5,961 Comments for Kings Park Psychiatric Center

Happy Birthday Ed. I'll be 37 in three weeks. Where's my Ben-Gay and Geritol? Oh, here they are, right next to my beer...

Holy Shit, I'm 34 today!!(see what reading your comments will do Mr. Motts!!) ;-)

FYI, that's called a Bradley Shower. Designed to save water, while giving more people a chance to shower. Sadly, didn't do much for privacy.

Just looking at this makes me want cookies

One of the things you have to consider is the fact that back in those days (50-60 years ago and beyond) there wasn't much in the way of social services. Hell, there wasn't really even any Special Education classes for children who had emotional problems or mental handicaps. So, if a child had issues, the only options were to stay home with family all day, every day, or to be institutionalized. If a child requires assistance 'round the clock, that is very taxing on the family. Also, if one were to seek outside assistance, that woud be very expensive. Nowadays there are medicaid programs that can pay for the assistance, then, there was no such thing, so many parents felt their hands were tied. Add that to the social stigma attached to having a child that was "not right in the head" or "feeble minded" and you get mass institutionalization.

Just looking at this, I can smell a thousand half eaten meals being steamed off metal trays.

And I can add a hearty "amen" to this!

this was therapy for patients

There was some, nothing too crazy... when I revisited 7 at the beginning of this year there was a lot more graffiti (unfortunately in the morgue), and I imagine in many other places; didn't really see the whole building that time.

painting was done by patients as a form of therapy

not an uncommon site to see if you have worked in a state facility....it's better than throwing another person!

as student nurses we dissected cats and other animals

Where I never broke one myself, I've seen others do it. You get a large rock and throw it at the screen. Upon impact, it makes a loud noise with gray dust particles flying around.

The set pictured here I'll wager was made between '58 and '63. Older sets have a more rounded screen. Newer sets have a UHF channel selector.

looks like this room is slowly being eaten by the darkness, or dark mold...

Suicide notes look a lot different, generally speaking. Someone just quoted a beautiful poem written at the turn of the last century by Mr. Swinburne. It's a fairly well-known poem.