you can hear them in the halls at night...
April 16, 2005 8:05 AM   Subscribe

This post got me thinking about a couple of places on Long Island, NY, that are pretty scary. The Kings Park Psychiatric Center, for example. I've been there at night, and I tell you, knowing some of the history, it's terrifying. It's also strangely beautiful.
posted by exlotuseater (16 comments total)
 
Growing up a half mile from here (Smithtown), I can vouch for its creepiness. Today they are trying to convert it to a housing development, what a surprise. The town isn't wild about it, since it would mean hundreds more kids in their overcrowded schools.

My first day of learning to drive was up and down the empty streets there. Seemed like a great idea, but the cops actually pulled me over, license and registration, the whole thing. Reading the second link, I see that road is now open to traffic.

The land it sits on is wonderful, and it's a shame everyone can't get their acts together and figure out what to do with it (college, magnet school, golf course, catering hall, movie theaters, homes, waterfront shops.... all would fit inside the 800 acres.) The whole place is just a real shame... and creepy as hell.

My friends growing up and I never had the nerve to bust into any of the buildings, or get out of our cars for that matter... I'm sure this link will spook them good.

What creeps me out the most is that 15 years ago, the place just closed. I always wonder how many of the patients were just kicked out to live in Kings Park (would explain a LOT), or roam the grounds, waiting for a bunch of a kids driving around with slurpees and nothing to do to, and.......

Boo.
posted by sdrawkcab at 9:18 AM on April 16, 2005


I went there once, while working for the Parks Dept. We were sent to scavenge for stuff, whatever we could find. I went all through the place, but it was pretty well picked-over. The atmosphere was creepy, knowing that it was a psyc center, but over all it was just a decrepit, decaying, old building. I remember one room where the walls were covered in paintings, probably by the patients, of all kinds of stuff. Nothing macabre, it looked like childrens paintings.
posted by recurve at 9:28 AM on April 16, 2005


I remember a reality show that MTV had years ago called "Fear", in which they put a half dozen dopey high-school kids in ababndoned facilities like this (maybe they even used this place?) and had them spend the night there. All the episodes were at places reputed to be haunted, and the kids would have to go on "challenges", mainly walking around dark, empty buildings with only a flashlight and a camera to record their horror.

I always moan about both MTV and reality television, but that show was absolutely riveting.
posted by zardoz at 9:30 AM on April 16, 2005


"strangely beautiful," indeed! eek.
posted by LouReedsSon at 9:33 AM on April 16, 2005


Is there a way to get into it? I would be down for an excursion if anyone in the NYC/LI area wants to.
posted by spicynuts at 10:06 AM on April 16, 2005


spicynuts: the grounds are "open" in the sense that you can park on the street and just wander around; they do have security / night people roving around (one guy, I think) and they do prosecute for trespassing.

That said, I'll be back on LI for the better part if the summer, so...
posted by exlotuseater at 10:26 AM on April 16, 2005


you can get into it, but that may involve avoiding security guards. The only time I did it, there were guards patrolling the exterior grounds. I don't know if that was an irregular occurrence or what.
posted by shmegegge at 10:27 AM on April 16, 2005


Hmmmm...well I'm at least open to discussing it.
posted by spicynuts at 11:05 AM on April 16, 2005


From the Essex Mountain Sanatorium...'course that was for TB, primarily - so points off for that.
Much of it gone, but lots of fog-shrouded pictures and other artifacts here.
posted by nj_subgenius at 11:14 AM on April 16, 2005


I used to work as a human alarm system for, shall we say, a large midwestern university, prowling around in the dead of night checking doors and looking for leaks. A part of its medical sciences building was disused and abandoned with a large "gas chamber" used for research and a small opearting theatre. The place was extremely creepy with the abandoned old eqiuipment and the heavy pressure-seal door. I think the human mind is quite capable of creating its own ghosts.
posted by KirkJobSluder at 12:41 PM on April 16, 2005


places like that make me shiver and think of Silent Hill and Silent Hill 2.

I cant help thinking the places are trashed by the "ghosts" of the people that died there. Its the way things are odly stacked or placed that does it. (and yes i do realise its kids getting high not ghosts)
posted by lemonfridge at 2:21 PM on April 16, 2005


I hung out in a lot of scary places on Long Island, but I wouldn't go near Kings Park. The place gives me the creeps.

We stuck to the generic urban legend fare (like the Virgin Mary grave), mostly on the North Shore.

Great links - they make me think of Session 9.
posted by grey_flap at 4:37 PM on April 16, 2005


MARY'S GRAVE!!!! omg. grey_flap, it's good to meet someone who knows about mary's grave.
posted by exlotuseater at 5:24 PM on April 16, 2005


This reminds me a lot of the old Buffalo State Hospital, designed by HH Richardson (and mostly abandoned for years now).

It always drove me nuts that, living practically on top of it, they had made it damn near impossible to get inside.
posted by Kellydamnit at 6:33 PM on April 16, 2005


Very cool post, exlotuseater. Hip.
posted by Shane at 10:50 PM on April 16, 2005


Ack, yes, Silent Hill and Session 9. Nothing like an abandoned hospital, or better, asylum.
posted by dreamsign at 10:18 PM on April 22, 2005


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