According to paranormal researchers, Pennhurst Asylum is one of the most haunted places in Pennsylvania, if not the United States.
Ghost hunting has become a sort of cottage industry around the property, and there’s even a Pennhurst Paranormal Association.
Their tagline is “They lived here, died here, and are still here.”
But before we get into the haunted stuff, we have to talk a little bit about our setting.
Pennhurst Asylum itself is a beautiful, sprawling campus of about 20 buildings. The older buildings are red brick with granite and terra cotta trimmings, making them quite striking.
The facility was built to be almost entirely self-sufficient, with a power plant, farmland, and other facilities on the property.
For things that they could not provide for themselves, it was serviced by a private rail line that brought supplies from the outside world.
Many of the buildings are connected by underground fire-proof tunnels to make moving patients around easier, like many similar facilities of the era.
The buildings were designed with small rooms for 2 or 3 people, but within four years of its opening, Pennhurst was already overcrowded due to pressure to admit immigrants, orphans, and criminals.
Residents were classified into three categories: mental—imbecile or insane, physical—epileptic or healthy, and dental—good, poor, or treated.
In 1913, the Pennsylvania Legislature appointed a Commission for the Care of the Feeble-Minded, which stated that the disabled were “unfit for citizenship” and recommended a program of custodial care, meaning that Pennhurst would become even more overcrowded.
By the mid-60s, the asylum housed 2.791 people – 900 more than the facility could comfortably accommodate.
Most of these patients were children, and despite the facility’s label as a “school”, only 200 of the residents were in any kind of art, education, or recreational programs that could have helped improve their condition, though many were high-functioning enough to improve with such care.
The facility had only 9 medical doctors and 11 teachers on staff, none of whom had special education training.
Bullying was rampant and unpoliced, and it was thought that this was the real reason for the many “accidental” deaths and suicides that occurred.
