claims that after their time in the abandoned asylum, they felt that it was one of the most terrifying locations that they had ever been in. This creepy asylum may have been the end of many lives, but the legends of how haunted it is continue to spread.

The madness of the asylum is rumored to be one of the main reasons that those who worked here wanted to get out. There were rumors that they were haunted by the ghosts of the patients who died there. Now that the asylum has been torn down, the legends will continue to spread, but no one will ever know what happened there. The movie about the asylum was one way to get the rumors swirling yet again.

Most asylums around the world all have a few things in common. There are always stories about just how horrible the conditions were in them and how people were tortured there. The tales and legends of the Gonjiam Psychiatric Hospital seem to be all that there is left for us now.

Poveglia Island is known as one of the most haunted places in the world. Located in Italy between Venice and Lido, the island was first noted in the historical registry in 421. Most of the residents fled the island in 1379 due to warfare. However, from 1776 until 1876, the island was solely used for quarantine stations during the plague, and then a mental hospital was located there. In 1968, the mental hospital closed, and no one has lived on the island since. Quite a few incidents occurred here to make it as terrifying as it is today. Known as the island of death, Poveglia Island’s soil is made up of human remains due to all of the people who have lost their lives here.

This island has been off-limits to visitors; however, there is a way for visitors to catch a glimpse of the terror. When taking a boat ride in Venice, visitors may be able to see a few small glimpses of the island. The island is known as the island of death because of the horrible incidents that occurred here.

What Makes Poveglia Island So Haunted?

As most ghost hunters and horror seekers know, there are always reasons for places to become haunted. Poveglia Island is no different. With all of the deaths that happened on the island, the hauntings here are anything but normal. In fact, the tortured souls on this island have nowhere to go and roam free.

The creepy stories began to run rampant when the rumors of what happened in the past began to circulate. In fact, one of the doctors who worked at the mental hospital allegedly gave his patients lobotomies. This doctor couldn’t handle the work that he was doing, so he jumped to his death from the bell tower on the island in the 1930s. Apparently, he was driven mad by his work and the ghosts that were on the island.

The Haunted Hospital

Even though Poveglia Island is off-limits to visitors, some have stepped foot on this haunted soil. Some say that they have felt being touched and even scratched while there. Others have seen ghosts of the dead walking on the island. The island is a mass burial ground, and to this day, visitors can still see stacks of human remains there.

With over 100,000 people who have died here, this is known as one of the most haunted places in the entire world. The bones and ashes of the dead are always there as reminders of what happened here. The plague brought suffering and death to the island, and the mental hospital brought anguish and pain.

No Visiting The Island of Death

No matter what ghost hunters want to see here, spending time on the island is illegal. It is privately owned, and even the locals who live nearby will not try to visit. To this day, there have been human remains that still wash up on shore.

Ghost hunters from all over the world have been known to seek out abandoned hospitals. The hospital in Colorno, Italy, is located in the province of Parma. In 1873, it was used as a shelter when cholera broke out. Not only did the sick seek shelter here, but soon, it led to a place for vagrants, sex workers, and abandoned children. The conditions here were anything but hygienic, resulting in a lot of death.

After the hospital got a facelift, it became a psychiatric hospital. While it was a hospital, the methods that were used here varied from straightjackets and electroshock therapy. The windows all had bars on them, and those who lived here were not treated well. With all of the souls who passed away here, those who come to visit the abandoned hospital have heard moans and screams and even seen people walking around crying. This is where plenty of souls were lost.

The Haunted History of the Colorno Mental Hospital

Asylums all around the world were known for treating those with mental illness. This asylum was expansive, and with the growing number of patients here, it had to expand quickly. Although some rooms were larger, as the asylum grew, most of the rooms began to look like prison cells. These rooms had very small windows where the doctors could look in on their patients.

The rooms featured some very archaic forms of medicine, and some beds used restraints on the head and arms.  The asylum closed in 1979, and the patients were released to their doctors and families and on the streets. This building still stands today and there is paranormal activity lingering in the hallways.

The Paranormal Activity Today

Both ghost hunters and artists have come to the abandoned asylum to explore the history here. Plenty of them have stayed overnight and have a lot of creepy stories to share. Some have described the strange noises they have heard at night and thuds in the hallways. They have heard doors slamming around the building and water running when there is none. Others have seen people walking around in the hallways in gowns and wearing no shoes. During one rainy night, one visitor claimed to have seen a doctor coming from one of the rooms and was in tears. He then was seen jumping into the pond on the property. Is that the way he died?

If you want to have a paranormal experience like no other, visiting this abandoned hospital in Colorno could be right up your alley. Visitors worldwide have been here to take in the paranormal and take in the history of one of the world’s most haunted places. Enter if you dare!

The Haunted Waverly Hills Sanatorium

Waverly Hills Sanatorium is chronicled on many of the “scariest places” lists by paranormal historians. Many experts place Waverly Hills Sanatorium in the top 3 of the most haunted and scariest places preserved. Situated in the southwestern area of Louisville, Kentucky the sanatorium is renowned for being the most haunted asylum in the entire world.  Rife with reports of moving objects and cold spots to malicious appearances of ghostly doppelgängers mimicking the visitors to the sanatorium themselves. The stories are astonishing.

Is The Waverly Hills Sanatorium Haunted?

The location and former building where the sanatorium stands now was originally purchased in 1883 by a military man, Major Thomas Hays.  Due to the remote location at the time, the initial building was fashioned into a large one-room schoolhouse as the nearest school was several miles away.  A woman named Lizzie Lee served as the first teacher there and she held a special fondness in her heart for author Walter Scotts’s Waverly Novels series. Major Hays needed a name and found Lee’s penchant for the Waverly Novels to be the perfect name and the Waverly School was formed.  At the turn of the 20th Century, the region was hit very hard with a severe tuberculosis outbreak and the land the Waverly school was on was purchased.  Subsequently, the building and land were massively expanded and hospital construction was done so as to house the influx of tuberculosis patients.

Roughly beginning in 1911, for the next three years more and more beds and building extensions were added to create a five-story, four hundred bed building for those stricken with tuberculosis. A children’s wing for younger patients was even added, however as the numbers of cured children improved, feeble adults who had tuberculosis and could not care for themselves in the outside world were sent to live in this wing.  In 1962, cases of tuberculosis patients declined to a point where the Waverly accepted geriatric dementia patients.  For the next twenty years, the Waverly Hills cared for these patients until the state of Kentucky stepped in to close the sanatorium down due to severe neglect in 1982.  And that’s when the horror stories began to emerge.

Waverly Hills: The Creeper

The Creeper is hands down the most intimidating spirit in the entire sanatorium. Manifesting itself as a twisted shadow creature, The Creeper has been known to appear in the sanatorium hallways the most.  If spotted, it has long crudely twisted arms and legs and it seems to be spotted approaching some unlucky visitors in various ways.  Most commonly, it is spotted crawling along the floor, while other times The Creeper is on the ceiling, slowly approaching the unsuspecting.  One of the associations of being in the presence of The Creeper is doom.  Paranormal investigators to Waverly have claimed that when The Creeper has been spotted, they suddenly have such an overwhelming sense of dread saturate them, that the feeling of impending doom is immediately upon them, and more often than not they have to leave the property as it takes hours to calm down again.

Room 502

Room 502 is the most haunted individual room in the complex.  Pretty young nurse Mary Hillenburg worked at Waverly, and according to stories there, she became pregnant out of wedlock.  Feeling ashamed and hopeless about her situation, it is believed she sought out an abortion, but something about the procedure went horribly wrong and she committed suicide by hanging herself inside the room.  Her death was a gory scene and the baby was already dead and was put down the body chute the sanatorium had.

Today Room 502 has chilling reports of vicious cold spots, and objects indeed flying past visitors.  EVP sessions have picked up the words “get back” inside the room and the phantom screeching of the chair Mary kicked out from under herself to be hanged is also audibly heard.   The body chute to the Waverly was often used as patients often succumbed to their illnesses.  Bodies were sent down to a tunnel where they were rounded up and transported via train to unknown destinations.  EVPs collected from this area of the sanatorium are quite chilling in their simplicity as words like “pain” and “leave now” are picked up.

Emerge from the body chute tunnel and you’re likely to catch a glimpse of Timmy, a child ghost there.   A young patient who passed away at the age of six, Timmy had a fondness for toy balls.  Over the years, visitors bring in toy balls and leave them for Timmy to play with and many a time people have claimed to see one of these toy balls in a room roll furiously back in forth on the floor unassisted, before Timmy’s spirit rolls it at them.

Hollywood Comes A Knocking

Waverly is also no stranger to modern American horror pop culture.  In 2005, reputed horror documentarian and filmmaker Phillip Adrian Booth directed a little then-unknown cast to star in a film entitled Death Tunnel.  The plot was horror-cliche of college sorority hazing gone wrong as a half dozen young women have to endure five floors of pure hell as they’re terrorized by the long tormented spirits there.  Menacing ghosts in the film were inspired in part by actual spirits said to be haunting the Waverly.  Even wilder is the fact that this film, in particular, was filmed at the Waverly Hills itself.  Cast members have been quite reluctant to reveal as to whether or not filming there added to the fear-filled environment they were trying to create, but filming in such a place no doubt added considerably to the scare factor and requiring all acting parts in the film to be quite method.

Visit The Waverly Hills Sanatorium

The Waverly Hills Sanatorium today is completely open for ghost tours, events, and paranormal investigations of all types.  Visitors are encouraged to take videos or pictures that document any paranormal activity they find on the grounds, however, arrangements to visit must be made via reservation.  Even with all the tour groups, some people have been brave enough to attend one of the all-night tours.  And it’s completely normal to see them last only an hour or two before running out the building screaming in sheer terror.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, mental health was broadly defined. Health conditions and mental capacities simply had yet to be discovered by medical science and as a result, thousands of people were not handled with enough care and concern. While highly debatable, their life-care was turned over by their families to the aid afforded by the state and they were placed into asylums. One such place that is registered to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places is the Danvers State Hospital. Located in the town of Danvers, Massachusetts, the now-defunct asylum has been chronicled as a hotbed of paranormal activity. After all, Danvers is an adjacent offshoot of Salem, where the infamous Salem Witch Trials took place.

Originally constructed in 1878, the Danvers State Hospital opened under the original name of the Danvers Lunatic Asylum. It was designed by a Boston architect named Nathaniel Bradlee, who was responsible for the famous Jordan Marsh store in Boston as well as Boston’s Downtown Crossing. His design of the asylum had it perfectly laid out with four housing buildings that were separated by gender and divided by the towering administration building.

The outer fringe locations of the housing buildings on each side were reserved for the most hostile and violent patients. Slated with five hundred beds to house people, over the decades this number grew to two thousand, and many expansion buildings were added. With such a large population of increasing diverse patients with severe mental, physical, and emotional problems, it comes as no surprise that areas of the asylum eventually became haunted.

Is the Danvers State Hospital Haunted?

Upon opening, the asylum was quickly overcrowded. While the number of patients rapidly increased, the number of employees there did not. Greatly outnumbered and already poor in medical knowledge and technology for the time, the asylum administrators turned to the use of lobotomies to quell the out of control patients. The medical care while already poor, was even worse for those who were given lobotomies and as a result, a substantial number died.

But for a group of patients that died, more were added to the hospital to the point that the structure served as a revolving door for sure death. As the years passed, sanitary conditions deteriorated, and also electroshock therapy was made common so this only ramped up the volatile situation. This is the prevailing theory, coupled with the geographical tie to Salem as to why the asylum is haunted.

The Ghosts of Danvers Lunatic Asylum

Gerald Richards was a hospital administrator there in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Due to the nature of his job, he lived on the premises with his wife and three children. One of his children, Jeralyn Levasseur, has been one of the only people to ever step forward and verify that a ghost was seen in the administrator’s quarters.

In the quarters where she lived with her family as a child, she had memories of playing in the attic with her brother and sister. However, the attic soon became off-limits that were self-imposed after seeing the spirit of an elderly woman in the corner of the darkened attic, scowling at her and her siblings. That was not the only encounter with this particular apparition as she claimed that she was awoken several times at night by the same scowling spirit as it would slowly pull the covers straight off her bed.

Unsurprisingly, the asylum closed in 1992. As it sat abandoned, this opened the flood gates for paranormal investigators and ghost hunters to explore the haunted site. Many groups started off by doing walkthroughs of the abandoned asylum. Almost instantly the audible cries and moans of the spirits said to be haunting the asylum are quite numerous. Electronic voice phenomenon (EVPs), is something that has captured and occurring at a fairly high level. Among the more chilling EVPs captured are a spirit saying, “I live here” and “I am warning you”.

Only near the closing of the asylum was it discovered to have small, underground tunnels connecting the buildings. Historians date these tunnels to the original construction of the hospital, meaning they were put in under the direction of the asylum’s first administrator Thomas Kirkbride, who was notorious in his methodology.

His tunnels have thought to have been constructed so as to keep the more violent patients completely out of sight, thus giving the asylum’s upper levels a more sedate and dignified look and preached to his infamous Kirkbride Plan that he always referred to as, “a special apparatus for the care of lunacy”. It should come as no surprise as ghost hunters and former hospital workers alike have seen Thomas Kirkbride’s ghost floating through the underground tunnels.

In 2005 the property was sold to a real estate developer and a series of the connecting buildings were torn down. In their place has gone a small collection of condo apartments. Not all of the buildings were totally demolished as those underground tunnels prevent this to a degree. Outback behind the grounds is the asylum’s cemetery. With such sacred ground, the developers have not constructed anything new on that part of the land.

People who live in the apartments now claim to hear moans and screams at night, theorized to be from the spirits still tied to the land. Many a Danvers police officer has responded to complaints of the terrifying noises at night only to find a desolate and empty lot, but night after night the screams are said to remain heard.

The Filming of Session 9

Before most of the hospital was demolished in 2006, Hollywood used some of the Danvers hospital, and many of it’s creepy and existing equipment as props, to make the cult classic film Session 9.

Session 9  is a 2001 psychological horror film directed by Brad Anderson and stars David Caruso, Peter Mullan, Stephen Gevedon, Paul Guilfoyle, Josh Lucas, and Brendan Sexton. It tells the story of a work crew assigned to remove asbestos from an abandoned mental institution. It doesn’t take long for the crew boss to hear voices and have one of his men go missing. As you can imagine, they don’t find him in their truck outside.

When asked about filming Session 9 at the Danvers State Hospital, David Caruso said,

“It was a place you never got comfortable in. It wasn’t like day three and we were throwing water balloons because it was so much fun to be there. It was always scary. You can really feel the pain of the people that went through Danvers. It’s a rough environment. It’s not fun. It’s on the film. They didn’t have to dress any sets, or anything. All of that stuff was sitting there. The federal government walked away from it about thirty years ago. It was a terrifying location.”

Session 9 Trailer

The hospital is the most important place in humanity’s world. Life begins there, and it certainly ends with death there. Diseases are cured, stitches sewn, and miracles made. Perhaps the truest and most manifested physical source of hope people have, the hospital is crucial to humanity’s survival. But what becomes of hospitals that have been abandoned for reasons of finance, location, or bigger facilities? Often too elaborate and expensive for demolition, the hospitals are simply left to the ruin of the elements. And as many paranormal seekers have found, these abandoned hospitals aren’t so quiet. The Old South Pittsburg Hospital is quite possibly the most haunted hospital in the entire United States.

Is the Old South Pittsburg Hospital Haunted?

Located a dozen miles outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee, the Old South Pittsburg Hospital is perhaps one of the most active and terrifying abandoned hospitals in the South. As far back as 1778, a Native American tribe called the Chiaha inhabited the land that the hospital was eventually built on. Peace was a mainstay until decades later when both Union and Confederate forces came through and slaughtered a large amount of the Chiaha. Some mass graves were used, and after the Civil War, the property was abandoned all the way up to 1959 when the South Pittsburg Hospital was built to help the growing area populations. After a slew of wrongful death and malpractice lawsuits, on top of haunting rumors, the South Pittsburg Hospital closed in 1998. And that’s when the ghost hunters began to take a closer look.

Paranormal seekers would conduct overnight stays in the hospital in attempts to gauge the full level of activity. Abandoned medical furniture such as gurneys and wheelchairs would move on their own. Leftover hospital beds have been known to relocate to other previously empty patient rooms without any human involvement. The second floor of the hospital was home to the emergency room and general admissions. A large EVP presence has picked up a rather disturbingly large amount of screams from men, women, and unfortunately children. No doubt that their screams came from whatever reasons brought them to the hospital in the first place.

The Ghosts of the Old South Pittsburg Hospital

The third floor of the hospital is where the majority of the surgical operations were performed and is said to be the most active. A shadowy figure ranging seven to nine feet in height floats in and out among the rooms. This particular spirit is no fan of the living and ghost hunters have claimed to have not only seen the spirit but audibly hear it tell them to “get out!”. Some ghost hunters have theorized the shadow figure to be demonic in origin as a foul smell can be accompanied whenever its presence is very close at hand.

There has been reported physical deaths of nurses while on duty at the hospital, so there have been sightings of ghost nurses in the building. One, in particular, is referred to as the “naughty nurse” as she has been known to get physical with some unsuspecting ghost hunters by touching them in inappropriate places. Given the demonic association with the shadow figure on the third floor, it’s anyone’s guess as if it is truly a leftover spirit of a nurse who was employed there, the ghost of a long passed Chiaha tribe member, or something much more sinister.

Given that the hospital had a maternity ward, there is the spirit of a child that is in the building as well. Affectionately named “Buddy” by paranormal groups, the spirit is believed to be of toddler age. There have been reports of objects being rolled towards unsuspecting ghost hunters and visitors by Buddy in an effort to have them roll it back and play with him. One unidentified ghost hunter claimed to have heard Buddy’s spirit ask softly if she would please pick him up and hold him. As endearing as Buddy’s little spirit is, there has not been any malevolent activity associated with his presence.

Visit the Old South Pittsburg Hospital

To help further advocate that there is life after death, the Old South Pittsburg Hospital is fully endeared and accommodating to the paranormal and ghost hunting community. It is operated by paranormal enthusiasts who actually open up the hospital for investigations and their website is fully accommodating to any questions or tour inquiries. There are both daytime and nighttime tours as well as overnight investigations for the crazy brave. According to various groups, there is simply no “perfect” time in which to capture a shadowy figure on film or record a disturbing EVP. Simply put, the activity there is running twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week….just like a real hospital.

Old Haunted Western State Hospital

Old Western State Mental Hospital is one of the eeriest places in all of Washington State. It was originally Fort Steilacoom Asylum in 1871, but the building dates back to 1849 when it was part of the Fort Steilacoom Army post.

The history of the hospital tells stories of frontal lobotomies, mental wards that were secretly open for prostitution by the orderlies and brutal attacks on patients. The grounds are creepy indeed and many paranormal groups will ghost hunt at night after the park closes. Be careful and watch your step.

The hospital catered to the insane and stories from the high security wards of beatings and crazed outbreaks are plentiful.

How to get to the Old Western State Hospital

The ruins of the old mental hospital are inside Fort Steilacoom County Park in Lakewood. The address is located on the map tab above. There is a path at the end of the parking lot that takes you through the woods. You’ll walk a little bit and find the old hospital in ruins and graffiti. The grounds have deteriorated with time.

Image credit

The ruins of the hospital are slowly disappearing. The cemetery is ominous and paranormal researchers have captured orbs and strong signals suggesting ghostly inhabitants. A walk around the grounds during the day can be spooky, but at night things get even more interesting.

Nirvana and Western State Hospital’s most famous patient

Frances Farmer was an up and coming Hollywood actress in the 1930s, starring in films with Bing Crosby and Cary Grant. Unfortunately she struggled with alcoholism and was arrested for drunk driving with her car’s headlights on during a war time blackout. You read that right. While awaiting trial she was very violent and had to be regularly subdued.  At her sentencing, her family urged the judge to move her to a psychiatric hospital, believing that she needed treatment. She spent a short time in a California hospital but eventually made her way to Western State Hospital where she spent almost 5 years.

This time of her life was documented in the 1978 book Shadowland by William Arnold. As popular as this book was, it wasn’t very factual. Arnold admitted in 1983 to making up the story that Frances was given a lobotomy during her stay at the hospital. But 1983 was a bit too late and Hollywood made their film Frances, starring Jessica Lang, where she indeed get’s a lobotomy. Oops!

This isn’t to say that her stay at Western State wasn’t a horrible experience. In her biography, Will There Really Be A Morning? she states that she was “raped by orderlies, gnawed on by rats and poisoned by tainted food…chained in padded cells, strapped into strait jackets and half drowned in ice baths.”

Frances was released from the hospital for good in 1950. She made a small comeback in Hollywood but never regained her much desired stardom. She died in 1970 of esophageal cancer at the young age of 57.

Being from Seattle and all, super group Nirvana took a shine to the story of Frances. In 1993, Nirvana released the song Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge On Seattle off of their album In Utero. Nirvana’s singer Kurt Cobain said of the song, “I guess that’s my way of letting the world know that bureaucracy is everywhere and it can happen to anybody and it’s a really evil thing,.” He went on to say “The story of Frances Farmer is so sad and it can happen to anybody and it almost felt at a time that it was happening to us.”

Nirvana’s Frances Farmer Will Have Revenge On Seattle

Rolling Hills Asylum in East Bethany, NY is an historical property that is authentically haunted! Originally opened in 1827 as The Genesee County Poor House, it became a safe haven for the mentally and physically disabled, war veterans, widows, orphans, drunkards, and more. In 1938 the county added a hospital to the facility – the Genesee County Infirmary, and in 1964 it converted the property to the Genesee County Nursing Home, or as the locals lovingly referred to it as  “the old county home” until closing in 1974.  Steeped in nearly 200 years of history, mystery and mayhem, today, Rolling Hills Asylum’s nearly 60,000 sq. ft.  is reputed to be the most haunted asylum in the USA and has been featured in numerous films and television shows such as Syfy’s Ghost Hunters, Travel Channel’s Ghost Adventures, and Destination America’s Ghost Asylum.  Come on out and enjoy an Historical or Flashlight tour,  a public or private ghost hunt, horror movie night,  celebrity event, or one of the dozens of other special events!  We are open year round, even in the winter!  Rolling Hills Asylum is located just 45 minutes between Rochester and Buffalo off exit 48 in Batavia. For more details go to www.RollingHillsAsylum.com

If you are in the Eureka Springs area in Arkansas, you are probably more than familiar with the Victorian 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa. The tales of the ghosts here are terrifying, yet it happens to still be one of the most popular hotels in the area for tourists. Is it the ghostly forces that attract visitors or is it the accommodations? Let’s find out more about who is haunting the 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa and if they are, in fact, friendly.

The Haunted History of the 1886 Crescent Hotel

Known as one of the most Haunted Hotels in America, the 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa has had several functions since its construction. At one point, it served as a girls’ college and even was a cancer hospital. It was originally built as a retreat for very wealthy travelers. It quickly became a symbol of elegance. It hasn’t always been a hotel, and there have been periods when it was part of the transformations taking place in the area. It all began when news of how magical the town was began to spread all over the country.

Eureka Springs gained a reputation in the 1800s as a beautiful town in the mountains where travelers went for solace and rejuvenation. The town made great progress to accommodate all of the visitors. Soon, it was booming, and more and more people came to see how magical it was.

It didn’t take long for the town to need more lodging for its guests. In 1886, the Crescent Hotel was opened. The designers wanted it to overlook the mountains and showcase the beauty of the area. The hotel’s service was known to be some of the best in the area. It was a great getaway for wealthier travelers. However, it changed hands shortly after it opened.

In 1902, the Frisco Railroad leased the hotel for five years. It was very slow in the winter, so Crescent College opened for women. The building acted as a college until 1934. The college was known for providing women with an exceptional education, and women from around the country attended classes here. Even though it was short-lived as a college, those who attended gained many life experiences during that time.

The hotel was then purchased by Norman Baker. He was ready to share with others that he had found the cure for cancer. He turned the hotel into the Baker Cancer Clinic and claimed to be a healer. It was clear that he was scamming cancer patients out of money because they trusted that he would cure them. Not only did he pretend to heal cancer patients, but he also broadcast very controversial claims over the radio. He told his listeners that he could heal cancer without surgery and pushed for patients from all over the world to come to Eureka Springs.

Room 419 – 1886 Crescent Hotel

Soon, the American Medical Association would begin to investigate his claims. In 1940, he was arrested and thrown in prison for mail fraud, ending his medical practice for good. However, while he was in the hotel, he made a lot of changes to it. He built hidden staircases and even made himself an escape route if he ever needed it.

In 1946, it was purchased again, and the owners began to make major changes to it. Most of these changes still exist today. In 1967, the hotel suffered some devastation after a fire broke out due to faulty wiring. More changes had to take place to make the hotel what it is today.

The Ghosts and Hauntings of 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa

Theodora – Room 419

Since it reopened, the 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa has experienced many paranormal events. There are rumors that some of the ghosts are those of the cancer patients who died there. One spirit often seen in the hotel is Theodora. She is a former cancer patient who was in Dr. Baker’s care. Some guests have seen her trying to find her keys right outside of room 419 and trying to clean up that room.

Michael – Room 218

In room 218, there was a man named Michael who apparently fell to his death. There are a lot of rumors as to what really happened to him in this room. No one knows the exact story, but Michael has been seen hanging out in this room, and his presence is also felt in other parts of the hotel.

Breckie and Morris

There are ghosts of children in this hotel as well. One child, Breckie, who was the son of Richard and Mary Breckenridge Thompson, died at the hotel when he had complications from appendicitis. Guests and staff have seen him going around the hotel and bouncing his ball. Not only is Breckie hanging around, but the hotel cat, Morris, also lingers around. He was called the hotel’s General Manager for 21 years. When he died, he was buried on the property, and guests have seen and heard him around the hotel often. Clearly, he is still devoted to the hotel and making sure it is still taken care of.

Dr. Baker

Paranormal experts continue to visit the 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa. It recently emerged that the hotel is connected to a hospital, which could be one of the main reasons that the ghosts continue to linger. Graves have also been found where Dr. Baker buried some of his cancer patients.

Those who have stayed at the 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa have seen quite a bit of paranormal activity. The ghosts and hauntings continue as more guests visit the hotel. If you are looking for some haunts during your next hotel stay in Arkansas, be sure to check in at the 1886 Crescent Hotel and Spa.