Worcester State Hospital

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Also Known As THE WORCESTER LUNATIC Asylum. It opened in 1833, but by the 1870s, it had become inadequate for the state's needs. It was proprosed that contrsuction start on a brand new asylum - a grouping of much smaller, decentralized buildings. However, this was rejected, and a new, massive building was erected. It was designed by architect Ward P. Delano. Completed in 1877, the total cost reached well over one million dollars.

A boarded up Worcester State Hospital


In 1901 a satellite facility which became the Grafton State Hospital was opened in nearby Grafton, Massachusetts to give non-violent patients an opportunity to engage in therapeutic work in a rural environment.Overcrowding soon became a problem, and Merrick Bemis, the superintendent at the time, called for the construction of a new asylum. A massive structure was to be laid out in the Kirkbride Plan and located on Belmont Street. Construction began in 1870 and the newly built Worcester State Hospital was completed in 1876 at the cost of well over a million dollars. Designed by architect Ward P. Delano of the firm Fuller & Delano of Worcester, the flagstone and brick building stood four stories tall, and between the 500-foot (150 m) wings stood a clock tower, looming above the administration building. The building seems to reflect more of a prison complex in the styles, layout, and sheer size of the institution.

 A massive fire at Worcester State Hospital on July 22, 1991, destroyed almost all of the building's roof as well as the wards, save for the right most wing and the administration building. The hospital still functions as a psychiatric facility in Worcester, Massachusetts.
People have heard screams coming from the building. Could the screams be from patients who died there? It is also said that there are blood stains on the walls of the building. 

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