While it is currently a park, Snake Hill has been the site of a variety of different institutions over its history. An almshouse was located here, and several hospitals and a penitentiary. Most famously, Snake Hill was the site of a huge lunatic asylum. Many of those who died while inmates of the asylum still lay in the ground here in unmarked and unidentified graves. Continue reading
This state-funded school and hospital center was at the heart of the human rights movement that revolutionized this country’s approach to healthcare for the mentally and physically handicapped. This facility was one of the most striking examples of the maltreatment that was characteristic of such institutions––at one point, papers labeled it “The Shame of the Pennsylvania”. And the legacy of all this suffering might just be the lingering spirits that are said to still wander its abandoned wards today. Continue reading
For many decades, rumors of ghosts haunting the grounds of Overbrook have been in circulation. If these ghosts are in fact present, one must wonder – how many of those troubled souls met their end while freezing to death within the walls of the institution charged with caring for their well being?
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