Tuesday, October 4, 2016
The Knoxville Iowa VA Medical Center was originally constructed in 1892 as the State Industrial Home for the Blind. It was soon transformed into the State Hospital for Inebriates and accepted its first patients on January 18, 1906. This faciliy was short-lived, however, and was closed by 1908. The US Veterans Bureau acquired the property in 1922 and constructed additional buildings here to serve veterans of WWI and later expansions were constructed for veterans of subsequent wars. As with all such psychiatric institutions, however, long-term housing of patients began to dwindle throughout the later half of the 20th century. In the early 2000's, the VA began looking at closing this facility and within a few years it was empty.
We explored 9 of the buildings on this large campus and all of the tunnels which connected them. According to my comrade's smart device, this included over 6 miles of walking (indoors) and countless stairwells by the time it was over. What we found inside was rather disappointing, however. It seems the organization which owns the site, while being notoriously inefficient in many other areas, was quite efficient at cleaning the place out. As a result, there wasn't much to see other than hallways and empty rooms. There are about 9 individual buildings represented in the below photos.
NOTE: For nearly 10 years, I called this location "Government Health Campus". I have since updated this post to reflect the site's real name and history. It was recently demolished.
Thursday, April 7, 2016
Rockland Psychiatric Center was originally opened in 1927 with over 5,000 beds. At its peak, it housed over 9,000 psychiatric patients with a staff of 2,000. Along with most other psychiatric hospitals, new medicines and specialized treatments came into favor by the 1970's and these took the place of more controversial treatments such as Electro-Shock therapy and Pre-Frontal Lobotomies. These new treatment methods resulted in better recovery thus increasing discharge rates and greatly reducing the need for such a high capacity of patients in such massive campuses.
Click here for video.
This is part five of an epic 7 part, 2,600 mile, road trip.
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