In our last communication from the grave, we promised a report on a tantalizing trip we made earlier this year to a place the curious love to go. Everyone loves a wreck~~an old abandoned place that people and time have forgotten. That is not limited to cemeteries, but extends to grand old buildings that were once prominent citizens in their community. One such gracious, and tragic, entity is Danvers State Hospital; Danvers, Massachusetts.

Many people, over the past twenty-plus years since the facility was closed, have ventured there illegally as trespassers to roam the enormous old building and get a glimpse of 19th century ‘modern’ medical treatment. The Gravestone Girls were quite fortunate to have the acquaintance of a construction foreman who knew our love for all things old and broken, and granted our wish to visit the remains of the estate.

On a cold January Saturday, late in the afternoon, we drove up the long, winding driveway of 450 Maple Street to visit the old ghost on the hill. Much of the facility had already been demolished and new condos had risen in their place. The only remaining structure was the main Kirkwood Building. Named for the original design architect, who conceived and constructed a central building with long side buildings attached (like horizontal flying buttresses) that formed ‘bat wings’. How fitting for an insane asylum. Seems someone had a sense of humor in 1878. In fact, that design style was repeatedly used for these torture houses---ahem, treatment centers---around the country throughout the mid-late 19th century, the peak of asylum construction.

We had the distinct fortune to be able to roam the building quite freely. One room dropped off quite suddenly to the infamous ‘catacombs’ below. Problem—no flashlight and no way to get back up to the first floor once you dropped down below ground level. OK, so no dark and dirty visits to be made that day. However, we did collect artifact scraps as souvenirs of our journey. In a kitchen, there now sits a bowl which contains pieces of the Danvers Kirkwood building bricks, mint green bathroom tile, broken glass, and other assorted goodies.

We could go on and on about the beauty and tragedy of the demise of this fabulous creature. However, we will let the photos speak for themselves and move on to the cemetery.

More Photos Here!

Heading away from the building, we visited the hospital cemetery. Patients who died while in the care of DSH were interred in one of two cemeteries on the grounds. We visited the first location and met patients 1 thru 672 who encountered their end in the old wards. When you died at DSH, your remains made the final walk on a path from the infirmary down the hill to the cemetery for chronological burial in the cemetery. You were provided with a small concrete stop-sign shaped marker that identified you by your patient number, and lost your name to history.

It’s been more than 40 years since anyone was laid to rest in those cemeteries. Over that time, nothing was done to tend the grounds and its inhabitants. In 2001 a group of former patients and patient family members cleaned up the grounds and worked to put names and identities to those marker numbers. Visit the DSMC. The stop-sign markers were pulled up and neatly stacked on the outside ridge of the property where they sit today, waiting to be stolen or vandalized. Somehow we are confused at how this is preservation. Admirable effort on cleanup, however, incomplete. New markers were put down which restored identity with a full name, birth date and death date.

A rummage thru the leaves gave us plenty of photo ops of gravestones in their wooded habitat. Close inspection of our shots upon developing them revealed we quite accidentally photographed the gravestone of DSH patient #444, made famous by the 2001 horror movie Session 9. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not.

We ran out of daylight much too soon and all construction vehicles were ordered off the property at sundown. Reluctantly we departed with our treasures, photos and memories.

We could tell you that something strange and unearthly happened to us that day. We could tell you we saw ghosts in the windows where glass should be. We could lie about the paranormal and preternatural that is supposed to haunt that hill. Truth be told, we needed no such supernatural sightings to convince us of the beauty and the sorrow that resides in that property. DSH is the product of an age that forged ahead its knowledge of the human mind at a staggering rate for the time. Much of it was right, very much of it was wrong for the people who were subjected to the medicinal miracles of the day. It was all contained in a building that spanned over 100 years. It speaks. You hear what you want to.

We will leave you with one image captured by a visitor to another old New England 19th century mental health facility for your consideration. I didn’t have to be told what I was seeing.

The greatest tragedy of this story is that shortly after our visit, the last of DSH (and some of its newly built life) burned to the ground in the middle of the night. Perpetrators unknown. Perhaps that creature was tired and just didn’t want to continue its march through our new century.

Photo credit: http://www.newenglandcuriosities.com/

Memento Mori!

The Gravestone Girls -
Putting the 'Rave' Back in Grave