Preservation Alerts
The following historic state hospital sites are in danger of demolition, destruction, or some other sort of serious negative alteration:

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To some, the asylums of the 19th century represent a darker period in mental health care, with involuntary incarceration, barbaric and ineffective treatments, and abuse of patients.

However, there is also a legacy of progressive institutional treatment left by Dorothea Dix, Thomas Story Kirkbride, John Galt, and others represented by these buildings and sites. The sites that remain stand in monument to the successes and failures of these reforms and their efforts. The treatments and philosophies seem rather outdated and quant today, but at the time were a considered to be great improvement in the treatment of people perceived in need of psychiatric care.

A large proportion of these historic institutions are no longer psychiatric hospitals. What remains are the magnificent castle-like buildings wrought of brick and stone in incredible detail, a legacy of an attention to detail in architecture which seems to have been long forgotten.

Scope of this site: Presented here are hospitals which are still in operation, hospitals which are still standing but are now closed, hospitals that are still standing but are no longer used as hospitals, and hospitals that havebeen long since or recently demolished.

The largest and best-known institutions presented here (including the majority of the Kirkbride hospitals) were started by and run by state governments. Well-known examples of this type include Danvers State Insane Asylum in Massachusetts and Fergus Falls State Hospital in Minnesota. This site also institutions run by city and county governments (such as the numerous county asylums in Wisconsin, along with private institutions such as Brattleboro Retreat. Also included are state homes, instititions for the developmentally disabled, childrens' asylums, and institutions for the deaf and blind.

In addition to the psychiatric institutions, there are some medical hospitals and sanitariums, sanatoriums, poor farms, and prisons included in the site. These include certain Pennsylvania state hospitals, which in some cases are actually medical hospitals, and not psychiatric institutions at all. Although a few of these might be included in this site (especially where they share locations with insane asylums), the focus of this site is not on these types of facilities. Note: This site is not yet complete: there are a lot of asylums that have not been added yet.

Architects:: The architects of these buildings include H.H. Richardson, George Kessler, Samuel Sloan, Gordon W. Lloyd, Stephen Vaughn Shipman (who designed several), state capitol architect Elijah E. Myers, Ward P. Delano, Isaac Perry, John Notman, Frederick Law Olmsted (landscapes and grounds), A.J. Davis, H.W.S. Cleveland, Edward O. Fallis, Warren Dunnell, Charles C Rittenhouse, Richard Karl AugustKletting, John A. Fox, and others. Dr. Thomas Story Kirkbride, while not an architect, devised the basic floor plan many of these architects used in the design of their main asylum buildings.

Sanitariums: To most, the word "sanitarium" currently has identical meaning to "insane asylum". However, a century ago, the typical sanitarium was most likely a hospital or residential health spa. Some historic sanitariums were state-run tuberculosis hospitals, and a few were actually insane asylums. In this site, the term "sanitorium" tends to be reserved for the TB institutions. The most famous historic sanitarium was the Kellogg Sanitarium in Battle Creek, Michigan. This sanitarium was of the hospital/health spa variety,and was depicted in the film and book "The Road to Wellville". Kellogg's corn flakes were invented at this institution. Several historic sanitariums are included at the end of the listings for each state.

Type of Information Presented: This site contains scores of historic asylum postcard images, along with many other photos (historic and modern). Most of the pages contain postcard images or photos, while some of the pages contain only text at this time.

Also included are some architect or planner sketches of the hospitals as they were supposed to look (drawn before construction), and the intended floor plans.

Some photos or other renditions of famous figures from this part of mental health history are included with the entry for the institution that the person was associated with.

These hospitals with their imposing main buildings are quickly vanishing from the American landscape.

You can read more about Thomas Story Kirkbride inThe Art of Asylum-Keeping : Thomas Story Kirkbride and the Origins of AmericanPsychiatry

See the following historic images of historic state hospitals from across the nation (states and territories). Hospitals that are known for sure to be Kirkbride hospitals are indicated with an asterisk *. The images include photographs, sketches, and floor plans. Note: Image sizes range from 30K to over 300K: these larger ones may take some time to load.

Terminology and Names
Over the years, factors such as changes in the mission of the state hospital, changes in philosophy, and even changes in terminology has left these facilities with many names. Some state hospitals have had several names, and it seems like any institution that lasted from the 19th century into the 20th century had at least one name change.
Examples of Names (tending from earlier to recent)

• Lunatic Hospital
• Lunatic Asylum
• Asylum for the Insane
• Insane Asylum
• State Hospital
• Mental Health Center
• Psychiatric Hospital
• Regional Center
• Retreat
• Developmental Center
• Center

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Key to Symbols

Starred entries have a lot of information; at least four images and/or substantial text.

Type: Kirkride Entries with this symbol of a large building with a tall central wing and wings attached on either side in a symmetric fashion are known Kirkbride hospitals.

Entries with this symbol areasylums based on a plan of scattered cottages. Hospitals which started as Kirkbride, but later added cottages are included under the Kirkbride category above instead of this cottage category.

Entries with this symbol are asylums that consisted mainly of one single-wing building.

Entries with this symbol are asylums that consist of a large rambling building that is not on the Kirkbride plan.

Entries with this symbol have the main asylum building intact (or mostly intact), or the cottages pretty much remain in the case of cottage-based hospitals. Preserved hospitals canstill be in use as psychiatric hospitals, used for another purpose, or abandoned.

Entries with this symbol are in danger of demolition at this time.

Entries with this symbol are asylums of which little remains

Entries with this symbol are for asylums that have lost their most significant historic structures, but many of the other buildings and the grounds remain.

Entries with this symbol are for asylums buildings that are currently undergoing some sort of remodeling or renovation.

Institution entries with this symbolhave "Asylum Tourist" information, with information on museums at statehospitals (and former state hospitals) and other sites open to the public,and general information on viewing the sites. The "Asylum Tourist"entries also include information on publicly-viewable asylumsites NOT worth seeing, and why.

Intrusion at psychiatric institutions, residences, and hospitals which are still in operation is strongly discouraged (along with any sort of trepassing at any place where entry or exploration is prohibited or illegal).The privacy and treatment of the residents and patients must be respected. This also includes former institutions which have been converted to another residential use.

This symbol, prison bars, represents institutions that have now become prisons.

This symbol represents institutions which have now become colleges.