Can't Get Enough of Those Abandoned Hospitals

I found this very fantastically eerie video on an urban exploration website called The Fifi Organization. This video, titled Abandoned Hospitals of the Eastern U.S. contains creepy audio from the cassettes the urban explorers found in the hospitals. Very Session 9.

American Horror Story Returns

American Horror Story is back this fall and will be titled American Horror Story: Asylum. If you haven't already heard, it's filled with a completely new cast of characters (some actors will return as new characters including Jessica Lange and Evan Peters) and is set in a new place - this time a church-run sanitarium in New England. I can feel the chills already.

Check out the creepy new trailers for the show:

Opacity: For the Urban Explorer in You

My sister recently sent me this link. It's a site called Opacity, devoted to urban ruins in the Northeast. Here's what they write about themselves:

This site is dedicated to documenting various abandoned places through both text and photographs; recording their transformations through time before they are demolished. The abundance of abandoned asylums and psychiatric hospitals in the New England area create the bulk of the locations here; these beautiful state funded structures are vast and complex, giving insight to both the humanity and mistreatment towards the mentally ill over the past two centuries.

They include Byberry (Philadelphia State Hospital) on the site, which my sister was always interested in. Unfortunately before she could see it, it was demolished.

Byberry

The site also includes Norwich State Hospital in CT, which I've been to. Very creepy. At the time I had a camera that generated prints (remember those?) instead of a digital camera. I wish I could find those pictures because there were some great shots.

 Norwich

A Mental Hospital and a Big, Pink Boat! Ghost Adventures in Rolling Hills Asylum

Ahhhh, Ghost Adventures. On Friday night's episode, the guys went to Rolling Hills Asylum in Bethany, NY, which once housed orphans, homeless mothers and their children, and the criminally insane. Such a messed-up mix, of course, leads to a vast buffet of paranormal energy.

One of the orphans was Roy - a man who suffered from giantism. Tragically, his father dropped him off one day at Rolling Hills when Roy was 12 and never came back for him. Roy spent fifty years in the place and eventually died there. When GAC did their lock down, they captured two very convincing photographs of a giant figure.

Also present? An evil nurse named Emmy, who dabbled in the black arts. Ooooo, you can imagine the creepy EVPs the guys captured. Some were a little hard to decipher, but some were so clear they made me jumpy, especially a scream heard by Nick while he was alone in Nurse Emmy's former room.

In another memorable part of the episode, Aaron got a face full of spider web, which later turned out may have been little slaps around his face. Aaron also caught a slamming, metal door on camera.

I was watching the episode late at night alone and was sure I saw a white flash of light appear to the left of my face. Oh, how I love the creeps of the GAC!

Of course, the show wouldn't be complete without the guys' entertaining side excursions. This time? River rafting near Niagara Falls in a "big, pink boat."

Dude, who's scared of a big, pink boat??

Zak says: "Does the boat match my lip gloss?"

**On a side note, check out this guy's blog post. He talks about filming with GAC and has some incredible behind-the-scenes photos of taping the Rolling Hills episode.

PennHurst to Open "Asylum Haunted House"

PennHurst State School and Hospital, a former institution for the mentally disabled, is now a "haunted house", causing an uproar among advocates for those who were once patients there.

Located in Spring City, PA, the new entertainment site was once home to over a thousand people who were abused and neglected. Despite the hospital's exploitation, those running the new business are employing 95 people and hoping to attract thousands of visitors.

I'm not sure I would want to visit the place as a "haunted house", but I would definitely like to see it as a historical place. Why are there no daytime tours? Perhaps they could open the building as a museum of sorts and collect money that way as well.

Ghost Adventures did a memorable show on PennHurst last season. See a clip from the show here.

You can read the article about the controversy here. Also, some amazing urban exploration photos of the place from 2008 can be found here.

Thanks to my sister, Lynn, who sent me the info on this place!

Zak Bagans at PennHurst

HAND IN THE WINDOW: EBAY LISTING OF THE WEEK

There's a creepy photo on Ebay of a hand in the window of an abandoned mental asylum. The listing description is as follows:

A Black & White photograph of a first floor window in a building near the main Kirkbride administration building at Taunton State Hospital in Taunton MA. I photographed this window in 2004 while on a photo shoot for a show and an edition of my magazine called "Asylum Architecture" The vision of Thomas Story Kirkbride.

This shot was photographed with high speed black and white film. During the shoot I photographed using mostly infrared film so I pretty much disregarded this roll of high speed B&W film. However months later in reviewing the contact sheets, I discovered some very odd and disturbing images on this roll of film.

There was nothing in this window when I looked in, but upon re examining the negatives I discovered several frames contained some very disturbing images. In this photo is what appears to be an old hand.

I have re visted this window several times since and have never seen the hand again. I have researched the Hospital and have found this hospital at Taunton housed some very notorious patients including serial murderer Honora Kelley a.k.a. Jane Toppan and has been the sight of many bizzare happenings! The Hospital is the 2nd oldest Kirkbride complex in Massachusetts.

The print is up for $2,499.00 right now, but I'm pretty sure that's a misprint since this seller's other photos are going for $24.99. She has some pretty cool photos for sale.

Taunton State Mental Hospital by Cyril Place Photography

GHOST EXPERIENCE FOR SALE: EBAY LISTING OF THE WEEK

This week a guy was selling his ghost "experience" on Ebay. He visited an abandoned mental asylum in Marlboro, NJ and recorded 30 minutes of audio in the hospital graveyard. The auction closed with 0 bids, but it's still worth checking out. There are a lot of photos of the buildings and some orb pictures around the headstones.

Here's a little bit about the place from his listing:

"Even its beginnings were tainted w death and suffering. The land the hospital sits on was originally a slaughterhouse/cattle farm. The owner was referred to as Old Man Sam. He was said to live in a house painted with blood, and used to hang slaughtered carcasses on the property to warn people away. The State wanted his land so they could build the hospital complex, but he refused their offers. They eventually just seized the land. Old Man Sam swore revenge. He eventually was driven insane and wound up as an inmate in the hospital. Years later he escaped and was never found. There have been many reports of a "Watcher" in these woods by the staff and patients, and many people believe this to be Old Man Sam. He doesn't move or make a sound, he just stands there, watching. If you turn for a second he disappears. It is said whenever someone would report seeing this Watcher in the woods, someone would turn up missing or dead within a short time of the sighting."