1,944 Comments for Worcester State Hospital

My family is from Mass, My grand father died in a TB hospital, a step grand father died in a scitso (sp) hospital, I cant find either, my family says Worcester mass, or Rutland mass.

Now , not only are many mentally ill folks homeless (thanks Saint Reagan!!), we are also seeing many psychotic folks placed in nursing homes and prisons which dosn't benefit anyone involved. The lucky ones are in residential settings, but when they have a break, good luck finding a psych bed. The old hospitals were far from perfect, but it seems in roughly 20 years we have gone from too many psych beds to not enough. Welcome to 3rd world USA. Happy 4th y'all, and let's not even talk about all the young war vets coming home with PTSD and worse.

Devin, energy still lingers ins some of thses places...sometimes positive, sometimes, well...That said, back in '66 Wifred gave a great wiffle cut when I was there. Very nice barber!

I think those are records on the floor too. But there are small like 45s except they don't have the large center hole. They may be 7" LPs, or 7" vinyl 78s. The one is warped in a way that suggests it is vinyl. There were vinyl 16-RPM discs made for Muzak machines in the late 50s-early 60s -- possible.

Purple chair,
purple chair.

I only want to see you sitting in the purple chair.

The painting and the American Eagle decal on the piano are not original to the piece. That is a style known as "antiquing" which became popular in the late 50s-70s. A base coat of light beige was used and then the darker streaks were brushed on lightly over top of that. It was intended to resemble old Pennsylvania Dutch, Shaker, Early American painted furniture that was done usually with milk-paint (home-made paint made from milk or other protein-base substances) and the old furniture often has a streaked look that was mimicked in this piano. The decal was added after the paint was dry and maybe varnished over. A couple of the stars are missing.

The piano looks like an early 20th-century upright. Before it was antiqued it likely had a mahogany, walnut, or quarter-sawn oak veneer. The uneven level of the keys indicates that there are broken hammers and levers and the whole action is likely frozen.

The "racked" square in the door above the knob is an old repair...
It's called a "Dutchman"

The detail is amazing. WOW! love this picture

Gorgeous! Great work and Happy Easter, Motts and All!

Interesting how tax credits meant to stimulate the restoration of this structure could be diverted and sold as if they were an open market commodity. It appears that somebody's pockets have become well lined in that situation and this structure will now meet its demise.

Interesting how tax credits meant to stimulate the restoration of this structure could be diverted and sold as if they were an open market commodity. It appears that somebody's pockets have become well lined in that situation and this structure will now meet its demise.

wow! we have scales like that at my work. very old, i believe the manufactorer is Toledo

the cages from the ceiling were used to spin people in. normal people would get dizzy, the "insane" wouldn't.

i found that out 10 minutes ago simply by reading the intro page of this location.

i would love to buy this, too (if i had the $) and build my own mansion!

Thanks; it is a baffling decision to tear down the clock tower. This structure and even the old wing that were standing were in decent shape - seemed like prime candidates for preservation to me.

When they hauled away the fire damaged parts of the Kirkbride building in the 1990s, the gaping holes that led to the other parts of the building were carefully paved with original stone, and it all looked pretty damn good. I mean it didn't look like the typical "abandoned eyesore" that most people despise. I really thought these remnants would be around for a long time... I guess that stone work was all for naught.